Kuno Francke - The German Classics of the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Volume 11

"I don't understand you."

"I mean the question is so great and so weighty that it requires every pair of strong shoulders to move it; and it is so worthy and so holy that I am sorry for him who will not or cannot with full conviction participate in council and action."

"Or 'cannot'!" exclaimed Uncle Ernst; "quite right! Did I not take part in counsel and action as long as I could – on the barricades, in those March days, in the national convention, and everywhere and at all times when it was within human possibility – I mean when it was possible for an honorable man to put his shoulder to the wheel, as you said? I will not mention the fact that I pushed my shoulders sore in so doing – more than once; that they tricked me and molested me, dragged me from one penitential stool to another, and occasionally, too, clapped me into prison – that belonged to the game, and better people than I fared no better, but even worse, much worse. In a word, it was a struggle – a hopeless struggle, with very unequal weapons, if you will, but still a struggle! But how is it now? It is a fair, an old-clothes shop, where they dicker to and fro over the counter, and auction off one tatter after another of our proud old banner of freedom to the man who carries them all in his pocket, and who, they know, carries them all in his pocket."

The cloud on his brow grew more lowering, his dark brown eyes flashed, his deep voice grew sullen – a storm was coming; Reinhold thought it advisable to reef a few sails.

"I am not a politician, Uncle," he said. "I believe I have precious little talent for politics, and have at least had no time to cultivate such talent as I may possess. So I cannot contradict you when you say it is not altogether as it should be in this country. But then, too, you will grant me, as the aristocrats had to grant, that the question, viewed from the other side – I mean from abroad, from aboard ship, from a foreign harbor beyond the sea – makes a very different and much better impression; and I think you cannot blame me for thinking more favorably of the man – to put it flatly, for having a respect for him to whom we owe respect in the last analysis, a respect which the German name now enjoys throughout the world."

"I know the song!" said Uncle Ernst. "He sang it often enough, the sly old fowler, and still sings it every time when the bullfinches won't go into his net: 'Who is responsible for 1864, for 1866, for 1870? I! I!! I!!!'"

"And isn't he right, Uncle?"

"No, and a thousand times no!" exclaimed Uncle Ernst. "Has one man sole claim to the treasure which others have dug up and unearthed from the depths of the earth with unspeakable toil and labor, simply because he removed the last shovelful of earth? Schleswig-Holstein would still be Danish today if the noblemen had conquered it; Germany would still be torn into a thousand shreds if the noblemen had had to patch it together; the ravens would still flutter about the Kyffhäuser, if thousands and thousands of patriotic hearts had not dreamed of German unity, had not thought of Germany's greatness day and night – the hearts and heads of men who were not rewarded for their services with lands and the title of Count and Prince, and were not pardoned."

"I tell you, Uncle," said Reinhold, "I think it is with German unity as with other great things. Many fared in their imagination westward to the East Indies; in reality only one finally did it, and he discovered – America."

"I thought," said Uncle Ernst solemnly, "that the man who discovered it was called Columbus, and he is said to have been thrown into prison in gratitude for it, and to have died in obscurity. The one who came after and pocketed the glory, and for whom the land was named, was a wretched rascal not worthy to unloose the latchet of the discoverer's shoes."

"Well, really!" exclaimed Reinhold, laughing in spite of himself – "I believe no other man on the whole globe would speak in that way of Bismarck."

"Quite possible!" replied Uncle Ernst; "and I do not believe another man on the globe hates him as I do."

Uncle Ernst drained at one draught the glass he had just filled. It occurred to Reinhold that his uncle had tipped the bottle freely, and he thought he noticed that the hand which raised the glass to his mouth trembled a little, and that the hitherto steady gleam of his great eyes was dimmed and flickered ominously.

"That is the result of my obstinacy," said Reinhold to himself; "why excite the anger of the old graybeard? Every one has a right to look at things in his own way! You should have changed the course of the conversation."

On their way through the city he had given a brief account of the stranding of the steamer and the events that followed, so he could now without apparent effort resume the thread of his story there, and tell further how he had been kindly received by the President in Sundin and what prospects the President had held out to him. He described the manner of the man – how he at one time enveloped himself in clouds of diplomacy and, at another, spoke of men and things with the greatest frankness, while at the same time, in spite of his apparent tacking, keeping his goal clearly in view.

"You haven't drawn a bad portrait of the man," said Uncle Ernst. "I know him very well, ever since 1847, when he sat at the extreme right in the General Assembly. Now he belongs to the opposition – I mean to the concealed opposition of the old solid Bureaucracy, which bears a grudge toward the all-powerful Major Domus and would like, rather, to put an end to his clever economy, the sooner the better. He is not one of the worst; and yet I could wish that you hadn't gone quite so far with him."

"I have not yet committed myself," said Reinhold, "and I shall not do so until I have convinced myself that I shall find in the position offered to me a sphere of action in keeping with my powers and qualifications. But, if that should be the case, then I should have to accept it."

"Should 'have to'? Why?"

"Because I have sworn to serve my country on land and sea," replied Reinhold, with a smile. "The land service I have completed; now I should like to try the sea service."

"It appears that 'service' has become a necessity with you," said Uncle Ernst with a grim smile. It was intended as scorn – so Reinhold felt it; but he was determined not to yield to his opponent on a point which concerned, not himself, but his most personal views and convictions.

"Why should I deny," he questioned, "that the rigid Prussian military discipline has made a very profound impression on me? With us, in a small Republican community, everything is a little lax; no one understands rightly the art of commanding, and no one will submit to commands. Then we go on board ship, where one alone commands and the others must obey. But no one has learned what he is now to do; the officers lack, only too often, the proper attitude; they proceed at random with abuse and noise, where a calm firm word would be more in place; another time they let things go at sixes and sevens, and give free rein when they should keep a tight rein. The men, for their part, are the less able to endure such irregular treatment, as they are mostly rough fellows, only waiting for the opportunity to throw off restraint, which chafes them. So things do not move without friction of all sorts, and one may thank God if things don't come to a worse pass, and even to the worst, as indeed they unfortunately do, frequently enough, and as has happened to me more than once. And if one has been able to maintain authority without mishap during a long voyage and has finally established order and discipline among the men, by that time one is again in harbor; and on the next voyage the dance begins again. In the army none of this is to be found. Every one knows in advance that unconditional obedience is his first and last duty; indeed, what is still more important, every one, even the roughest, feels that disobedience is not simply a misdemeanor but folly, which, if it were permitted in even the slightest case, would of necessity destroy the whole organization – that our enormous, strangely complicated mechanism, which we call the Army, can work only when every one of the smallest wheels, and every one of the smallest cogs in the smallest wheel, performs in its place and time exactly what is prescribed."