Life and Phantasy by William Allingham: With frontispiece by Sir John E. Millais: A design by Arthur H. Hughes and a song for voice and piano forte |
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WEIMAR.
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| IV. |
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 | Life and Phantasy |  |
WEIMAR.
By help of that kindly Scot, James Marshall,
then Secretary to the Grand Duchess, I saw here, among other
interesting things the most interesting, Goethe's House just as he
left it, at that time jealously shut up from the public by the poet's
grandson. Some of the great man's coats and hats hung in a
recess (I ventured to try on a hat, and found it extravagantly too
large for a large-sized head). In a narrow slip of a place, like part
of a passage, stood his few books carelessly on deal shelves. This
narrow book-room opened into the working-room, low-ceilinged,
squarish, its two small windows looking into a garden with wicket
to a quiet back street. Round the working-room ran a continuous
breast-high desk, with ledge at top, and between this desk, on
which books or papers could lie for reference, and a large, low table
in the centre, Goethe paced, dictating to his amanuensis—for the
last eight years of his life to the very man who was showing me
the place. On the opposite side from the book-room was the door
of the small bed-room, with hardly space for more than the
curtainless bed, arm-chair, and little table, on which stood a phial
marked inside with some brown medicine, and labelled “Herr
Geheimerath von Goethe.” This was the old part of the house, the
Poet's workshop and living place, entered by a furtive door off the
wide staircase leading from the Roman hall to the reception-rooms,
with their casts of statues, framed engravings, and glass cases of
curiosities. The impress of Goethe's personality everywhere was
clear and fresh, as tho' he were but gone a week or two.
By help of that kindly Scot, James Marshall, then Secretary to the Grand Duchess, I saw here, among other interesting things the most interesting, Goethe's House just as he left it, at that time jealously shut up from the public by the poet's grandson. Some of the great man's coats and hats hung in a recess (I ventured to try on a hat, and found it extravagantly too large for a large-sized head). In a narrow slip of a place, like part of a passage, stood his few books carelessly on deal shelves. This narrow book-room opened into the working-room, low-ceilinged, squarish, its two small windows looking into a garden with wicket to a quiet back street. Round the working-room ran a continuous breast-high desk, with ledge at top, and between this desk, on which books or papers could lie for reference, and a large, low table in the centre, Goethe paced, dictating to his amanuensis—for the last eight years of his life to the very man who was showing me the place. On the opposite side from the book-room was the door of the small bed-room, with hardly space for more than the curtainless bed, arm-chair, and little table, on which stood a phial marked inside with some brown medicine, and labelled “Herr Geheimerath von Goethe.” This was the old part of the house, the Poet's workshop and living place, entered by a furtive door off the wide staircase leading from the Roman hall to the reception-rooms, with their casts of statues, framed engravings, and glass cases of curiosities. The impress of Goethe's personality everywhere was clear and fresh, as tho' he were but gone a week or two.
I
In little German Weimar,With soft green hills enfolded,
Where shady Ilm-brook wanders,
A Great Man lived and wrote;
In life and art and nature
He conn'd their “open secret,”
Of men and hours and fortunes
He reverently took note.
Upon a verge of Europe,
Facing the silent sunsets,
And loud Atlantic billows,
For me, too, rose his thought,—
Turn'd to a shape of stars on high
Within the spiritual sky
Of many an upward-gazing eye.
II
And now, this new October,Within a holy garden,
'Mid flowers and trees and crosses,
When dusk begins to fall,—
Where linden leaves are paling,
And poplar leaves are gilded,
And crimson is the wild-vine
That hangs across the wall,—
I see the little temple
Wherein, with dust of princes,
The body lies of Goethe,
And may not move at all.
He mark'd all changes of the year;
He loved to live; he did not fear
The never-broken silence here.
III
Slow foots the gray old Sexton,The ducal town's Dead-watcher,
Attending day and night time
A bell that never rings;
The corpse upon the pallet,
A thread to every finger,—
The slightest touch would sound it,
But silence broods and clings.
Beside the room of stillness,
While yet his couch is warmer,
This old man hath his biding,
Therefrom the key he brings.
For mighty mortals, in his day,
He hath unlock'd the House of Clay,—
For them, as we are wont to say.
IV
By yellow-leafy midwalkSlow foots that aged Sexton;
“Ja wohl! I have seen Goethe,
And spoken, too, with him.”
The lamp with cord he lowers,
And I, by steps descending,
Behold, through grated doorway,
A chamber chill and dim,—
Gaze on a dark red coffer:
Full fourscore years were counted,
When that grand head lay useless,
And each heroic limb.
Schiller's dust is close beside,
And Karl August's not far,—denied
His chosen place by princely pride.
V
The day had gloom'd and drizzled,But clear'd itself in parting,
The hills were soft and hazy,
Fine colours streak'd the west
(Above that distant ocean),
And Weimar stood before me,
A dream of half my lifetime,
A vision for the rest:
The House that fronts the fountain,
The Cottage at the woodside,—
Long since I surely knew them,
But still, to see was best.
Town and Park for eyes and feet:
But all th'inhabitants I greet
Are Ghosts, in every walk and street.
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