University of Virginia Library

10. CHAPTER X.
THE PARTING.

It was now that season of the year, which an
old English writer calls the amiable month of
June, and at that hour of the day, when, face to
face, the rising moon beholds the setting sun. As
yet the stars were few in heaven. But, after
the heat of the day, the coolness and the twilight
descended like a benediction upon the earth, by all
those gentle sounds attended, which are the meek
companions of the night.

Flemming and the Baron had passed the afternoon
at the Castle. They had rambled once
more together, and for the last time, over the
magnificent ruin. On the morrow they were to
part, perhaps forever. The Baron was going to
Berlin, to join his sister; and Flemming, driven

forward by the restless spirit within him, longed
once more for a change of scene, and was going to
the Tyrol and Switzerland. Alas! he never said
to the passing hour; “Stay, for thou art fair!”
but reached forward into the dark future, with
unsatisfied longings and aimless desires, that were
never still.

As the day was closing, they sat down on the
terrace of Elisabeth's Garden. The sun had
set beyond the blue Alsatian hills; and on the valley
of the Rhine fell the purple mist, like the mantle
of the departing prophet from his fiery chariot.
Over the castle walls, and the trees of the garden,
rose the large moon; and between the contending
daylight and moonlight there were as yet no
shadows. But at length the shadows came; transparent
and faint outlines, that deepened into form.
In the valley below only the river gleamed, like
steel; and here and there the lamps were lighted
in the town. Solemnly stood the leafy lindentrees
in the garden near them, their trunks in
darkness and their summits bronzed with moonlight;

and in his niche in the great round tower,
overhung with ivy, like a majestic phantom, stood
the gray statue of Louis, with his venerable beard,
and shirt of mail, and flowing mantle; and the
mild, majestic countenance looked forth into the
silent night, as the countenance of a seer, who
reads the stars. At intervals the wind of the
summer night passed through the ruined castle
and the trees, and they sent forth a sound as if
nature were sighing in her dreams; and for a moment
overhead the broad leaves gently clashed together,
like brazen cymbals, with a tinkling sound;
and then all was still, save the sweet, passionate
song of nightingales, that nowhere upon earth
sing more sweetly than in the gardens of Heidelberg
Castle.

The hour, the scene, and the near-approaching
separation of the two young friends, had filled their
hearts with a pleasant, though at the same time
not painless excitement. They had been conversing
about the magnificent old ruin, and the
ages in which it had been built, and the vicissitudes

of time and war, that had battered down its
walls, and left it “tenantless, save to the crannying
wind.”

“How sorrowful and sublime is the face of that
statue yonder,” said Flemming. “It reminds me
of the old Danish hero Beowulf; for careful, sorrowing,
he seeth in his son's bower the wine-hall
deserted, the resort of the wind, noiseless;
the knight sleepeth; the warrior lieth in darkness;
there is no noise of the harp, no joy in the
dwellings, as there was before.”

“Even as you say,” replied the Baron; “but
it often astonishes me, that, coming from that fresh
green world of yours beyond the sea, you should
feel so much interest in these old things; nay, at
times, seem so to have drunk in their spirit, as
really to live in the times of old. For my part, I
do not see what charm there is in the pale and
wrinkled countenance of the Past, so to entice the
soul of a young man. It seems to me like falling
in love with one's grandmother. Give me the
Present;—warm, glowing, palpitating with life.

She is my mistress; and the Future stands waiting
like my wife that is to be, for whom, to tell the
truth, I care very little just now. Indeed, my
friend, I wish you would take more heed of this
philosophy of mine; and not waste the golden
hours of youth in vain regrets for the past, and
indefinite, dim longings for the future. Youth
comes but once in a lifetime.”

“Therefore,” said Flemming; “let us so enjoy
it as to be still young when we are old. For my
part, I grow happier as I grow older. When I
compare my sensations and enjoyments now, with
what they were ten years ago, the comparison is
vastly in favor of the present. Much of the fever
and fretfulness of life is over. The world and I
look each other more calmly in the face. My
mind is more self-possessed. It has done me good
to be somewhat parched by the heat and drenched
by the rain of life.”

“Now you speak like an old philosopher,” answered
the Baron, laughing. “But you deceive
yourself. I never knew a more restless, feverish

spirit than yours. Do not think you have gained
the mastery yet. You are only riding at anchor
here in an eddy of the stream; you will soon be
swept away again in the mighty current and whirl
of accident. Do not trust this momentary calm.
I know you better than you know yourself.
There is something Faust-like in you; you would
fain grasp the highest and the deepest; and `reel
from desire to enjoyment, and in enjoyment languish
for desire.' When a momentary change of
feeling comes over you, you think the change permanent,
and thus live in constant self-deception.”

“I confess,” said Flemming, “there may be
some truth in what you say. There are times
when my soul is restless; and a voice sounds
within me, like the trump of the archangel, and
thoughts that were buried, long ago, come out of
their graves. At such times my favorite occupations
and pursuits no longer charm me. The
quiet face of Nature seems to mock me.”

“There certainly are seasons,” replied the
Baron, “when Nature seems not to sympathize

with her beloved children. She sits there so
eternally calm and self-possessed, so very motherly
and serene, and cares so little whether the
heart of her child breaks or not, that at times I
almost lose my patience. About that, too, she
cares so little, that, out of sheer obstinacy, I become
good-humored again, and then she smiles.”

“I think we must confess, however,” continued
Flemming, “that all this springs from our own imperfection,
not from hers. How beautiful is this
green world, which we inhabit! See yonder, how
the moonlight mingles with the mist! What a
glorious night is this! Truly every man has a
Paradise around him until he sins, and the angel of
an accusing conscience drives him from his Eden.
And even then there are holy hours, when this
angel sleeps, and man comes back, and, with the
innocent eyes of a child, looks into his lost Paradise
again,—into the broad gates and rural solitudes
of Nature. I feel this often. We have
much to enjoy in the quiet and retirement of our

own thoughts. Boisterous mirth and loud laughter
are not my mood. I love that tranquillity of
soul, in which we feel the blessing of existence,
and which in itself is a prayer and a thanksgiving.
I find, however, that, as I grow older, I love the
country less, and the city more.”

“Yes,” interrupted the Baron; “and presently
you will love the city less and the country more.
Say at once, that you have an undefined longing for
both; and prefer town or country, according to
the mood you are in. I think a man must be of a
very quiet and happy nature, who can long endure
the country; and, moreover, very well contented
with his own insignificant person, very
self-complacent, to be continually occupied with
himself and his own thoughts. To say the least,
a city life makes one more tolerant and liberal in
his judgment of others. One is not eternally
wrapped up in self-contemplation; which, after all,
is only a more holy kind of vanity.”

In conversation like this, the hours glided away;
till at length, from the Giant's Tower, the Castle

clock struck twelve, with a sound that seemed to
come from the Middle Ages. Like watchmen
from their belfries the city clocks answered it, one
by one. Then distant and muffled sounds were
heard. Inarticulate words seemed to blot the foggy
air, as if written on wet paper. These were
the bells of Handschuhsheimer, and of other villages
on the broad plain of the Rhine, and among
the hills of the Odenwald; mysterious sounds, that
seemed not of this world.

Beneath them, in the shadow of the hills, lay
the valley, like a fathomless, black gulf; and above
were the cloistered stars, that, nun-like, walk the
holy aisles of heaven. The city was asleep in the
valley below; all asleep and silent, save the clocks,
that had just struck twelve, and the veering, golden
weathercocks, that were swimming in the moonshine,
like golden fishes, in a glass vase. And
again the wind of the summer night passed through
the old Castle, and the trees, and the nightingales
recorded under the dark, shadowy leaves, and the
heart of Flemming was full.

When he had retired to his chamber, a feeling
of utter loneliness came over him. The night
before one begins a journey is always a dismal
night; for, as Byron says,

And how much more so when the place and people
are pleasant; as was the case with those, that
Flemming was now leaving. No wonder he was
sad and sleepless. Thoughts came and went, and
bright and gloomy fancies, and dreams and visions,
and sweet faces looked under his closed eyelids,
and vanished away, and came again, and again departed.
He heard the clock strike from hour to
hour, and said, “Another hour is gone.” At length
the birds began to sing; and ever and anon the
cock crew. He arose, and looked forth into the
gray dawn; and before him lay the city he was so
soon to leave, all white and ghastly, like a city
that had arisen from its grave.

“All things must change,” said he to the Baron,
as he embraced him, and held him by the hand.

“Friends must be torn asunder, and swept along
in the current of events, to see each other seldom,
and perchance no more. For ever and ever in the
eddies of time and accident we whirl away. Besides
which, some of us have a perpetual motion in
our wooden heads, as Wodenblock had in his
wooden leg; and like him we travel on, without
rest or sleep, and have hardly time to take a friend
by the hand in passing; and at length are seen
hurrying through some distant land, worn to a
skeleton, and all unknown.”