Justly do the sons of that time boast of the men of the Landwehr who readily answered to the call; but not less was the zeal with which the people at home laboured after the command was given for the war. People of every calling, every citizen, the smallest places, the moat distant districts, bore their part in the work, often undergoing the greatest labours and sufferings, especially those on the frontiers. A simple arrangement sufficed for the business in the circles; a military commission was formed of two landed proprietors, one citizen and one yeoman, the landrath of the circle, and the burgomaster of the capital of the circle, were almost always the almost zealous members of it. It was undoubtedly an occupation for simple men which was adapted to awaken extraordinary powers. They had to deal with the remains of the French army, with their hunger and typhus, with the thronging Russians who for many months were in a doubtful position, with two languages, that of their new friends being more strange to them than that of their retreating enemies; and, added to this, the coarseness and wildness of their new allies, whose subaltern officers were for the most part no better than their soldiers, lusting after brandy, and at least as rapacious and more brutal than irregular troops. Soon did the commissioners learn how to deal with the wild people; tobacco chests stood open, together with clay pipes, in the office room: it was an endless coming and going of Russian officers, they filled their pipes and smoked, demanded brandy, and received harmless beer. If ever the coarseness of the strangers broke out, the Prussian officials at last learnt to punish the ill-behaved with their own weapons, the kantschu, which perhaps a Russian officer had left him, that he might more easily manage his people. The last typhus sufferers of the French still filled the hospitals of the city, the Baschkirs bivouacked with their felt caps in the market-place; the inhabitants quarrelled with the foreigners quartered on them; every day the Russians required the necessaries of life and transport, couriers; Russian and Prussian officers demanded relays of horses, the cultivators and peasants of the neighbouring villages complained that they had been deprived of theirs, that no ploughboys were to be found, and that the cultivation of the land was impossible. In the midst of all this hurly-burly came the orders of their own government, strong and dictatorial, as was required by the times, and not always practical, which was natural in such haste; the cloth-makers were to furnish cloth, the shoe-makers shoes, the harness-makers and saddlers cartouche-boxes and saddles; so many hundred pair of boots and shoes, so many hundred pieces of cloth, and so many saddles, all in one short week, without money or secure bills of exchange. The artisans were for the greater part poor people without credit; how was the raw material to be obtained, how was the workman to be paid, how were the means of life to be obtained in these weeks in which the usual chance profit was lost? This did not go on for one week, but for a whole year. Truly the spirit of sacrifice which showed itself in gifts, and in the offer of their own lives, was among the highest and noblest things of this great time; but not less honourable was the self-sacrificing, unpretending, and unobserved fulfilment of duty of many thousands of the lower classes, who, each in his sphere in the city or in the village, worked for the same idea of his State to the uttermost of his own powers.
The question is still unsolved of the military importance, in a civilised country, of a levée en masse. The law for the establishment of this popular force was carried to the very last possibility of demand. In the first edict, the 21st of April, there was an almost fanatical strictness, which, in the subsequent laws of the 24th of July, was much mitigated. The edict exercised a great moral effect; it was a sharp admonition to the dilatory, that it was a question for all, of life or death. It had an imposing effect even upon the enemy by its Draconic paragraphs. But it was, immediately after its appearance, severely blamed by impartial judges, because it demanded what was impossible, and it had no great practical effect. The Prussians had always been a warlike people, but in 1813 they had not the military capacity which they have now. Besides the standing army, there were, before the introduction of the universal obligation of service, only the peaceful citizens without any practice in arms or movement of masses, or at the utmost, the old shooting guilds which handled the ancient shooting weapons. But now the nation had sent into the field all who were capable of fighting; the strength of the country was strained to the uttermost; every family had given up what they possessed of military spirit. The older men, who remained behind, who were also indispensable for the daily work of the field and workshop, were not especially capacitated to do valiant service in arms. Thus it was no wonder that this fearful law brought to light the ludicrous side of the picture; endless goodwill together with boorishness and narrowmindedness. It was read with great edification, that the whole people were to take up arms to withstand the invading enemy; that the women and children also were to be employed in certain occupations, was quite to the reader's mind, especially those who were not grown up; but doubts were excited by the sentence in which it was stated, that cowardice was to be punished by the loss of weapons, the doubling of taxes, and corporeal chastisement, as he who showed the feeling of a slave was to be treated as a slave. Then the poor little artisan, who could scarcely keep his children from hunger, had never touched a weapon, and had all his life anxiously avoided every kind of fighting, was placed in the position to put the difficult question wistfully to himself—what is cowardice? And when the law further forbade anyone in a city which was occupied by the enemy to visit any play, ball, or place of amusement, not to ring the bells, to solemnise no marriages, and to live as if in deepest mourning, it appeared to the unprejudiced minds of Germans as tyrannical—more Spanish and Polish than German.
Yet the people, in the enthusiasm of this spring-time, overlooked these hardships, and prepared themselves for the struggle. Even before the decree, patriotic feeling had, in East Prussia, established here and there similar rules. Now this zeal had spread through the cities more than in the open countries. The organisation began almost everywhere, and was carried through in many places. Beacons were erected, alarm poles rose high from Berlin to the Elbe, and towards Silesia resinous pines, on which empty tar-barrels were nailed, surrounded with tarred straw; near them a watch was posted, and they more than once did good service. All kinds of weapons were searched out, fowling-pieces and pistols, which had been cleverly foreseen in the ordinance when it directed that, "For ammunition, in case of a deficiency in balls, every kind of common shot may be used, and the possessors of fire-arms must have a constant provision of powder and lead." He who had no musket, furnished himself for the levy as the Landwehr did at first, with pikes; they were exercised in companies—the butchers, brewers, and farmers formed squadrons. The first rank of infantry were pikemen; the second and third, if possible, musketeers. In this also, the intellectual leaders of the people showed a good example; they knew well that it was necessary, but it was no easy matter for them, especially if they were no longer young. At Berlin, Savigny and Eichhorn were of the Landwehr committee; in the levy none was more zealous than Fichte; his pike, and that of his son, leant against the wall in the front hall, and it was a pleasure to see the zealous man brandishing his sword on the drill-ground, and placing himself in a posture of attack. They wished to make him an officer, but he declined with these words: "Here I am, only fit to be a common man." He, Buttmann, Rühs, and Schleiermacher drilled in the same company; but Buttmann, the great Greek scholar, could not quite distinguish between right and left; he declared that was most difficult. Rühs was in the same condition, and it constantly happened that the two learned men, in their evolutions, either turned their backs, or looked each other in the face puzzled. Once, when it was a question of an encounter with the enemy, and how a valiant man ought to conduct himself in that case, Buttmann listened, leaning sadly on his spear, and said at last: "It is very well for you to talk, you are of a courageous nature."[[53]]
If this Landsturm was to be mobilised for the maintenance of the security of the circle, or for service in the rear of the enemy, or in the neighbourhood of fortresses still held by them, the alarm bell was rung, and the town became in a state of stormy excitement. Anxiously did the women pack up food and drink, bandages and lint, in the knapsack, for according to the regulations no one was to forget the knapsack, bread-bag, and field-flask; it was his duty to carry with him provisions for three days; not unfrequently did the female inhabitants feel like the wife of a cutler in Burg, who stated to the commanding officer that her husband must remain behind, for he was the only cutler in the place, or like the wife of a watchmaker, who had compelled her husband to conceal himself. He was, however, traced by other women whose husbands had gone, was taken by them to the churchyard, placed on a grave, and punished in a maternal way with the palm of the hand.
Any one who was a child at that time, will remember the enthusiasm with which the boys also armed. The elder ones assembled together in companies, and armed themselves with pikes; the smaller ones, too, had good cudgels. A poor boy who was working in a manufactory was asked why he carried no weapon, "I have all my pockets full of stones," was his answer; he carried them about with him against the French.[[54]] And no regulation of the Landsturm ordinance was so zealously obeyed by the rising generation, as the provision that every Landsturmer should, if possible, carry a shrill-sounding pipe with him, in order to recognise others in the dark, and come to an understanding. By the greatest industry the boys learnt to produce shrill tones from every kind of signal pipe, and there is reason to believe that the present use of the pipe in street rows was first adopted by our youths from hatred to the French. Seldom were the Landsturm employed in military service in 1813; they were more often employed in clearing the districts of marauding rabble, and as watchers, or in the messenger service; their only serious military service against the enemy was performed at that Büren, which under Frederic II. had driven back its flying sons to the King's army. There, after the peace, all the men wore the military medal. Up to the present day the people retain the memory of this feature of the great war; it has been more enduring than many others of more importance. Still do old people boast that though not in the field, yet at home they had borne arms for the Fatherland; it also is fitting that their sons should remember it. The time may come when in another form, and with stricter discipline, the general armament of the people will be an important part of German military power.
But whilst here the dangerous game was not carried on in its terrible reality, yet all eyes and ears were incessantly directed to the distance. The war had begun in earnest. Those who were left behind were in continual anxiety concerning the fate of those they loved, and of Fatherland. No day passed without some report, no post came without the announcement of some important event; life seemed to fly amidst the longing and the expectation with which they looked forth beyond their city walls. Every little success filled them with transport; it was announced at the door of the town hall, in the church, and in the theatre, wherever men were collected together. On the 5th April was the conflict, at Zehdenick, the first undoubted victory of the Prussians; far and wide through the provinces did people hasten to the church towers to endeavour to descry the first intelligence; and when the thunder of cannon had ceased, and the joyful news ran through the country, there was no bounds to the general exultation; everything that was praiseworthy was proudly extolled, above all the valiant artillery that with guns and powder waggons had chased the enemy through the burning market-place of Leitzkau, amidst the flames that were gathering around them; also the black Hussars, with their death's-heads, valiant Lithuanians, who had ridden over the smart red Hussars from Paris at the first onset. And when the proprietor of the market-place afterwards made a collection through the newspapers for his poor people who had been burnt out, and excused himself for begging at such a time for aid to private misfortune, the country people were not forgotten who had first suffered from the war.
Louder became the din of war, more furious did the conflict of masses rage; the exultation of victory and fearful anxiety alternated in the hearts of those remaining at home. After the battle of Grossgörschen, it was proclaimed that assistance was needed for the wounded. Then there began everywhere among the people collections of linen and lint; unweariedly did not only children but grown-up people draw out the threads of old linen, the women cut bandages, and the teachers in schools cut the rags which the little girls and boys at their request brought with them from their homes, into shape, and whilst they taught the children, these with burning tears collected the pieces into great heaps. Making lint was the evening work of families; it might be of some use to the soldiers.
In the neighbourhood of the allied armies and in the chief cities, hospitals were erected, and everywhere the women assisted—court ladies, and authoresses like Rachel Levin. In one great hospital at Berlin there was Frau Fichte and Frau Reimer, the superintendents of the female nurses. The hospital, owing to the retreating French, had become a pest-house, bad nervous fevers were prevalent, and the strange fancies of the invalids made it a terrible abode. The wife of Fichte shuddered at these horrors, but he endeavoured to sustain her in his noble way. When she was overtaken with nervous fever, he nursed the invalid, caught the infection, and died. Reil also, the great physician and scholar, died there in the midst of his philanthropic efforts. Frau Reimer was preserved; her house had been, before the war, the resort of the Prussian patriots, now her husband had become one of the Landwehr under Putlitz; her anxieties about him and his business and her little children, neither damped her spirit nor engrossed her time; from morning to evening, spring and summer, she was actively occupied; never weary, she divided her time betwixt her family and her care of the sick, and her life appeared to herself indestructible.[[55]] To her husband, friends and contemporaries, this zeal seemed natural, and a matter of course. In a similar way did German women do their duty everywhere with the greatest self-denial and devotedness, and with quiet enduring energy.
The fearful battle of Bautzen took place; the armistice followed. The Prussians were full of uneasiness. Streams of blood had flowed, their army was driven back, the Emperor appeared invincible by earthly weapons. For some weeks the most intelligent looked gloomily at the future, but the people still maintained a right feeling of self-respect and elevated resolution. Trust in their own energy, and the goodness of their cause, and above all trust in God, were the source of this frame of mind. Every one saw that the strength of Prussia in this campaign was incomparably greater than in the last unfortunate war. Only a little more strength seemed to be necessary to overthrow the tyrant; if they could only make a little more exertion, he might be hurled back. The voluntary contributions continued, late in the autumn receipts were given for them. The equipment of the Landwehr was ended, the artisan had everywhere worked for his King and Fatherland.
The war again raged, blow and counterblow, flux and reflux; the armies pressed on; now one saw from Thurm the hosts of the enemy, now the approach of friends. The cities and provinces of the west learnt from Berlin and Breslau the fate of the war. Ah, its terrible features are not strange to Germans; up to the time of our fathers, the hearts of almost every generation of citizens have been shaken by them.