Read Ebook: De Gouden Vaas by Hoffmann E T A Ernst Theodor Amadeus Wasch Karel Johan Hendrik Translator

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Bright banner of Columbia, A fragment of the sky, Torn down with all thy glitt'ring stars-- Angelic blazonry! Stream onward, like the fiery cloud That hung o'er Egypt's sea, Terror and darkness to the proud, A light to guide the free.

Bright banner of Columbia! Thou glory'st not in blood; Yet, if the foe invade our land, The foe shall be withstood; A death-grasp shall his welcome be, A bloody turf his pillow, And on the battle-wave he'll find A tomb in every billow.

Dark banner of oppression, Droop o'er thy millions slain! All stained with floods of human gore, Thou ne'er shalt wave again; Save when the wail of misery, The orphan's plaintive cry, And the widow's moan amid thy folds, Shall breathe in agony.

But thou, my country's banner, Unstained by guilt or crime, Shalt wave o'er every tyrant-flag, Until the end of time: For Peace lies nestling in thy wings, And each emblazoned star Sheds down its sweetest influence To heal the wounds of war.

Then wave thou on for ages, O'er mountain, lake and sea, For God has stamped upon thy folds His word--ETERNITY. Yet when the earth's by thee forsaken, No mortal shall weep o'er thee, For the dread Archangel's trump shall be The requiem of thy glory.

Then, banner of my country, Shalt thou be upward borne, To gild again thy native skies, From which thou once wert torn; For thy earthly mission's over, To the dust oppression's hurled; Thou'st struck to none but a deathless power, 'Mid the wrecks of a falling world.

Avena.

STORY AND SENTIMENT, OR, CONVERSATIONS WITH A MAN OF TASTE AND IMAGINATION.

No. 3.

A NIGHT AT THE FARM HOUSE.

This tale is in the hand writing of my friend.

I found my host a well bred, sensible fellow, somewhat free in the use of provincialisms, and not wanting in love to a good broad-faced joke; somewhat witty withal, and a memory in which he had stored many an odd story, some good and some bad, which stories he told with a tolerably good grace.

I pause here to record my observations on one of the peculiarities in the New England character--I mean its modesty. Foreigners, and residents of other parts of this widely extended territory may talk of Yankee impudence, but for the life of me, in all my wanderings, I could never find the genuine modesty of a native New Englander. They may cheat you--that is, some of them may, some of their outlawed, who with trunk and tin wagon travel into other States to prey on the unwary; but where turn you and find not some, who do and ever will disgrace the soil that nursed them? For New England I claim no entire exemption; perfection is not beneath the sun: but there is more of it here than elsewhere--and in proof of it I adduce, their superior sagacity, their nobler intelligence. Where intelligence is found, will you find least of the weaknesses of human nature.

But to return: having bid Bessy, a short, flaxen-haired, chubby-cheeked damsel, of about fourteen, the very image of her father, bring him a cup of cider; and poking our chairs close into the fire--so close that the wind which came down chimney, would now and then puff out the smoke and curl it up about mine host's neck and shoulders, making him look for all the world like Vulcan peeping through the clouds of his own smithy--he began as follows.

'Late last March and on one of the coldest nights in my memory, my wife and me were startled by a loud knock at the door, about nine o' the clock; and more so by the abrupt entrance of a stranger, who had been as it seems just ceremonious enough to knock, but not sufficiently so to wait until bidden a welcome. Marching directly up to the fire he doffed his cap, and then in a bland, gentle voice, and the language of a gentleman, prayed our pardons for his boldness, and craved our hospitality.

'Now Biddy here is not the most hospitable in her feelings, but even she was softened by the coldness of the weather, and the soft accents of the stranger. So, bidding him welcome and placing before him such entertainment as we best could, he ate his meal and then sat himself down--right where you are, sir, at this moment--as if for conversation.

'His age, I should think, was about forty five. In person he was strikingly handsome, yet care-worn; his hair was black--his eyes likewise, and a somewhat cynical curl about his small mouth made you hesitate to address him, thinking he was perhaps a person of strong prejudices. His skin was as fair as a girl's; a fine set of teeth were displayed when he smiled; in short, his appearance was such that I should have taken him, perhaps, for a scholar; for, though his dress was rich it was careless, and there was a sort of method in what he said though the subjects were simple, as I am told is ever found in men of education. At first, he was very taciturn.

"You find it a cold air, sir," said I, breaking the silence.

"Yes--yes, sir."

"You've ridden far?"

"Yes--yes, sir."

"You're come from the south, eh?"

"Yes--yes, sir."

"You're not from York, I guess?"

"Yes--yes, sir."

'Well, thinks I, you may be a scholar for aught I know, but hang me! if I think there's much variety in your talk.

'I took him on another tack.

"You have, at least, sir, come where hearts are warm, and hospitality is proffered cheerfully."

'He started at this; a gentle flush tinged his cheek; and he seemed struck with an ingenuous consciousness of his want of courtesy. Turning to me he took my hand in his, and pressing it, replied--

'There was something so earnest, yet unstudied; so easy, yet solemn, and 'heart-twinging,' to use a phrase of Biddy's, in this, that both she and me began to water about the eyes like two babies.

'Returning the kind pressure of his hand, I said--

"But you are young, sir--too young to feel that life has no claims upon--"

"Too old--too old, sir," interrupted he with emphasis, "too old for earth, and too wise to do any good in it. Some of the world, sir, live faster than others. Grief can crowd twenty years into ten, and care make the vigor of manhood, the tottering imbecility of four score. Believe it not--believe it not; they err, sir, who measure life by years. Events, events notch it right--these notch the chronicle of human life."

"And yet, sir, 'tis man's right to be always happy."

'This, sir,' said my host, 'may give you some idea of his character. The evening passed off--though not very happily; for there was that about him which took hold of my feelings, and when I shook hands with him for the night there was an ache in my bosom, I could'nt well get rid of.

'In the morning, he was up betimes--breakfasted--and rose to depart. Before he went however, he took from his bosom a paper; and handing it to me, bade me keep it till his return. 'It is a short sketch of some of the events of my life,' rejoined he, as he mounted his horse, 'and though it benefit you not, it will perform at least one good office--make you remember me.' He bowed, and rode away.

'That paper I have now somewhere, and if you wish, sir, I will read it to you.' My host rose, and going to a huge cat-hole, or cupboard in the corner of the room, he succeeded in finding it--not forgetting by the way, to tumble out sundry articles of house-wife memory, such as balls of yarn, woollen stockings, flannels, and night-caps, and strewing them over the floor. Seated again by the comfortable fire, he now put on a huge pair of brass spectacles, blew his nose thrice, and proceeded to decipher--

THE STRANGER'S MANUSCRIPT.

'I pass over my boyhood.

'I had now entered upon my sixteenth spring, and with less unhappiness, perchance, than ordinarily meets us in this world. Sadness I had known, but unkindness I had never felt; nor had a suspicion of how very opposed the heart is to rectitude, found a lodgment in my mind. I was on the point of visiting the metropolis; and I know I felt as boys mostly do on their entering into the great world--elated with the thoughts of what I was to see and meet with, in a scene I had heard so much about. I talked of little else; and when the day came heralded by a morning of unusual loveliness, my happiness almost sickened me. I remember I went out into the fields, and every thing looked gayer and brighter than I had ever seen it. The flowers looked prettier--the dew was brighter--the birds chirped to me as I passed them--and a subtle spirit of life seemed to pervade all things and participate in my happiness. I returned home happy, and strove to while off the hours preceding my departure --but ere that afternoon came, a dingy, dusky atmosphere, spread itself all about the earth, and the very sky looked, as I thought, fiendish--threatening. I shall not soon forget how soon it was communicated to my feelings. My spirits sunk down. A fearful change seemed working itself through my disposition, which amazed and maddened me. I answered those sharply, who interrogated me as to the cause of it. I gave my orders harshly. I ran from room to room, absent and thoughtful. In fine, all my characteristic amiableness had gone from me, and I seemed transformed into something devilish. I was changed as I suppose those spirits will be at the last day, when they turn half hoping to the judgment seat, and, reading their condemnation there, instantly become fiends.

'A gentle tap was heard at the door, and my mother glided silently into the room; and seating herself beside me, she laid my head upon her bosom. She parted the dark curls from my forehead, and I felt her lips pressed feverishly upon it, and a tear fell upon my face--one of her tears! I opened my eyes at this and looked her full in the face--O! how she looked--pale--wan--beautiful.

"My son--my son--speak to me"--Staring her full in the face, I drew my hand half unconsciously over my eyes--then, recollection suddenly returning, I knelt wildly at her feet--

"Your blessing--Mother!" I gasped.

"Bless thee--bless thee--my boy!" I started up--screamed--and fled from the room. It seemed as if I was mad at her--mad even in my idolatry; and I verily believe I struck her, for I heard her groan and fall heavily upon the floor.

'Before I slept I was upon the ocean--and I have a dim recollection that there was a storm--that the green and crested billows hissed angrily as the thunder growled over them--that the ship went forward like a mad horse plowing through whole mountains of water, and shaking off the white surf from her bows in sheets of silver--and I remember that the violence of the tempest seemed to harmonize awfully with the loud passions within me.

'Years had passed. The bright enthusiasm of youth had gone off with them. The glowing thoughts, passions, sympathies, consuming themselves in their own fire--my whole character had saddened down into the melancholy, homeless wanderer. I was no longer the sunny featured boy that had spent so many pleasant hours on the hill side--by the sandy margin of the lake that washed its base and sent up there with every wind that fanned it, a gentle lullaby--by the rivulet that in early days had caught my laughing features as I bent over it to gather water flowers--no! I was that boy no longer. The peace which had once lived in my heart, had become a worthless and withered flower, scentless as a shadow; the innocency which once gave a zest to every thing had gone from me; the gray hairs of premature age were intermingled with the dark ones of my youth--no! I was that boy no longer. I had traveled--but what was travel to me? I had been in the north and south, in the east and west; I had wandered over the solemn grounds of Corcyra, and amid the classic ruins of Italy; I had stood beneath the sky of Africa and sat me down like Marius amid the relics of her better days, and tried to wake in my heart some of that dormant enthusiasm belonging to young minds; but it was like seeking to resuscitate the dead dust in the earth beneath, or to call life into the mouldering mausoleums and temples around me--no! I was that boy no longer.

'The time of the grain gathering had gone by, and later Autumn had fully set in; for the trees were more than half stripped of that gorgeous covering peculiar to this season; and no music came out from the forest save the whistle of a single quail, and this too in that pensive cadence which is heard only at the close of the year. I was revisiting the scenes of my childhood--a spot I had not seen for twenty years, and during which period I had been a wanderer where no tidings of the weal or wo of my family reached me. It is not necessary to recount the circumstances which had made me thus long a voluntary exile. It need only be said, I parted from home and all I held dear, in anger--angry with self--angry with man--angry with that pure and exemplary being who had borne me on her heart, and by whom I had been so often taught to kneel and pray even before I could myself frame a benediction--'with her who taught me that God loved obedient children.' O! that one offence! Any thing else--had it been any thing else, I had suppressed the groans over my nightly pillow, and borne it like a man while it grieved me. But she, she in whose character unkindness had no part--a blow, a damning blow--God! God! this was unmitigated misery. And yet I had suffered--God knows it, year after year, and seen it preying on my health, and felt it withering up all my finer sensibilities--and yet I would not return. I could not. I felt as if a power was upon me, against which my united energies were nothing. I felt as if it was my destiny, and strange as it may appear, I thought it right. I felt it certain that home was not for me, and though I would wake from an unrefreshing sleep, and recount for hours as a miser his gold every early association, it brought the wish but not the purpose to return. Sickness came--O! what a leveler is sickness of all the petty passions and enmities which creep into the dispositions of men! How it tears up the character, wrings out from the hardened heart the bitter gall of contrition, and forces into amendment! Sickness accomplished in me what reason and conscience could not do, and broke down that indomitable barrier which had so long interposed betwixt me and duty. I rose from my bed, a habitant rather of another world than the denizen of this, and my first thought was home. This cherished for a few weeks grew into a passion, and the fear that the grave had closed over all I loved magnified the wish a thousand fold, while every obstacle which now interposed betwixt me and a return sent a chill through me, like that which we may suppose lies on the heart of the dead. The swiftest speed seemed but delay, and it was only on the last day of my journey and I neared home that my impatience subsided, and my anxiety began to assume another form--something terrible and strange, foreboding and oppressive.

'But my cup was not yet full. We drew up at the inn door, and I heard the guard rudely order the beggar from the spot, and curse him for an idle mendicant. This was too much for my swollen heart to bear, and leaping from the opposite side of the carriage, I took my way forward alone. I came to the small hill which ran along by the side of the village, from the top of which the immediate valley where lay my father's dwelling appeared in view; and as I paused there for a moment, and memory ran over the thousand senseless objects that lay around me with each of which I could associate a forgotten happiness, I thought death a boon I could have prayed for. At that moment the village school poured forth its groups of noisy and innocent children. This was as it was wont to be--this seemed natural. But looking nearer, I knew them not--they were strangers. Here and there I thought I recognized a face I had once known, but it was transient and soon passed--all was strange. A celebrated 'Retreat for the Insane' was in our village, and reaching the summit of the hill I stood by its walls. The door was closed but not fastened; and I know not why, but an indefinable feeling led me to enter there. I know not but it was the unbreathed wish of my heart to witness some spectacle of human suffering--hoping thereby to lessen my own; perhaps I thought I might soon make it my own dwelling, and I wanted to familiarize the objects I should meet with;--but I entered. Seated upon the ground with scarce a mat to cover them, was a lot of wretched beings busied as their several dispositions prompted them. One was blowing bubbles--he said he was maturing a system of astronomy, whereby Galileo should be forgotten and the world profited. Another was heaping up sand, and hoarding it in his bosom--he called it gold. A third it seemed had been a lay preacher, and now and then he howled forth a torrent of truth and error, interlarded with imprecations and blasphemies the most horrid. And there was one there, a tall and handsome youth, with eyes as black as midnight, and his brow drawn down into the scowl of a demon--He said he was ANALYZING A HUMAN HEART. Sudden my ears were saluted with loud and piercing shrieks that made my whole frame shiver, and betwixt each scream I thought I recognized the shrill echo of a lash as applied to the naked skin. Another--and an old man came tottering round an angle of the building; and seeing me, he ran to my feet and cowered down like a whipped hound seeking for protection.

"Curse them for inhuman wretches"--groaned, or rather screamed the old man--"They chain me up like a vile beast--a dog to murder me. They drag me into that black den and shut me there, and say I'm crazed--mad. What is mad? Who?--O! yes,--my children, they broke my heart--one went from me, and the other--Ah! save me--save me"--His keepers came in sight, and in their hands were the scourges they had been using, the sounds of which had rung in my ears so appalling. "O! don't--don't--I'll follow--you won't whip me, will you master--I'm good--good"--and the old man actually knelt down, and like a beast licked the feet of his tormentors. I fell to the earth senseless.

'A long and doleful night followed--a blank--a vacancy; so long, it seemed ten thousand eternities; so gloomy, it seemed as if the darkness was consolidated. O! what a night is that, when the helm of reason breaks--the unshackled faculties wander forth--and the maddened powers invoke images of horror, only to madden themselves the more by gazing at them! All that is grand--all that is terrible--all horrible, loathsome, fearful images, that the mind had ever while healthy repulsed, then come back on the heart like vultures that have been scared awhile from their prey, whose fasts have only whetted their ungorged appetites. At one moment, I seemed borne through the Eternal void chained to the lightnings; at another, I was dashing downward towards a tremendous barrier of cavernous rocks, and their serrated pinnacles seemed waiting to embrace me. Now I was tossed on billows of fire, and a tremendous surge would hurl me on a jagged precipice; then with its reflux suck me down through unimaginable depths, and the hot fires scorched me as they shot into my brain. Again I heard peals of laughter, and howlings of formless, shapeless beings that hovered around me; they had snakes and basilisks twisted round their foreheads, and the flames that issued from their forked mouths seemed to burn into my very soul. Then came the sense of a release--the gasping, choking, horrible consciousness, that you are struggling on the confines of two worlds, and not knowing which is to be yours--whether earth or death shall have you. Suddenly a fountain seemed tossing its cool spray over me--the fires that withered up my brain went out--the fiends that howled about me passed away--the subtlest life began to dance through my veins--and I awoke!

My first thoughts were true to their mark, and my first words, "Mother, lives she? The rest--father, brother--God of Heaven! why was I reserved for it?"

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