 | CHAPTER X. A volume from the life of Herbert Barclay |  |
10. CHAPTER X.
Alfred opened the paper and read as
follows:
—“I had spent several weeks—as every one
may spend them at Dresden—delightfully.
It is one of the most charming towns in Europe.
Far away from travellers' thoroughfares;
free from the bustle of commerce, and the
tramp and insolence of soldiery; a cultivated,
polished society, over which the good-hearted,
old-fashioned royal family diffuses additional
courtesy; rich collections of the treasures
of art, and curious hoards from antiquity;
the best music; one of the finest galleries
of paintings in the world; a beautiful
country around;—all these form a whole of
singular attractiveness, and makes Dresden a
spot where the traveller, enjoying a luxurious
drawing to an end. I had staid a fortnight
beyond the time I had fixed for continuing
my journey south through Bohemia. Having
at last resolutely made up my mind to set off in
a few days, I took leave of my kind Dresden
friends. Talking with one of them of the
resources for amusement of his city—`Have
you,' said he, `been at a boar hunt?' `A
boar hunt! No. Are wild boars hunted
near this?' `Yes,' said he. `The king
has a hunt at stated times at this season: if
you would like to see one, to-morrow is one
of his days.' `I would'nt miss it for the
world,' said I. `Then, send a horse to
Moritzburg this afternoon; and ride out in a
carriage to-morrow morning to breakfast: the
hunt begins at eleven o'clock.'—`How fortunate,'
said I to myself as I proceeded to a
livery-stable to engage a horse, `how fortunate
that I heard of this! A royal boar hunt
away in the interior of Germany! What a
rare chance for a traveller!' I examined
as strong and sure-footed, I ordered
him to be sent out that afternoon to be
fresh for me the following day. I provided
myself with a good hunting sword and a pair
of large pistols; and the next morning, after
a two hours drive, I found myself at nine
o'clock at the inn near the palace of Moritzburg,
the royal hunting lodge.
“After seeing to my horse, I went to breakfast.
I was impatient for eleven o'clock to
arrive. The anticipation of danger whetted
my eagerness. I had read accounts of desperate
fights between boars and their hunters,
of narrow escapes, and chivalrous deeds—
one of a king, whose life, in peril from a furious
boar, was saved by a knight at the risk
of his own. Perhaps, said I, something of
the kind may happen to myself! Perhaps I
may beat the king and his suite, and be the
first to strike the animal! I examined my
sword and pistols. But I must not be too
bold; and one of Snyder's finest pictures, a
In the mean time two other gentlemen
had arrived at the inn, and were taking
breakfast out of doors under a tree. As they
talked loud and seemed to have no objection
to be listened to, from the piazza a few feet
above them could be heard distinctly their
whole conversation, from which I learnt that
they were two young Frenchmen, one of
them attached to the French legation at
Dresden, the other a student of Heidelberg.
Their talk was of themselves and other
Frenchmen, which at any other time might
have interested me; but my mind was now
too much pre-occupied to listen long to any
thing, and I soon walked out to the stable.—
I had my horse brought out and saddled and
bridled in order to try him. I saw that the
girths, reins, and stirrup leathers were all
strong and well fastened, and having girded
on my sword and put my pistols in my belt,
I mounted, and following the direction given
me to turn round the corner of a wall that
the starting point, I in a few minutes came
up to the hunting party, already assembled
without the palace court. It consisted of the
old king and his brother Anthony, attended
by half a dozen of the royal household.
They were just about to start, as, falling into
the rear, I joined them. I scanned their
horses, and thought, as I spurred and reined
in my hired steed, that he would prove a
match for any of them. In a few moments
I heard steps behind us, and looking back
saw the two Frenchmen.
“We had entered a pine wood and were
proceeding in silence, still keeping to the
road, at a moderate trot, hearing every now
and then from a valley to the left the cry of
the dogs. The two Frenchmen continued
their talk, and so loudly as to attract the attention
of the royal party, several of whom
looked round. Lest I should be taken for
one of the Frenchmen, I separated myself
from them as much as I could, riding up by
who seemed to be half groom half
gentleman. He eyed me with a suspecting
air, and his look was several times, I thought,
directed towards my pistols. Wishing to
let him see that I had no connexion with the
Frenchmen, I put on a deaf look as to their
conversation and made a remark to him in
German. I got only a monosyllable in return;
and observing that he appeared as
anxious to keep me behind him as I was to
keep the Frenchmen behind me, I fell
back,—thinking to myself, how I would dash
ahead of him in the thick of the hunt,—
when a rattling volley of French, exchanged
between the two Frenchmen, drove me forward
again. Presently a yell as of a hundred
hounds swept up from the valley. The
party quickened its speed. `Ah!' said I to
the German, `the hunt, I suppose, is going to
begin now.'—`Begin! its ended, I believe.'—
`Ended!'—`Yes;' said he, with evident satisfaction
after listening for a moment, `they
who have caught the boar?' `The huntsmen.'
The party suddenly turned to the
left through another road in the direction
whence the cries of the dogs came. We
had now got into a gallop and were approaching
the dogs whose cries however had become
faint. Suddenly we halted. One of
the party rode forward, and soon returned.—
Upon this the king dismounted under the
shade of some tall trees. We all followed
his example. One of the Frenchmen was
describing to the other a boar hunt he had
witnessed in France, and in so loud a tone
that even the old king looked round. I drew
off from them, fearing that I should be implicated
in their discourtesy. I kept my
eyes fixed in the direction of the dogs.
Presently I described the boar—bleeding and
exhausted, dragged along on his back by four
men, one having hold of each of his legs.—
They dragged him before the king. One of
the attendants presented to his majesty a
walked up to the prostrate boar, and pierced
his heart. He drew out the sword and gave
it back to the attendant. He then remounted
his horse, and the rest of the party did so
after him, and we trotted back by the same
road to Mortizburg. The wood through
which we passed was intersected in every
direction by smooth roads. The wall I had
gone round on starting from the inn was part
of an inclosure in which wild boars, taken in
the forest when young, are confined. When
the king wishes to have a boar hunt, a full
grown animal is caught in the pen; his tusks
are sawed off; and he is then let loose.”
“Well,” said Mr. Barclay, seeing that Alfred
had finished, “there was good sport, although
not of the kind you expected.”
“You should head this,” said Alfred,--“A
royal boar hunt in Germany, in which the
hunter was hunted by two Frenchmen.”
“These two young men,” said Mr. Keppel,
“as they appeared on that morning, were,
a realization of the vulgar English and American
notion of a Frenchman; and had I not
lived some time among the French people
and known personally many individuals of it,
I should have exclaimed—What complete
Frenchmen! whereas they only presented a
caricature of traits superficially distinctive of
their nation—talkativeness, and fondness for
display.”
“And perhaps,” said Mr. Barclay, “had
you become acquainted with them, you would
have found that their conduct on that occasion,
though unwittingly on their part, was a caricature
even of themselves.”
“About the same time,” said Mr. Keppel,
“I met with another and more complete caricature—an
Englishman, whom you might
have supposed to be travelling for a wager or
as a penance. He admired nothing, and despised
the people: he was always uncomfortable
and always grumbling. He avoided contact
with the natives and associated only
he had been taken in, when sometime after
we had been acquainted, he discovered that
I was not an Englishman. His countrymen
called him, by way of distinction, John Bull.”
“The hunt itself was another caricature,”
said Alfred.
“Not exactly a caricature,” said Mr. Keppel;
“rather a degeneration. The old king,
no longer capable of performing the reality,
went through the form merely of a hunt.”
“This condition of the royal amusement in
Saxony,” said Mr. Barclay, “may be taken
as a type of that of the serious vocation of
kings in most countries of Europe, where the
ceremony and outward circumstance of monarchy
are continued, while much of its power
has passed, and is further passing away;
where, indeed, although there is a nominal
monarch, there is, in strictness, no monarchy.”
“I hav'nt yet done with the traveller's journal,”
said Alfred. “Listen to some verse.”
pausing at the end of each piece, to make
comments, or to listen to those of Mr. Keppel.
“THE ALPS AT SUNSET.
Of earth: changeless where every thing is change:
Motionless 'midst the ceaseless flow of life!
Ye bear no earthly stamp; but lift on high
Your speechless, spotless heads, snow-capt, above
All nether influence,—cleaving earth-born clouds,
That round your cold sides cling like living arms
Around a corpse, insensate to their touch.
Ye are a mystery,—and from the plain
And common of this world, sudden ye rear
Your giant forms, midst the recurring spans
Of time, fit emblems of eternity.
Since first from Zurich's hills, your image loomed,
A heaven-descended vision, on my sight,
Filling my mind with wonder—day on day
I've journeyed towards ye. At your mighty base
I've stood in awed silence, pondering
With baffled thought.—Around me darkness spreads
Its veil. But ye with beaming summits still
Glow in the sunshine. Telegraphs 'twixt worlds!
For on your tow'ring heads, the westward sun
Casts his last ray for Europe—unto me,
A golden herald from my far-off home.
“TO GOETHE.
Of the Eternal! Through the palling night
Of superstition,—making man rejoice
In his free'd powers,—thy keen word pierces, bright
With wisdom and with beauty. And the light
Of thy deep poetry on passion gleams
Serene, in triumph o'er its gloom,—a sight
Like that at even, when the black storm-cloud seems
Gilded at once and vanquished by the day-god's beams.
“The first tone trembling from thy youthful lyre
Awed even thyself; and through the land, a thrill
Shot wildly; eager passion—young desire—
Leapt with new life, confounding human will,
And threat'ning desolating sway—until
A deeper strain o'er the rapt spirit swept.
Hush'd by the re-awakened sound, stood still
The charmed crowd, and list'ning, mildly wept
Redeeming tears, and love inspired in calmness slept.
“Deep hast thou drunk of wo, in the turmoil
Of the world's business mingling; yet apart
From noisy strife,—the solitary toil
Of genius thine; weaving in open mart
Thy perdurable web with wondrous art.
Passions reveal themselves upon thy page,
Exposing as they rend the struggling heart:—
But—like æolian strings where tempests wage—
Thou catchest from them but the music of their rage.
“TRANSLATIONS[1] FROM GOETHE'S FAUST.
HYMN OF ANGELS.
Raphael.
“The sun still sings, forever singing,
In brother spheres his rival song,
And now his path prescribed is bringing
To end, as thunder rolls along.
Though none his law can see or say.
The unrevealed works and voices
Are grand as on creation's day.
“And swift and light the earth is streaming
With gorgeous change so black and bright;
In hues of Paradise now beaming—
And now wrapt deep in gloom of night.
The sea 'gainst rushing rivers striving,
On rocklands bursts its foam and wrath;
And rock and sea are onward driving
Eternally in Heaven's path.
“And storms in contest wild are pouring
From land to sea, from sea to land,
Of deepest action one close band:
There lightning's vivid flash is glaring
Before the coming thunder hoarse:
But these, Oh! Lord, thy orders bearing,
Revere the universe's course.
“The sight to Angels, vigor gives,
Though none thy law can see or say;
And thy bright world forever lives,
As bright as on creation's day.
Note by the Editor.—It is so common for writers to
represent their fictions as realities, that some readers of this
volume may be disposed to doubt the truth of its alleged origin.
Although the editor would regret such an opinion, as
an error calculated to weaken the impression of the contents
of the volume, he should not have alluded to it,—trusting to
the discernment of the majority of readers,—but for the introduction
of these translations from Faust, between the latter
of which and the prose version of the same passage by
Mr. Hayward there is so strong a resemblance, that the
reader who should doubt that it had been made at the time it
purports to have been made, would be excusable for doubting
that the resemblance is an accidental coincidence. For the
satisfaction of such, he makes known, that both of these
translations were published in this country in the year 1830,
and may be seen in print as a proof that the resemblance is
purely accidental.
Mr. Hayward, should Mr. Keppel's translation, meet his
eye, would be amused by the coincidence, as the Editor of
this volume was on reading his,—extracted in a beautiful article
in Frazer's Magazine, to which the editor is indebted for
all that he has seen of Mr. H's highly commended version.
In a fine critique on Faust, is Nos. 1 and 2 of the Knicker-bocker,
there are translations, whose excellence, combining
fidelity with poetic lightness and spirit, prove the writer competent
to give a poetic version of the whole of the great original.
Although it be, in strictness, true, as the writer states,
that a perfect translation of a great Poem is an impossibility;
the specimens he has given are evidence that, would he perform
this task, his production would be an acquisition to the
English language, and an honor to American literature.
“FROM THE GARDEN SCENE.
“Who dare him name?
And who, proclaim,
I believe in him:
Who that may,
Feeling say,
I believe in him not.
The all-infolder,
The all-upholder,
Holds and upholds he not
Thee, me, himself?
Arches not Heaven there above?
Lies not the earth firm here below?
And mount not up eternal stars
Friendly twinkling over us?
And feel'st thou not existence
Pouring through thy heart,
And weaving in eternal mystery
Invisibly visible around thee?
Fill full thy soul with consciousness of being,
And when thou art happy in the fulness,
Call it then what thou wilt—
Call it bliss! soul! love! God!
I have no name for it!
Feeling is all in all:
Name is sound and smoke
Curling round Heaven's fire.
“That is all right well and good;
About the same as what the parson says,
Only in somewhat different words.
“All places say it,
All hearts beneath the light of heaven,
Each in its own language;
Why not I in mine?”
| CHAPTER X. A volume from the life of Herbert Barclay | |