Коллектив авторов - The German Classics of the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Volume 10

Your most faithful

v.B.

Berlin, Friday. (Postmark, August 17, '49.)

Dearest Nanne ,– * * * Your last letter, in which you inform me of the happy solution of the wet-nurse difficulty, took a real load off my heart; I thanked God for His mercy, and could almost have got drunk from pure gayety. May His protection extend henceforward, too, over you and the little darling. I am living with Hans here at the corner of Taubenstrasse, three rooms and one alcove, quite elegant, but narrow little holes; Hans' bed full of bugs, but mine not as yet—I seem not to be to their taste. We pay twenty-five rix-dollars a month, together. If there were one additional small room, and not two flights of stairs, I could live with you here, and Hans could get another apartment below in this house. But, as it is, it would be too cramped for us. I have talked with the fiancé of the wet-nurse, a modest-looking person. He spoke of her with love, and declared in reply to my question that he certainly is willing to marry her. What he wrote about the "white pestilence" is nonsense; no such sickness exists, least of all in Berlin. The cholera is fast disappearing. I have not heard a word more about it since I came here; one sees it only in newspaper reports. Isn't our mammy jealous because, according to the paper, I have been in company with "strikingly handsome" Englishwomen? Lady Jersey was really something uncommon, such as is usually seen only in keepsakes . I would have paid a rix-dollar admission if she had been exhibited for money. She is now in Vienna. For the rest, I have not had a letter from you this long time; my last news comes from Bernhard, who left you a week ago today. God has upheld you meantime, I trust, my angel. It is possible that a letter from you is here. The delivery is always rather irregular: sometimes the letter-carrier brings them, sometimes they are delivered at the Chamber postal station. I will go immediately and inquire if anything is there; then I will take a bath, and return at least ten calls that have been paid me. It is a misery that now the people always receive one—one loses a terrible amount of time at it…. Hans is still inclined to treat me tyrannically, but I resist, and have been so far successful that I sleep as long as I please, whereat the coffee grows cold, however, as he is obstinately bent on not breakfasting alone. So, too, he will not go to bed if I do not go at the same time, but sleeps, just like my little Nanne, on the sofa…. Now, good-by my much-beloved heart. I am very anxious on your account, and often am quite tearful about it. Best regards to the parents.

Your most faithful v.B.

Berlin, Monday. (Postmark, August 28, '49.)

My Darling ,—I sit here in my corner room, two flights up, and survey the sky, full of nothing but little sunset-tinted lambs, as it appears, along the Taubenstrasse and over the tree-tops of Prinz Carl's garden, while along Friedrichstrasse it is all golden and cloudless; the air damp and mild, too. I thought of you and of Venice, and this only I wanted to write to you. News has come today that Venice has surrendered at discretion; so we can go there again, and again see the tall white grenadiers. * * * I dined with Manteuffel today, yesterday with Prince Albert, of course, day before yesterday with Arnim, and then I took a ride with him of fourteen miles at a gallop—which suited me well, save for some muscular pains. In the Chamber we keep on doing nothing whatever; in the Upper House the German question, happily, has been brought forward again in very good speeches by Gerlach, Bethmann, and Stahl, and yet today the Camphausen proposition was adopted with all the votes against nineteen. With us, too, it is beginning to excite men's tempers. The proposition is bad in its tendency, but its result insignificant even if it goes through with us, as is to be expected. Tant de bruit pour une omelette. The real decision will not be reached in our Chambers, but in diplomacy and on the battlefield, and all that we prate and resolve about it has no more value than the moonshine observations of a sentimental youth who builds air-castles and thinks that some unexpected event will make him a great man. Je m'en moque! —and the farce often bores me nearly to death, because I see no sensible object in this straw-threshing. Mother's little letter gave me great pleasure, because, in the first place, I see that you are well, and then because she has her old joke with me, which is much pleasanter at a distance, as it does not lead to strife; and yet how I should like to quarrel with mammy once more! I am genuinely homesick to be quietly with you all in Schönhausen. Have you received the ribbon for Aennchen?

Tuesday.—Hans is just breakfasting, and eating up, from sheer stinginess, a quarter pound of butter that he bought three days ago, because it begins to get old. Now he screams that my tea is there, too. I close for today, as I have something to do afterwards. My love to FatherMotherAnnaAdelheidMarie and all the rest. God's blessing be with you and keep you well and merry.

Your most faithful v.B.

Berlin, September 11, '49. (Postmarked September 10.)

I wrote yesterday, my Nannie, but as it costs me nothing, not even for paper, for this is the Chamber's, I do want to improve a wearisome moment, during which I must listen to the reading of a confused report on normal prices, to send you another little greeting; but again without the ribbon, for I am going to buy that later on. This morning I attended the cavalry manoeuvres, on a very pleasant horse of Fritz's; rode sharply, swallowed much dust, but, nevertheless, had a good time; it is really pretty, these brilliant, rapidly moving masses interspersed with the clanking of iron and the bugle signals. The Queen, my old flame, greeted me so cordially. Having driven past without noticing me, she rose and turned backward over the bar of the carriage, to nod to me thrice; that lady appreciates a Prussian heart. Tomorrow I shall take a look at the grand parade, in which the infantry also participates. I believe I have written you that the King and Leopold Gerlach visited the Emperor of Austria at Teplitz, where there was also a Russian plenipotentiary. The proletariats of the Chamber are now gradually coming to see that on that occasion something may have been concocted which will cast mildew on their German hot-house flowers, and the fact that his Majesty has conversed with the ruler of all the Croatians frightens them somewhat. Qui vivra verra . These Frankfort cabbage-heads are incorrigible; they and their phrases are like the old liars who in the end honestly believe their own stories; and the impression produced on our Chamber by such ridiculous things as they say, without any regard for the matter in hand, or for common-sense, will be sure at last to convince people generally that peasants and provincials are not fit to make laws and conduct European politics. Now I must listen. Farewell, my much-beloved heart. Love to my daughter and your parents.

Your most faithful v.B.

Berlin, Friday.

(Postmarked September 21, '49.)

I am well, my darling Nan, but I am cold, for in the morning the rooms are already so chilly that I long very much for the Schönhausen fireplaces, and matters in the Chamber are so tedious that I often have serious thoughts of resigning my commission. In the ministry there is again a shameful measure preparing; they now want to submit a real property tax bill, according to which those estates which are not manors are to be indemnified, while manors must suffer, as the number of nobles is not dangerous. Only if encumbered for more than two-thirds of their value, they are to be assisted by loans. What good will a loan do a bankrupt, who has it to repay! It is a mixture of cowardice and shameless injustice such as I could not have expected. Yesterday we had soft, warm autumn weather, and I took a long walk in the Thiergarten, by the same solitary paths which we used to traverse together; I sat, too, on our bench near the swan-pond; the young swans which were then still in their eggs on the little island were now swimming vivaciously about, fat, gray, and blasé , among the dirty ducks, and the old ones sleepily laid their heads on their backs. The handsome large maple standing near the bridge has already leaves of a dark-red color; I wished to send you one of them, but in my pocket it has become so hard that it crumbles away; the gold-fish pond is almost dried up; the lindens, the black alders, and other delicate things bestrew the paths with their yellow, rustling foliage, and the round chestnut-burrs exhibit a medley of all shades of sombre and attractive fall coloring. The promenade, with its morning fogs among the trees, reminded me vividly of Kniephof, the woodcock-hunt, the line of springes, and how everything was so green and fresh when I used to walk there with you, my darling. * * * On the 1st of October I shall probably have to attend the celebration of the nine-hundredth anniversary of the founding of the cathedral there, to which the King is coming. For the 2d and the following days I have been invited to go on a royal hunt to the Falkenstein. I should be very glad to shoot a deer in those woods which we and Mary saw illuminated by the moon on that evening; but even if matters in the Chamber should not prevent, I am at a loss how to reconcile that with our journey, and I feel as though I should steal my days from you by going. * * * I am now going out to buy a waist, to call on Rauch, and then again to the Thiergarten. All love to father and mother, and may God preserve you in the future as hitherto, my dearest.