“Old fellow, you are crazy!” said I, casting a timid look at the wooden god; “it is the light of the candles flickering about him.” At the same time a queer feeling came over me as I followed the old man out of the Bacchus-cellar. Was it really the light of the candles, was it an illusion what I saw? Did he not nod to me with his little round pate, did he not put out one of his chubby legs and shake and writhe with secret laughter? I ran after the old man and walked close behind him.
“Now to the twelve Apostles,” I said to him. He did not reply; shaking his head dubiously he walked on. There were two or three steps to ascend from the large cellar into a small one, into the subterranean heavens, the seat of the blessed, where abide the twelve Apostles. What are ye, vaults and sepulchres of royal families, beside these catacombs! Place coffin by coffin, laud upon black marble the merits of the man who sleeps below, employ a garrulous keeper in garments of mourning, let him praise the unspeakable greatness of this dust or of that, let him relate the marvellous virtues of a prince who fell at such and such a battle, the exquisite beauty of a princess upon whose sarcophagus the virgin’s myrtle twines with the bursting rosebud—it will remind you of mortality, it may cost you a tear; but can it touch you like this bed-chamber of a century, this resting-place of a glorious race? There they lie in their dark-brown coffins devoid of ornament and frippery. No marble boasts of their silent merits, their inconspicuous virtue, their excellent character; but what man with a heart for virtue of this sort does not feel himself stirred when the old custodian, this keeper of the catacombs, this sexton of the subterranean church, places his candles upon the coffins and lets the light fall upon the illustrious names of the great dead! Like royal heads, these too have no long title and surname; in noble simplicity their names appear upon the brown coffins. There is Andrew, here John, in yonder corner Judas, in this Peter. Who is not touched when he is then told that there lies the noble one of Nierenstein, born 1718; here he of Rüdesheim, born 1726. To the right Paul, to the left James, the good James!
“Good-night, ye old lords of the Rhine; good-night. And if there is anything I can do for you, fiery Judas, or you, gentle Andrew, or you, dear John, come, come to me.”
“Lord of Heaven!” the old man interrupted me, slamming the door and turning the key. “Are you intoxicated already by the few drops you had, that you should thus tempt the devil? Don’t you know that the wine-spirits arise this night, and visit each other, as they always do on the 1st of September? And should I lose my place thereby, I shall run off and leave you if you speak such words again. It is not yet twelve o’clock, but at any moment one of them might come creeping out of his cask and frighten us to death with a hideous grimace.”
“Stop your foolish prattle, old fellow, and be comforted. I will not say another word to wake your wine-spirits. But now take me to the Rose.”
We walked on; we entered a vault, the rose-garden of Bremen. There she lay, old Rose, bulky, tremendous, with an air of commanding sovereignty. What an enormous cask! and every bumper worth its weight in gold! 1615! Where are the hands that planted thee? Where are the eyes that revelled in thy bloom. Where are the happy folks that exulted when thou, noble grape, wert cut upon the heights of the Rhinelands, when thou wert pulled and thy golden flood burst into the tub? They are gone, like the waves of the river that bathed the foot of thy vineyard.
“There, and now good-night, Frau Rose!” said the old servant pleasantly. “Now, good-night, and God bless you; here, this way, sir, not around that corner; this is the way out of the cellar. Here, come, do not run against those casks; I will hold the candle.”
“No, indeed, old chap,” I said; “the joke is only just beginning. All this was but a foretaste. Bring me two or three bottles of your choicest of ’22 in the large room yonder.”
He stood there with eyes wide open, the poor fool. “Sir,” he said solemnly, “put it out of your mind. I will not stay with you for love or money.”
“Who told you to stay with me? Put the wine where I tell you, and, in God’s name, go along with you.”