The Lost Manuscript: A Novel. Gustav Freytag

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      "What will come of it?"

      "Husband and wife," said the Professor decidedly; he pressed his friend's hands, and strode across the fields to the songs of the larks which greeted him from every sheaf.

      Fritz was alone. The word had been spoken. A new and awful fate overshadowed the life of his friend. So this was to be the end of it? Thusnelda, instead of Tacitus! Fritz felt alas! that the social custom of marriage might be a very venerable institution. It was inevitable that most men pass through the uprooting struggle which is the consequence of a change in the mutual relations of life. He could not think of his friend amid his books, with his colleagues, and this woman. He felt painfully that his relation to the Professor must be changed by it. But he did not think long of himself, but anxiously worried about his rash friend; and not less about her who had so dangerously impressed the soul of the other. The faithful rash friend looked angrily upon the surrounding stubble and straw, and he clenched his fists against the deceased Bachhuber; against the valley of Rossau; nay, even against the immediate cause of this mischievous confusion-against the manuscript of Tacitus.

       CHAPTER IX.

      ILSE

      Since the death of her mother Ilse had lived an unvaried home life. Though then scarcely grown up, she had taken charge of the household. Spring and autumn came and went. One year rolled over her head like another. Her father and sisters, the estate, the laborers, and the poor of the valley-these formed her life. More than once a suitor, a sturdy, worthy proprietor of the neighborhood, had asked her hand in marriage. But she felt contented with her home, and she knew that her father wished her to remain with him. In the evening, when the active man rested on the sofa, and the children were sent to bed she sat silently by him with her embroidery, or talked over the small occurrences of the day-the illness of a laborer, the damage done by a hail storm or the name of the new milch cow. It was a lonely country. Much of it was woodland. Most of the estates were small. There were no rich neighbors. And the father, who had worked his way by his energy until he became an opulent man, had no inclination for society life, nor had his daughter. On Sunday the Pastor came to dinner, and then the father's farm-inspectors remained and related the little gossip of the neighborhood over their coffee; the children, who, during the week, were under the charge of a tutor, amused themselves in the garden and fields. When Ilse had a leisure hour she seated herself in her own little sitting-room with a book out of her father's small library-a novel by Walter Scott, a tale by Hauff, or a volume of Schiller.

      But now a profusion of thoughts, images, and feeling had been awakened in her mind by this stranger. Much that she had hitherto looked upon with indifference in the outer world now became interesting to her. Like fire-works which unexpectedly shoot up, illuminating particular spots in the landscape with their colored light, his conversation threw a fascinating light, now here and now there, on a life that was strange to her. When he spoke, when his words, copious and choice, flowed from his innermost heart-she bent her head as in a dream, then fixed her eyes on his face. She felt a respect commingled with fear for a human mind that soared so loftily and firmly above the earth. He spoke of the past as intimately as of the present; he knew how to explain the secret thoughts of men who had lived a thousand years ago. Ah! she felt the glory and greatness of human learning to be the merit and greatness of the man who sat opposite to her. The intellectual labor of the centuries appeared to her as a supernatural being which proclaimed from a human mouth things unheard of in her home.

      But it was not learning alone. When she looked up at him, she saw beaming eyes, a kindly expression about the eloquent lips, and she felt herself irresistibly attracted by the warmth of the man's nature. Then she sat opposite to him as a quiet listener. But when she entered her room, she knelt down and covered her face with her hands. In this solitude she saw him before her and offered him homage.

      Thus she awoke to a new life. It was a state of pure enthusiasm, of unselfish rapture, such as a man knows not and only a woman can experience, – which comes only to a pure, innocent heart when the greatest crisis of earthly existence visits a sensitive soul in the bloom of life.

      She saw also that her father was partially under the same magical influence. At dinner, which used to be so silent, conversation now flowed as from a living spring; in the evening, when formerly he used to sit wearily over the newspaper, many things were now discussed, and there were frequent disputes which lasted late into the night. Her father, when he took his bedroom candle from the table, was always in cheerful humor; and more than once he repeated to himself, pacing up and down, sentences that had been uttered by his guest. "He is, in his way, a fine man," he said; "in all things stable and sound; one always knows how to take him."

      Occasionally she was alarmed at the Professor's opinions. The two friends, indeed, avoided what might wound the deep faith of their gentle hearer, but in the conversation of the Professor there sometimes seemed to lie hidden a different conception of venerated doctrines and of human duties; and yet, what he maintained was so noble and good that she could not guard herself against it by her own reasoning.

      He was often vehement in his expressions; when he condemned a thing he did it in forcible language, and sometimes became so vehement that the Doctor and even her father withdrew from the contest. She thought then that he was different from almost all men-prouder, nobler, and more decided. When he expected much of others, as is natural to one who has lived in closer intercourse with the ideal world than with real life, it alarmed her to think in what light she must appear to him. But, on the other hand, this same man was ready to acknowledge everything that was good, and he rejoiced like a child when he learned that any one had shown himself brave and energetic.

      He was a serious man, and yet he had become a favorite with the children, even more than the Doctor. They confided their little secrets to him, he visited them in their nursery, and gave them advice according to his youthful recollections, as to how they should make a large paper kite; he himself painted the eyes and the mustache, and cut the tassels for the tail. It was a joyful day when the kite rose from the stubble-field for the first time. Then, when evening came, he sat down, surrounded by the children, like the partridge amongst her young. Franz climbed up the arm-chair and played with his hair; one of the bigger ones sat on each knee. Then riddles were propounded and stories told. And when Ilse heard how he repeated and taught small rhymes to the children, her heart swelled with joy that such a mind should hold such intimate intercourse with simple children. And she watched his countenance and saw a child-like expression light up the features of the man, laughing and happy; and she imagined him as a little boy, sitting on his mother's lap. Happy mother!

      Then came the hour among the sheaves, the learned discourse which began with Tacitus and ended with a silent acknowledgment of love. The blessed cheerfulness of his countenance, the trembling sound of his voice, had torn away the veil that concealed her own agitated feelings. She now knew that she loved him deeply and eternally, and she had a conviction that he felt just as she did. He, who was so greatly her superior, had condescended to her; she had felt his warm breath and the quick pressure of his hand. As she passed through the field, a glow suffused her cheeks; the earth and heaven, fields and sun-lit wood, floated before her like luminous clouds. With winged feet she hastened down into the woody plain, where the foliage enveloped her. Now she felt herself alone. She unconsciously grasped a slender birch tree, which shook beneath her convulsive grasp, until its leaves fell in a shower around her. She raised her hands to the golden light of the heavens and threw herself down on the mossy ground. Her bosom heaved and panted violently and she trembled with inward excitement. Love had descended from heaven upon the young woman, taking possession of her body and soul with its irresistible power.

      Thus she lay a long time. Butterflies played about her hair. A little lizard crept over her hand. The white tips of the wild flowers and the branches of the hazel bent over her, as if these little children of nature wished to veil the deep emotions of the sister who had come to them in the happiest moment of her life.

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