Memoirs of Bertha von Suttner (Vol. 1 of 2) - the records of an eventful life.

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Title: Memoirs of Bertha von Suttner (Vol. 1 of 2) - the records of an eventful life.
Author: Suttner, Bertha Von
Language: English
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(VOL. 1 OF 2) ***

MEMOIRS OF BERTHA VON SUTTNER

[Illustration: _Bertha v. Suttner_]

MEMOIRS OF BERTHA VON SUTTNER
THE RECORDS OF AN EVENTFUL LIFE

AUTHORIZED TRANSLATION

VOLUME I

PUBLISHED FOR THE INTERNATIONAL SCHOOL OF PEACE
GINN AND COMPANY, BOSTON AND LONDON
1910

=The Athnæum Press=
GINN AND COMPANY · PROPRIETORS BOSTON · U.S.A.

PREFACE
TO MY ENGLISH AND AMERICAN READERS

It is a great gratification to me that the story of my life—which I
cannot suppose to be of general interest except in so far as it is
linked with the story of a world-wide movement—is now put before the
great community of the English-speaking nations; for it is in these very
nations that the origin of that movement is to be sought, and by them
its final victory is being most efficiently hastened. I have been
brought to a clear recognition of this fact especially by the days I
have spent in the United States and in England in recent years. There I
perceived with astonishment and admiration how in these two countries
(especially in America) the peace problem, still largely antagonized or
ignored on the continent of Europe, has not only met with widespread
comprehension but also received already a positive and practical working
out. Little of this is told in the present book; yet in it I have set
down the fact that the reading of English scholars and thinkers (Herbert
Spencer, Henry Thomas Buckle, etc.) was what opened my mind to take in
the peace cause, and furthermore that a tract of the London Peace
Association presided over by Hodgson Pratt, accidentally coming to my
knowledge, gave the initial occasion for all that I have endeavored to
do as a helper in the peace movement.

In the year 1904 I came to America on the occasion of the Boston
Congress. Of the sublime impressions that I there received I give a
brief and fragmentary account in the supplementary chapter appended to
this edition. In the year 1907 I attended the Interparliamentary
Conference in London, and there had opportunity to hear
Campbell-Bannerman speak; his proposals for the limitation of armaments,
and for a League of Peace among states, bore renewed witness to the
pacifist disposition of British statesmen. A year later, while the Peace
Congress was being held in London, it was my privilege to meet the King
and Queen of England; and in words that I heard from the mouth of Edward
VII, and in those which he caused to be written to me by his private
secretary, Lord Knollys, I have confirmation of the fact that the name
by which he has passed into history, Edward the Peacemaker, is in full
measure his due.

At the last moment, just as I am writing these lines, the question of
the peace of the world has led to the taking of remarkable steps in
America. The most prominent men in the Union—Taft, Roosevelt, Elihu
Root, Knox, etc.—are coming forward with positive proposals for the
organization of the world, and the House of Representatives has accepted
a most significant law. Of this one of the greatest American workers for
peace writes me as follows in a letter dated from Skibo Castle, June 30,
1910:

... The greatest news received lately is the passing of a bill by the
House and Senate of the United States, establishing a commission to
take measures to bring about a League of Peace among nations. Mr.
Roosevelt is to be chairman. This means business. America is now in
earnest. We hope she will no longer be dragd into enormous armaments.
The good work goes bravely on.

Always yours
Andrew Carnegie

Yes, indeed: our brothers of the English-speaking race—especially those
in the young New World—“mean business” when they undertake anything. And
their enterprises are not (as an old prejudice assumes) limited to the
commercial and financial domain, but embrace the region of the highest
human thought, and rest upon the deepest ethical foundations.

BERTHA V. SUTTNER

VIENNA, 1910

CONTENTS OF VOLUME I

PART ONE

PAGE

I. CHILDHOOD 3

My certificate of baptism. The revolution of 1848. Landgrave
Fürstenberg. The feather ball. Castle Matzen.

II. EARLY YOUTH 20

Elvira. Playing “puff.” My mother’s singing. Clairvoyant Aunt
Lotti. Roulette and trente-et-quarante. Castles in the air. My
first journey. Season in Wiesbaden. Return. Grillparzer and
Ebner-Eschenbach at Elvira’s. Radetzky’s death. A schoolgirl
romance.

III. AN AUTOGRAPH ALBUM 57

Anastasius Grün. Friedrich Halm. Grillparzer. Wagner. Lenau’s
sister. Military autographs. King Ludwig of Bavaria. Schiller’s
daughter. Liebig. Schücking. Mädler. Körner. Anderssen. Meyerbeer.
Rückert. Hebbel. Gregorovius. Lamartine. Victor Hugo. Manzoni.
Dickens.

IV. MORE EPISODES OF YOUTH 70

The War of 1859. A prank. Elvira’s marriage.

PART TWO

V. ENTERING THE WORLD 81

Engaged. The engagement ended. Baden. Marietta. Season in Rome.
Carnival at Venice.

VI. A SEASON IN HOMBURG VOR DER HÖHE 95

Our way of living. My first singing lessons. The Princess of
Mingrelia. Tsar Alexander II. Adelina Patti.

VII. HERACLIUS OF GEORGIA 109

A disappointed dream of love.

VIII. NOVITIATE IN ART 119

Back to Baden. Singing lessons. Great hopes. A test before Madame
Viardot.

IX. THE YEAR 1866 132

Return. Elvira’s death. Fürstenberg’s death. The war. Homburg once
more. Back to Baden. Baron Koller.

X. RESIDENCE IN PARIS 144

Singing lessons resumed. Maître Duprez. The school in the Rue
Laval. In the house of the Princess of Mingrelia. In the imperial
box at the opera. Summer at Duprez’s place in the country. Return
to Paris. Princess Salomé’s engagement. Prince Achille Murat. The
wedding. With the young couple. Off to Baden-Baden.

XI. SEASON IN BADEN-BADEN 158

Resumption of trente-et-quarante. Baroness Seutter. Acquaintance
with King William I of Prussia. A letter from the king.

XII. PARIS AGAIN 163

Return to Paris. Renunciation of an artistic career. A dream of
Australian gold. Betrothal of Heraclius of Georgia.

XIII. THE YEAR 1870–1871 172

Resumption of music study in Milan. Outbreak of the Franco-German
War. My double existence in the world of books. Return of the
victorious troops to Berlin.

XIV. PRINCE WITTGENSTEIN 177

Duet practice and betrothal. Art journey and—end. Letters from
Castle Wittgenstein.

PART THREE

XV. IN THE SUTTNER HOUSE 191

Resolve to take a position. The Suttner family. Artur Gundaccar
von Suttner. Life in the Vienna _palais_ and in Schloss
Harmannsdorf. The Exposition year. Secret love. Letters from the
Princess of Mingrelia. Marriage of Prince Niko. Zogelsdorf quarry.
Three happy years. I tear myself away. Departure.

XVI. THE ZENITH OF HAPPINESS 207

Arrival in Paris. Alfred Nobel’s personality. Unendurable agony of
separation. Two dispatches. A plan of action. Arrival at Vienna.
Blissful meeting. At last and forever united.

PART FOUR

XVII. WEDDING JOURNEY 217

On the Black Sea. Jason mood. Arrival in Asia. The hotel in Poti.
Kutais. Count Rosmorduc. Reception at Prince Zeretelli’s. National
dances. Journey to Gordi. Prince Niko with escort comes to meet
us. Arrival at Gordi. Ceremonious reception.

XVIII. IN KUTAIS (1877) 227

Lessons. Rumors of war and outbreak of war. Red Cross fever. The
plague on the horizon. Bad times. Conclusion of peace. Mathilde.
Beginning of literary career.

XIX. TIFLIS 237

Another summer in Gordi. Business projects. Removal to Tiflis.
Princess Tamara of Georgia. Our manner of life. Double position.
Continued authorship. Illness.

XX. ZUGDIDI 242

The capital of Mingrelia. Our little house. Labors on the Murat
estate. Social life at the Murats’ and the Dedopali’s. Lonely
summer at Zugdidi. New literary labors. Prototype of _Es Löwos_.
New horizons. Study together.

XXI. OUR LAST DAYS IN THE CAUCASUS 251

The Dedopali’s death. Death of my mother. Prospect of coming home.
Translation of “The Tiger’s Skin.” Sojourn in a Mingrelian
village. A bit of Georgian history. Queen Tamara.

PART FIVE

XXII. AT HOME 263

Departure from the Caucasus. First destination, Görz. Return to
Harmannsdorf. Family life and neighborly visits. Literary
correspondence. Writers’ convention in Berlin.

XXIII. A WINTER IN PARIS 275

_Schriftstellerroman_ and _Das Maschinenzeitalter_. Journey to
Paris. Renewed acquaintance with Alfred Nobel. The Schnäbele
affair. Madame Adam’s salon. Princess Tamara of Georgia in Paris.
Max Nordau. A ball in the _palais_ of the _Revue des deux mondes_.
Victor Cherbuliez. Ludovic Halévy. Alphonse Daudet.

XXIV. THERE IS A PEACE MOVEMENT 287

Return from Paris. International Peace Association. _Das
Maschinenzeitalter_ by “Jemand.” Anonymity attains its end.
Bartholomäus von Carneri. At the Carneri table. In the hotel
Meissl.

XXV. _DIE WAFFEN NIEDER_ 294

How the plan for the book originated. Study of sources. The model
of my hero. Satisfaction in writing the word “End.” Unanimously
rejected by the editors. The publisher’s scruples. Publication.
How the book was received. Favorable and hostile criticisms.
Personal contact with the peace movement resulting from the novel.
The Peace Congress of 1889 in Paris. Founding of
Interparliamentary Union.

XXVI. INTERCOURSE WITH FRIENDS 303

In port. Trip to Vienna. Literary circles. Balduin Groller.
Theodor Herzl. Letter from Count Hoyos. Letter from Friedrich
Bodenstedt.

XXVII. MENTONE AND VENICE 312

The news of the Crown Prince’s death. Sojourn in Mentone. Octave
Mirbeau. A winter in Venice. Old acquaintances. Princess Tamara
and Marietta Saibante. Visit of Felix Moscheles to the widow
“Tillings.” Moscheles as peace propagandist. Formation of a
section in Venice through Marquis Pandolfi. The Grelix. The
Princess of Montenegro. Princess Hatzfeld, born Von Buch. A memory
of Cosima Wagner.

PART SIX

XXVIII. THE AUSTRIAN INTERPARLIAMENTARY GROUP IS FORMED 325

Return. Skeptical reception of my reports. Resumption of our
literary labors. Pandolfi suggests enlisting recruits in the
Austrian parliament for the conference at Rome. Correspondence
with members: Baron Kübeck, Pernerstorfer, Dr. Jaques, Dr. Exner.
The group is formed, Baron Pirquet turning the scale.

XXIX. FOUNDING OF THE AUSTRIAN PEACE SOCIETY 335

Appeal in the _Neue Freie Presse_. Response from the public.
Adhesions and contributions of money. Prosper von Piette sends a
thousand florins. Dr. Kunwald. Preliminary meeting. Joining the
International League. Circular for the formation of a national
union. Letter from the Duke of Oldenburg. Permanent organization.
Voices from members of the world’s intellectual aristocracy.

XXX. UNION FOR RESISTANCE TO ANTI-SEMITISM 348

A. G. von Suttner, Count Hoyos, Baron Leitenberger, and Professor
Nothnagel found the Union. Article in the _Neue Freie Presse_.

XXXI. THE CONGRESS IN ROME 356

Frame of mind. Life together in the Hotel Quirinal. General Türr
and his career. Little revolution against Bonghi. Alsace-Lorraine.
The Grelix couple. Baron Pirquet. Opening festival on the Capitol.
Ruggero Bonghi as chairman. Weighty words. Founding of the Bern
Central Bureau. Echoes. The monthly _Die Waffen nieder_ is
launched. A. H. Fried. “The Important Thing.”

PART SEVEN

XXXII. HOME AND FRIENDS 377

We two. Business troubles. Deaths. Family life at Castle Stockern.
Home theater. The twelfth of June. Visit of Prince André Dadiani.

XXXIII. LETTERS FROM ALFRED NOBEL 384

XXXIV. IN BERLIN AND HAMBURG 389

My review. Invitation to Berlin. A. H. Fried and his plans. The
reading. The Berlin _Tageblatt_ on a letter from Frédéric Passy. A
banquet. Voices from the press. Evening at Spielhagen’s. Dinner at
Mosse’s. The Empress Frederick. Professor W. Meyer does us the
honors of “Urania.” Excursion to Hamburg. An evening tea with Hans
Land, Dr. Löwenberg, Otto Ernst, and Detlev von Liliencron. A
letter of Liliencron’s.

XXXV. MORITZ VON EGIDY 400

His confession of faith. Further development. Candidacy for the
Reichstag. From his address to the electors. On the fear of
revolution. Idealists in act. My first meeting with Egidy. Visit
at his home. Consistency of preaching and practice. A letter from
Egidy.

XXXVI. VARIOUS OPINIONS 414

Letters from Alphonse Daudet, Paul Heyse, the Bishop of Durham,
Ruggero Bonghi, and Count Kamarofski.

XXXVII. THE BERN SESSIONS 420

Journey to Switzerland. Poem by Count Hoyos. Letter from Prince
Camillo Starhemberg. Opening of the Congress. First impulse to
arbitration treaties, from America. League of European states.
Social life of the Congressists. Arturo de Marcoartu. Alfred Nobel
complies with my invitation. On the lake of Lucerne. A parable by
Ruchonnet. Protest against distorted reports. A lively debate.
Arrival of the Interparliamentarians. The Conference. A prophetic
toast.

XXXVIII. VISIT TO ALFRED NOBEL 435

Arrival at Zurich. Nobel begins to take an interest in the peace
movement, and joins us. Trips on the lake. A glimpse into his
views of life. His first project for an act in furtherance of the
cause of peace.

XXXIX. ESTABLISHMENT OF THE GERMAN PEACE SOCIETY IN BERLIN 440

PART ONE
1843–1861

I
CHILDHOOD
My certificate of baptism · The revolution of 1848 · Landgrave
Fürstenberg · The Feather Ball · Castle Matzen

What gives me some justification for publishing my experiences is the
fact that I have met many interesting and distinguished contemporaries,
and that my participation in a movement which has gradually grown to be
of historic consequence has given me many glimpses into the political
affairs of our time; and that hence, all in all, I have something to say
that is really worth publishing.

Of course, if I meant to tell only of this period of my life, I should
have to confine myself to the history of the past fifteen or twenty
years, and wholly forego conjuring up pictures from my youth; and I
should have to deny myself the writing down of those personal
recollections which my whole changeful life has stamped upon my memory.
But I will not deny myself this. Now that I have been induced by the
above-mentioned reason to write my memoirs, it shall be a genuine record
of a life. Once again shall the stages of the long journey come in due
order before my inward eye, and from them what seems to me suitable for
reproduction shall be photographed on these pages.

So, without further exordium, let us begin:

The beginning of all human life is birth. Where and when and in what
environment I came into the world is most authentically shown by my
certificate of baptism. Here is the copy of that document:

CERTIFICATE OF BAPTISM

ad W.E. 200

From the Register of Births and Baptisms of the Parish of St.
Maria-Schnee, Lib. XIII, pg. 176, it is hereby officially certified
that in the year one thousand eight hundred and forty-three (1843) on
the ninth day of June was born in S.C. 697/2, and on the twentieth day
of the same month was baptized in accordance with the use of the
Catholic Christian Church by the then parish priest, the Reverend
Father Thomas Bazán,

Bertha Sophia Felicita Countess Kinsky of Chinic and Tettau,
legitimate (posthumous) daughter of the Right Honorable Franz Joseph
Count Kinsky of Chinic and Tettau, retired Royal and Imperial
Lieutenant Field-Marshal and Actual Chamberlain, born in Vienna—a
legitimate son of his Excellency the Right Honorable Ferdinand Count
Kinsky of Chinic and Tettau, Royal and Imperial Chamberlain and Grand
Steward and seigneur of the domain of Chlumec, by his wife the
Honorable Lady Christine, born Princess Liechtenstein—and his wife,
the Honorable Lady Sophia Wilhelmine Countess Kinsky of Chinic and
Tettau, born Von Körner, born in Prague (a legitimate daughter of the
Honorable Herr Joseph von Körner, Captain of Cavalry in the Royal and
Imperial Army, by his wife Frau Anna, born Hahn).

The sponsors at the christening were Barbara Kraticek, lady’s maid,
and the Honorable Herr Arthur Count Kinsky of Chinic and Tettau.
Midwife Frau Sabina Jerábek of S.C. 124.

Hereto witness the hand of the undersigned, and the parish seal.

Prague, Parish of St. Maria-Schnee, November 27, 1866

Dr. (illegible)
Minister at St. Maria-Schnee

At this christening service—though I vowed and abjured so many things in
it—I was not present. For I do not understand by the word “I” the living
corporeal form in which it is contained, but that self-consciousness
which is absent both in infancy and also at frequent intervals
throughout life: in sleep, in fainting, in narcotic stupefaction, under
the influence of drugs, and in a great many moments when one merely
breathes and does not think, look, hear; when one merely continues his
existence vegetatively until the I resumes its functions.

Prague, then, was the city where they set up my cradle, over which, as
over all cradles, so much was unprophesied. But my mother, who at my
birth was already a widow, soon moved to Brünn, and what I remember of
childhood is events that took place in the Moravian capital.

There I see myself standing by the window—five years old—and looking
down into the “great square,” where a noisy throng is in wild commotion.
A new word strikes upon my ear,—Revolution. Every one is looking out;
every one is repeating the new word and is greatly excited. What my
sensations were I no longer remember, but at any rate I too was excited,
else the picture and the word would not have impressed themselves on my
mind. But there is no more to it. The picture does not arouse any
comprehension; the word has no meaning. Thus appears my first experience
of a historical event.

But my memory reaches farther back, and shows me a scene which I was
concerned in at the age of three, and which stirred me far more
powerfully than the political overturnings of the year 1848.

I am about three years old. It is a beautiful afternoon, and my mother
and my guardian are planning to take me with them to a picnic in the
Schreibwald. The Schreibwald, a favorite place for excursions from
Brünn, shines among my memories of childhood as the sum of all natural
beauty, festive joy, woodland shade, mountain-climbing, social meals,—in
a word, as the acme of that combination of delights known as a picnic.
At that date, on the memorable afternoon, all these experiences were
doubtless not yet part of my consciousness; perhaps it was the very
first time I was to be taken to the Schreibwald; but to me the name was
forever afterwards associated with the following event.

They dressed me in a white cashmere frock trimmed with narrow red braid.
A superb thing—décolleté; I can still see before me the pattern of the
braiding, I could draw it on paper. How the onlookers would marvel when
they espied that! I felt myself beautiful in it, positively beautiful.
And then my guardian, looking out of the window (I can see him too in
his general’s uniform), remarked that it was clouding up, it would
probably rain. There followed a short session of the cabinet,—the
general, my mother, and the chambermaid Babette,—and the decision was
announced: the beautiful new frock might suffer harm.

“Put an old frock on the countess,” was my mother’s command. But the
countess declared most positively that she protested against it. I am in
the new frock: _j’y suis, j’y reste_; with this plagiarism thirty years
in advance of its original she made known her inflexible will. Perhaps,
as a matter of fact, not so much with words as with shrieks and stamping
of feet.

But consequently the next picture in this indelible picture gallery
shows me the brilliantly clad, beautiful, and energetic creature laid on
a large table, her face against the table-top, her red-embroidered frock
lifted by the obliging hand of the tall army man who stood by; and from
the maternal hand, slap, slap, the first whipping, with its burden of
despair and dishonor, came down on the object.

Yes, despair: that there could be such great woe in the world, and the
world not go to pieces under it, was most likely incomprehensible to me.
At last the wild sobbing subsided; I was stood in a corner and had to
beg for pardon—the victim of such grievous outrage, beg for pardon into
the bargain! But I did; unhappy I was, deeply unhappy, but subdued.
To-day I do not know why this occurrence made such a deep impression on
my soul; was it injured vanity on account of the ravishing frock, or
injured honor on account of the disciplinary procedure? Probably both.

Still another picture is fixed in my memory. Oh, I must have been a very
vain and pleasure-loving little ninny! My mother comes into the nursery;
she is wearing a beautiful gown, such as I have never yet seen on her,
and jewelry on her bare neck: mamma is going to the ball, and they
explain to me that this is a festivity where all are dressed so
beautifully as that and dance in rooms that are all lighted up. I want
to be taken with her, to go to the ball too. “Yes, my little roly-poly
is going to the ball too.” (I scream with delight.) “To the Feather Ball
she is going.” With that the beautiful mamma kisses me and goes. “So,”
says Babette, “now we will get ready for the Feather Ball.” And she
begins to undress me, which I permit in joyful anticipation. But when,
instead of being dressed in my best, I am put to bed and learn that this
is the Feather Ball, I break out in wild sobbing, deceived, trifled
with, humiliated.

I must delay a moment over the portrait of my guardian. It cast a
friendly radiance over all my childhood and early youth. Friedrich,
Landgrave of Fürstenberg, had been the comrade and friend of my deceased
father, and he faithfully fulfilled till his death the duties which he
had undertaken as guardian and protector and watchful friend to the
fatherless child. I simply worshiped him; I regarded him as a being of a
higher race, to whom I owed and gladly rendered unconditional obedience,
honor, and love. He was an elderly gentleman, past fifty, when I came
into the world; and, such being the way of children in judging age, he
seemed to me ever so old, but ever so dear. So smiling, so jolly, so
lordly, so indescribably kind. That confectionery that he used to bring
with him! those rich Christmas presents that he gave me! that care for
my education, my health, my future!

Lordly—he was a lord in fact. A member of the proudest Austrian
nobility, Master of the Ordnance, ultimately captain of the
_Arcièrengarde_, one of the highest positions at the court. He was never
absent at any of the great court functions, and brought me such lovely
bonbons from every imperial dinner. His lofty station inspired me with
pride rather than awe. For me he was “Fritzerl,” to whom I said _du_; on
whose knee I used to climb, as long as I was little, and pull his
mustache.

He died unmarried. His life was so methodically ordered, it ran its
course so free from cares and passions, between service and sociality,
that the wish to change it never arose in him. In Vienna he occupied
handsome bachelor quarters in the Inner City; in Moravia he had a domain
where he often spent a few weeks of the summer to see what his factors
were doing; but he preferred, instead of living in his own lonely
castle, to spend the summer months as a guest at the homes of his old
mother and his various sisters. He never took journeys. At the Austrian
boundarymonuments the world came to an end for him. Devotion, both
churchly and military, had an essential place, I will not say among the
virtues of his character, but among the virtues of his station in life.
He was never absent at any Sunday mass, any feast of the church, or any
parade. He had an enthusiasm for Field Marshal Radetzky, whom he had
known well personally. The glory of the Austrian army was in his eyes
one of the most admirable constituents of the universe. Society (by this
name he distinguished the circle in which he was born and in which he
moved) was to him the only class of human beings whose lives and fates
interested him; and he always attended all the great functions given at
the houses of the Schwarzenbergs, the Pallavacinis, etc. In the
Adelskasino he had his regular rubbers of whist with sundry friends of
his own rank. He was fond of card-playing in general—not gambling games,
for he was in the highest degree steady, but innocent games such as
piquet, omber, tarteln. This last he used to play with my mother at his
twice-a-week morning visit to our house, and I was allowed to sit by to
mark the points of the game with my little pencil. The various marriages
in society interested him greatly; he had a troop of nephews and nieces
who made more or less successful matches. He himself, though the male
line was to become extinct with him, did not think of marrying. The
reason was that he cherished an affection for a lady who, while she was
the widow of an aristocrat, was not by birth capable of being presented
at court, so a marriage with her appeared to be simply out of the
question. He would not cause such a vexation to his family—and at bottom
it would have been a vexation to him too; for everything that was out of
the rut, outside of tradition, outside of “correctness,” went against
his grain.

This figure stands before my memory as a type of the old-fashioned
Austrian: a type of which there are doubtless some specimens still, but
which, as is the fate of all types, is dying out. Our country is now
made up of Slavs, Germans, Croats, Italians, (it would not do at all to
say Magyars, they would grievously resent it,) and a few more
nationalities, but the collective name “Austrian” cannot again become a
proudly patriotic conception until—if ever—all the different races, with
individual autonomy, form a federative state as do the Germans, French,
and Italians in Switzerland. A friend of mine—a middle-class man, but
one who is made very welcome at court—was lately telling me of an
interview that he had with the Emperor not long ago. In the course of a
political conversation the Emperor asked him to what party he belonged:
“To the one which has only a single adherent, that is myself.” “And what
party is that?” “The Austrian, your Majesty.” “Well, how about me? don’t
you count me?” rejoined Franz Joseph, smiling.

—To come back to the past and my dear Fritzerl. It is a good thing that
he did not live to see the events of 1866. The defeats in Bohemia, the
severance of Venetia,—it would have cut him to the heart. And he would
have found it simply incomprehensible, as it were a calamity violating
all the laws of nature, and especially all divine ordinance. In that
conception of the world which characterizes the type that I refer to, an
essential point is the belief that Austria is the center of the world,
and that any disaster which befalls it—especially any disaster in
war—means an unnatural neglect of duty on the part of Providence. Unless
such defeats be meant as punishment, as merited chastisement for the
spread of unbelief, the dissolution of morals,[1] the dissemination of
revolutionary ideas. Then, surely, there is no help but by introducing
strict discipline, reorganizing the army vigorously; then perhaps the
Creator can be reconciled and the history of the world corrected by
future reconquests. Fritzerl was spared these pains and these
reflections.

If I said just now that there were still living some specimens of that
type, I was probably mistaken. It is simply impossible that to-day the
world is still mirrored in any head as it was mirrored in the heads of
those who were born within the eighteenth century, who lived during the
first introduction of the railway, who held the first photograph in
their hands, who saw with some repugnance the displacement of oil lamps
by petroleum. Essential to that old Austrian type (and it is the same
with the old English and other old national types) is a certain
limitation of experience and knowledge which to-day can no longer exist
even in the most conservative circles.

That types alter from generation to generation, that outlooks, views,
feelings change, is a fact of which one can best judge by one’s self
when one looks back into the past. For every man, though in most cases
he hugs the delusion of being a uniform continuous ego with definite
qualities of character, is himself a chain of the most diverse types.
Every new experience—leaving quite out of account the bodily changes of
blooming and fading, of health and disease—modifies the mental essence.
How much one sees, whether with the bodily eye as a landscape or with
the mental as an outlook on the world, is not a matter of stronger or
weaker eyesight, but peculiarly a matter of horizon.

If I look back into my childhood and youth, I do not see myself as the
same person, as having altered, but see standing side by side the most
diverse girl forms, each with a different horizon of ideas and filled
with different hopes, interests, and sensations. And if I set beside
them the forms from my maturer womanhood, or my present age, what have I
(beyond the mere recollection, as faint as the recollection of pictures
long since seen, or books long since read) in common with those
phantoms, or they with me? Dissolving mists, flying shadows, a passing
breath, is what life is.

My first love was no meaner a person than Franz Joseph I, Emperor of
Austria. To be sure I had never seen him,—only his picture,—but I
idolized him ardently. That he would marry me did not seem to me at all
beyond the bounds of possibility; on the contrary, fate owed me
something of the sort. Of course I should have to wait five or six years
yet, for I recognized that a ten-year-old child could not be made
empress. I should have to have bloomed out into a maiden of fifteen or
sixteen, the most beautiful maiden in the land; the young sovereign
would sometime espy me, enter into a conversation with me, be ravished
with my qualities of mind, and immediately lay his august person at my
feet. That was the time when I was convinced that the world had a
fairy-tale fortune ready for me. I exerted myself sincerely to deserve
it and to be ready to show brilliantly, when it came, that I had found
my right place; learning, learning, practicing, practicing, amazing
myself with my progress and knowledge. I was a real infant prodigy—in my
own eyes. It is true that I spoke French and English well (from my
earliest childhood I had had French and English _bonnes_), I played the
piano remarkably well, I had read an enormous deal: the Abbé Fleury’s
_Histoire de France, Le Siège de la Rochelle_; Victor Hugo’s _Ruy Blas_
and _Marie Tudor_; half of Schiller, Fladung’s Physics; “Jane Eyre,”
“Uncle Tom’s Cabin,”—those were the books (not children’s books, it will
be seen) in which I reveled at that age. Besides, I loved to dip into
the cyclopedia and pluck blossoms of all branches of knowledge. From
love of learning? I will not assert it; I think those lovely blossoms
seemed to me desirable only to make a wreath of for my adornment.

As an evil chance would have it, so soon as the year 1854—consequently I
was only eleven years old—Emperor Franz Joseph espied his cousin
Elisabeth, engaged in conversation with her, and laid his august person
at _her_ feet. I was not exactly unhappy (there are plenty more fairy
princes), but thenceforth I took a lively interest in Elisabeth of
Bavaria, sought for portraits of her, thought she bore some resemblance
to me, and imitated her way of doing her hair. You see, my actual
vehement passion for my young liege had died out some time since.
_Chiodo caccia chiodo_; the Italians use this proverb to illustrate the
fact that one love expels another.

On my eleventh birthday I had been taken to the theater for the first
time. “The White Lady”[2] was given. Ah, but that George Brown! (“What
joy to be a soldier!”) Yes, that is the comeliest profession—next to
that of opera tenor. For anything more captivating than that singer,—I
still remember his very name, Theodor Formes, so the impression must
have been deep,—anything more chivalrous I had never dreamed of. The
prince destined for me must look like that. He would not even have to be
a prince; only, if possible, in case he was not a tenor,—I would not
have given Herr Formes the mitten,—at any rate a soldier. In telling
this I see that I was a silly girl, to be sure, but not a genuine child.
That is probably due to my not having had any playmate of my own age,
but living only in the world of books, whose heroes were themselves not
children but grown people, whose fortunes turned mostly upon love and
marriage.

The most important thing in the universe, anyhow, was my little person.
The course of the world was only the machinery whose wheels were all
geared for the purpose of preparing a radiant good fortune for me. Was I
alone such a foolish, conceited child, or is this center-of-the-world
feeling a natural feeling in general among children and creatures of
limited intelligence? Is modesty a noble fruit which ripens only on the
tree of experience and knowledge?

It is just by this that the type of a man or of a class may be
authentically gauged—by _what appears important_. Of notable importance
to me in those days of childhood, besides the all-overtopping “I,” were
the Christmas festival; the great spring house-cleaning; the Old Ladies’
Home at Brünn; chestnut-gathering in the paths of the Augarten, carpeted
with autumn leaves; Fritzerl’s visits, my mother’s beautiful singing,
this mother’s axiomatic great love for me, and my love for her, which
was so great that when she went to Vienna for two or three days I would
sob for hours as if my heart were broken.

With such a circle of importance I might frame all the various sections
of my life, and thereby most clearly realize the phases, from that first
memory of the important pattern of braid on the white cashmere frock
down to the ideal of an assured international reign of law, which to-day
appears to me a thing so important as to discount everything else.

Here it is a question of something that is yet to come into existence,
and I think that attention to such things is but rare. Most people—and
with them I in the earlier epochs of my life—take the surrounding world
and the prevailing conditions as something given, axiomatic, almost
unalterable, upon whose origin one thinks but little, and upon making
any possible change in it not at all. As the air is here for breathing,
and one is not called upon to make any change in it, so the given social
order—political and moral—is here to furnish the atmosphere, the vital
air, of our social existence. Of course one does not think that in these
words, for the conception I speak of is altogether artless; that is, it
exists rather in sensation than in consciousness, just as we also,
without becoming conscious of it, draw breath constantly and do not
think of the quantity of nitrogen and oxygen in the air.

The recollection of a visit to the country in the year 1854 has remained
vividly fixed in my memory. To this day I see before me different
pictures of the castle, garden, and forest of the domain of Matzen,
while so many other scenes which I have since looked upon have vanished
from my memory. A peculiar camera it is that one carries in his head, in
which many pictures etch themselves so deeply and clearly, while others
leave no trace. It must be that the apparatus just snaps open for a
moment in the brain, but remains closed most of the time, so that the
outer world does not get photographed.

Then was not the first time that I had been at Matzen, but of the
earlier visit I have only a very dim idea. I only see myself carried
into the drawing-room in the nurse’s arms to be caressed there by the
lady of the house, Aunt Betty Kinsky, and her two grown daughters, Rosa
and Tinka. In the year 1854, when my mother was invited to Matzen again,
Aunt Betty no longer held sway there; she had died some years
previously, and the daughters had married away,—Rosa to a Baron Hahn in
Graz, Tinka to General Count Crenneville, commandant of the fortress of
Mainz. Mainz, you know, was at that time an Austrian garrison. How
things do shift on this changeable surface of our earth—where
everything, indeed, is in a continual process of change; but more
swiftly and unexpectedly than mountains and valleys, than the forests
and cities of a country, do its political boundaries and dependencies
change.

To come back to Matzen, which still stands on the same spot, but which I
have not seen again since then,—it was at that time under the dominion
of a newly married couple. On the same day when Emperor Franz Joseph
celebrated his wedding with Elisabeth of Bavaria, Count Christian
Kinsky, the present lord of Matzen and Angern, had brought home his
bride, Countess Therese Wrbna. A handsome and happy young couple.

A merrier, wittier man than “Christl” Kinsky cannot be imagined. To this
all Vienna society bears witness. Even at an advanced age, in the
anything but merry position of provincial marshal, he was able to bring
gayety and good humor even into the party-rent provincial assembly hall.

The castle, old and towered, stands on a wooded mountain; from the
second story a door leads out to a bit of level ground on which a
decorative garden is planted, and before the garden grill lies the
forest. A pavilion stands in the garden, and on the table in it lay
colored glasses, blue, yellow, red. They had me look out upon nature
through these (this memory dates from an earlier visit at Matzen, when I
was still quite small), and to see this blue forest, this yellow garden,
this green sky, was a magical surprise to me—I screamed with happiness.
Oh, there is nothing to beat having been just lately born, and feeling
as new everything—everything—that the world offers; tasting everything
for the first time. It would be fine to keep being born over again and
keep beginning everything over again from the start, traversing again
the magic realm of surprises that dazzles us with the first colored
glass, with the first Christmas-tree candle, somewhat later with the
first kiss, and always as an undreamed-of virgin country....

II
EARLY YOUTH
Elvira · Playing “puff” · My mother’s singing · Clairvoyant Aunt Lotti ·
Roulette and trente-et-quarante · Castles in the air · My first
journey · Season in Wiesbaden · Return · Grillparzer and
Ebner-Eschenbach at Elvira’s · Radetzky’s death · A schoolgirl romance

When I was nearly twelve years old I was for the first time vouchsafed
the good fortune of getting a companion of almost my own age.

A sister of my mother, known to me as Aunt Lotti, came on a visit,
accompanied by her only daughter, Elvira. We two girls were fired with
friendship for each other. I say “fired,” for our mutual affection was
an ardent one, and Elvira in particular showed a real adoration for me.

Aunt Lotti was the widow of a Saxon named Büschel, by occupation a
gentleman of leisure and bookworm. Elvira had, so to speak, grown up in
her father’s library. Büschel’s favorite department had been philosophy,
and he conversed with his little one mainly about Hegel, Fichte, and
Kant. For refreshment from such heavy diet he handed her Shakespeare.
And for very special sugarplums, Uhland, Körner, Hölderlin. Of course
the result of this education was a little bluestocking. Elvira had begun
writing at the age of eight,—songs, ballads, and the like,—and when I
made her acquaintance she had already composed several dramas in prose
and a few tragedies in verse. That she was to become the greatest
poetess of the century was a settled thing in her mind, in Aunt Lotti’s,
and in mine. Perhaps she would have, if an early death had not snatched
her away. She did win the recognition of great connoisseurs—I name only
Grillparzer, who read her pieces with admiring amazement and prophesied
a great future for her. In our family circle her genius was undisputed.
And she had that quality which stands for half of genius, iron-faced
industry. Every day she—the child—voluntarily spent three or four
consecutive hours at the writing-desk and wrote, wrote, wrote. Often she
had several pieces of work on the stocks,—a story, a drama, and various
poems in between. I remember the titles of some of the large pieces: one
was called “Karl the Sixth,” another “Delascar.” The name of this last
hero (I think he was a Moor) particularly pleased me, and seemed to me
to be of itself a guaranty of success. Whether these dramas were ever
completed I do not remember. I know I made their acquaintance in the
form of outlines—it was only individual scenes that were already
finished, certain especially effective monologues. Elvira was an
indefatigable user of the file. If on one day she had read to us a great
speech of Delascar’s, she often let us hear on the next day an entirely
new edition of the same speech.

To me her future renown was a tenet of faith. And she did not doubt the
fairy-tale fortune that life must bring to me; for, though she conceded
my intellectual inferiority (there was not a vestige of literary
tendency in me, the lyre was no more my instrument than the French
horn), she had unbounded admiration for my physical endowments and
social talents—I must become a great lady and take all hearts by storm.
As may be seen, we did not fail in mutual appreciation, and this was the
soil in which our friendship flourished so luxuriantly.

Elvira did not hope any social successes for herself. She was conscious
of her bashfulness and her lack of beauty. Small, with too large a head,
a Schiller head, she was certainly not a pretty girl; besides, she was
awkward in her movements, helpless in conversation,—no, as a woman she
would assuredly never please, while she was convinced (a conviction
which I shared) that I as such would achieve all sorts of triumphs. She
contented herself with the part destined to her, to become the Sappho of
the nineteenth century. A modest little pair of cousins, it must be
confessed!

So we were friends and swore lifelong fidelity to each other; we were
playmates too. But he who at this word imagines that we played together
with dolls or hoops, as would have befitted our age, is mistaken. We
played “puff.” That was a game invented by us, named so by ourselves,
with which we used to amuse ourselves, for hours at a time.

It consisted in this: we acted a comedy. Elvira took the part of the
hero, I of the heroine. The hero kept changing: now it was a French
marquis, now a Spanish student, or a rich English lord, or a young navy
officer, or a statesman who has come to rather mature years, often a
king appearing incognito; but I always represented myself, the heroine
was always Bertha Kinsky, mostly sixteen or seventeen years old, but in
many combinations already getting elderly—say twenty-two or
twenty-three. The comedy usually ended with a marriage; but there were
occasions when the hero died—then, naturally, it was a tragedy.

Before the game began, the time and place of the action were specified,
the hero’s name and description had to be settled, and a situation
prescribed. For example: In the year 1860 Bertha would be staying at a
castle near Moscow as the guest of the Russian ambassador’s wife. The
lady’s brother, Prince Alexander Alexandrovitch Rassumof, a very gloomy
and melancholy misanthrope, tall, elegant, dressed in black, with
uncannily gleaming eyes, is among the inmates of the house, but rarely
shows himself. He is understood to have been through a great misfortune
(a dark story of a false woman, of an opponent shot in a duel—the
particulars are not known) and to have withdrawn from the world. The
scene represents the garden, on the bank of a pond where a few swans are
gliding. I am sitting on a bench under a weeping willow with a book in
my hand, and from a side alley comes, buried in deep thought,—Alexander
Alexandrovitch. Now, after this was settled, the game could begin, and
we said “Puff.” By this magic word we were transformed into the dramatis
personæ—I into the seventeen-year-old Bertha, Elvira into the mysterious
Russian. And the dialogue began. If we wanted to interrupt the game for
a moment, we said “Puff,” and straightway we were again the two little
cousins, telling each other something: a scenic remark, such as “This
pencil means a pistol,” or perhaps something private that had no
connection with the game. And only when “Puff” was pronounced again was
the dialogue resumed. To indicate that the one or the other changed
color we had special signs: a quick and slight inflation of the cheeks
meant a faint blush; vigorous inflation, repeated a few times, meant
“suffused with crimson”; a swift, lightning-like drawing down of the
corners of the mouth was turning pale; a complete rolling over of the
under lip was downright ghostly pallor. The course that the piece was to
take was not sketched in advance, but was left to the spontaneous
development of the conversations and feelings, for in it we really felt
awaking interest in each other, budding affection, and usually, to end
with, glowing love that led to union for life. Such a dialogized novel
often lasted for days; for we could not go on playing without
interruption, since we were called away by other occupations,—lessons,
walks, meals, etc. The presence of our mothers did not always disturb
us: we sat down in another corner of the room, out of hearing, said
“Puff,” and the gloomy Alexander, or whatever was the name of the hero
of the day, was there again. To be sure we liked the game better when we
were alone, for then the dialogue could be accompanied with telling
gestures, and emotion could be expressed by raising our voices. When
such a comedy was played through, a new hero and a new situation must be
devised. Not always did something suggest itself; if not, we sat or
walked together in a state of sober paff, or chatted, till suddenly the
one or the other cried _Wasatem_. (Abbreviation for _Ich weiss ein
Thema_, “I know a topic.”) If the proposed topic seemed good and
interesting, then the word was “Puff,” and the transformation was
accomplished.

I remember that once, when we were playing in our corner of the room,
Aunt Lotti, busy with embroidery at the other end, called out, “There, I
don’t like your cough a bit, Elvira! So dry and so obstinate—we shall
have to ask the doctor.” Now Elvira had at that time no cough whatever,
but we had for several days been engaged in an extraordinarily touching
game of puff, in which the lover was a consumptive doomed to death.

I have spoken of my mother’s beautiful singing. This singing played a
great and influential part in my childhood and later life. My mother
always regarded it as a tragical missing of her vocation that she had
not become an opera singer. In her early youth a famous Italian maestro
had tested her voice and given her the assurance that no such soprano
had been heard since Grisi, Pasta, and Malibran, and to this was to be
added her dazzling presence; in short, the loftiest triumphs, the
richest harvests of gold, would have lain open to the beautiful girl if
she had adopted the theatrical career. Such was the opinion of the
maestro, who also undertook to give her singing lessons after the old
Italian method, and had, among other things, brought it to pass that she
gave Norma’s entrance recitative with full-toned and tragic power, again
putting to shame all the Grisis, Pastas, and Malibrans. But neither my
grandparents nor “Aunt Claudius,” who had taken charge of my mother and
brought her up, would hear a word of the theater, which in those days
was still regarded as a sink of iniquity; and mamma’s Norma recitative
never rang out on the boards, but very often thereafter in my nursery
(where our piano stood), and imprinted itself on my soul as the ne plus
ultra of womanly heroism and of operatic art. Druid priestess and
mistletoe bough, passion, sublimity,—thus stood in my imagination the
gleaming picture of Norma, enveloped in sweetest magic of melody, in
unearthly potency of voice.

To her old age my mother felt it as an affront, as a deprivation of all
the treasures that nature by her wonderous gifts had destined for her,
that she had not been allowed to take a course of training for the
theater. Indeed, if I should prove to have inherited this voice, she
might perhaps then be able to experience in her daughter the same
triumphs that she had missed; but of course the theatrical career would
be still more out of place for a Countess Kinsky than it would have been
for Fräulein von Körner, and it would not have done even to tell of such
an idea to Fritzerl. Nor did any wish for it awake in me myself. I saw
my future plainly before me, it was marked out for me in our daily games
of puff: to be grown up and introduced into the world, to have hearts
and offers of marriage flying to me, to meet the one, the only one, to
whom my heart too would fly, because he was the most aristocratic, the
most beautiful, the wisest, richest, and noblest of all. What he would
offer to me, and I richly pay back to him, would be perfect and lifelong
happiness.

It was soon manifest, too, that I had not a phenomenal voice; and only
in such a case could my mother have contemplated the project of an
artistic career for me, so there was no more talk of that possibility.

Whether my mother really possessed such a splendid voice as that maestro
had persuaded her, and talent with it, of course I could not judge, but
I took it on trust as a part of my creed; her singing pleased me very
much, but what does a child understand? When I now go back to that time
in thought, doubts come up in my mind, for her repertory was very
dilettantish. Besides that Norma recitative and the immediately
following adagio, _Casta diva_, she sang only the very easiest songs,
making such a selection as—in my present judgment—does not itself give
reason for inferring an artistic taste. To be sure, at that time there
were no songs by Wolff and Brahms, not to say Richard Strauss; but even
in those days pieces like _Du hast Diamanten und Perlen_, “Spanish
Serenade,” _Blau Äugelein, Gute Nacht du mein herziges Kind_, “Oh, tell
me, will she come to pray upon my grave,” and the like, belonged in the
category of street songs and sentimental trash. She was not a pianist,
so she could not accompany herself. Three times a week she sang for an
hour accompanied by my piano teacher. If he brought a new song she had
him play the voice part with the accompaniment, and the learning was a
prolonged and toilsome task for her. From all this I now conclude that
she was by no means a musical genius; and it takes that, aside from the
strength, volume, and tunefulness of the voice, to be a Pasta, Grisi,
Malibran, or a Henriette Sontag. My mother told many stories of the
fortunes and victories of these celebrated stars; then with the story
there sounded the undertone that she had been deprived of enjoying the
like successes, and the feeling fastened itself upon me that a great
singer was a marvelous sort of being at whose feet all contemporaries
knelt in adoration.

My dear mother’s was altogether a rather enthusiastic, high-keyed
temperament. Often she gave expression to her feelings in poems; but she
had no ambition or vanity connected with this branch of her talents. She
did not think herself a gifted poet; but she never lost the conviction
that she _could_ have been in music a star of the first magnitude.

Soon we had still more leisure to carry on our games of puff, Elvira and
I. Our two mothers took a trip to the baths in the summer of the year
1855, and we two stayed at home under the charge of a governess. Their
destination was Wiesbaden. The two ladies liked it so well there that in
the early summer of the next year they went there again, and this
time,—oh indescribable ecstasy—they took us with them. The first
considerable journey in my life! Up to that time I had only been taken a
few times to Vienna for two or three days, and that had been to me each
time a festal occasion; but now a real journey to foreign parts, a
prospective stay of weeks or perhaps months in a famous resort—it was
too heavenly!

Besides, utility was to be combined with pleasure there. For nothing
less was intended than to carry off one or two millions from the
gaming-table. Aunt Lotti regarded herself as a clairvoyant. She was
always having to do with presentiments, dreams, magnetic sleep, and such
things. During the epidemic of table-tipping she had also been an
extraordinary medium. Under her fingers the tables danced and leaped,
and then even cupboards that weighed hundreds of pounds, etc. I often
saw it myself; and when I helped form the chain there was such a
coruscating “fluid” coming into my finger-tips too, that everything that
I touched—the tables, the piano teacher’s tall hat, and the piano
itself—began to run around. I remember it clearly, and could therefore
come out as a palmary witness for table-tipping if I were not
distrustful of the testimony of a child’s perception. It may have been
imagination. But Aunt Lotti would not let any doubts be raised as to the
whole sphere of the occult in general. Nothing could offend her more
than not to acknowledge her gift of second sight.

In other respects she was a very sensible woman, and, as the widow of a
scholar who had made her a participant in his intellectual concerns, she
was many-sided in her culture and free-thinking in her tendencies; so
her vein of occultism could not be taken as childish superstition. There
was something else too. She often suffered from convulsions, and readily
fell into hypnotic sleep, which in those days was not yet called by that
name but by that of magnetic sleep, and the visions of which were rated
as clairvoyance. The result was that she regarded these phenomena, which
lay beyond the range of her normal waking life, as an especially
mysterious power of her own, a power of vision reaching into the future.

During her stay at Wiesbaden the preceding year she had learned that
when she went into the roulette room a number came into her mind, and
then this number won. She did not play, she only noticed this in
silence. My mother preferred to look on at the playing in the
trente-et-quarante room, and she thought she perceived in herself too
the gift of foreseeing when black won. She too did not play; but when
they were back from the journey neither of the two sisters could get rid
of the idea that it would really be an easy thing for them to get a
colossal fortune out of the German banks.

But such a thing was not to be lightly undertaken; it was essential to
test the phenomenon. So Aunt Lotti got a little bag with thirty-six
numbers and a zero, my mother six packs of cards, and now a systematic
test was carried out. Aunt Lotti threw herself into a sort of trance by
fixed staring and concentrated thinking, till a number flashed through
her brain; then Elvira put her hand in the bag and drew out a number. To
be sure, it was not invariably the foreseen one, but very often an
adjoining or similar one. For instance, the seer’s number was 5 and the
drawn one was 6 (adjoining) or 25 (similar); so the method was
determined to be that the transversals of the number thought of should
be bet on. Only those who know roulette will understand me; I consider
it superfluous to make myself clearer to others, as I have not the least
intention of starting a propaganda for Aunt Lotti’s system of play.
Regular accounts were kept of the losses and winnings, and the result
was uniformly a large amount of net winnings. Was there self-deception
about it? I do not know; but the imaginary ledger always showed immense
accumulations of profit. For the start was made with small stakes, and
as the capital grew the stake was increased till it reached the maximum,
and in this way there was no limit to the gains. Poor gambling-houses!
Would we content ourselves with relieving them of one or two millions,
or would we ruin them entirely? That was left for further consideration.
The latter would certainly be a moral deed, for gaming is an evil
passion by which so many are seduced and ruined or at least injured, for
it is a vice which—Aunt Lotti despised gaming; it was hateful to her;
but when one was furnished with such a miraculous gift would it not have
been a downright _sin_ not to lift the treasures to which one needed
only to put out a hand?

Aunt Lotti took no stock in my mother’s similar plans, for she was no
clairvoyant, no natural wonder, only a sort of imitator. It would soon
be seen that nothing was to be realized. But my mother’s tests came out
just as brilliantly. I myself dealt the cards and entered the winnings
and losses in a little book. The winnings were always so much the
greater that the first million was reached in a few weeks. “Chance,”
opined Aunt Lotti. Self-deception? I now ask myself in this case also.
The figures were there, and now plan-making and air-castle building
broke out among us in great style. In the neighborhood of Brünn there is
a Liechtenstein domain, Eisgrub, with a marvelous castle and park; we
had seen it once when we were on a picnic. We would buy Eisgrub. Perhaps
Prince Liechtenstein would not part with it—well, one can have anything
if one only pays a price well above the market value. The castle was
most beautifully furnished, but yet a good many things would have to be
changed; for instance, I was to have a chamber with porcelain walls and
porcelain furniture. This porcelain room afforded me such anticipatory
joys of possession as few things ever did. The pink diamonds in my
future jewel case were a delight to me too. All people have white
diamonds—the pink stones would be something special. But our wishes did
not turn merely toward ornament and show; we meant also to practice
beneficence on a large scale, i. e. build asylums for the blind,
hospitals, etc.; and surprise with adequate properties all our kinsfolk
and acquaintances who were suffering from any sort of lack. This whole
array of dreams of the future, which had consolidated into an assured
expectation, represented “the important thing” to me at that time.

Elvira kept aloof from all this plan-making. She set no store by earthly
possessions; the only harvest she wanted to reap was poetic fame; her
fancy was too thoroughly busied with its own creations to occupy itself
with idle air-castle-building into the bargain. Our games of puff had
undergone some modifications now: at present the hero no longer needed
to be furnished with wealth, but other combinations were devised. A poor
but proud lieutenant rejecting the adored millionairess who absolutely
throws herself at his head, but moved to relent by the sight of her
despair threatening to pass into consumption.

Thus the summer of 1856 came on, and the journey to Wiesbaden was
undertaken. Each of the million-huntresses carried in her cartridge box
(i. e. portemonnaie) a capital of a few hundred florins set apart for
this use; and the game bags too, i. e. two big portfolios with
combination locks, were in readiness for the noble quarry.

My guardian Fürstenberg was not taken into confidence: he was the
personification of propriety and sober sense; anything queer was hateful
to him. He did not approve of the journey itself to begin with. If he
had known what crazy ideas (for he would certainly have thought them
crazy) were connected with it, he would perhaps have put in a veto. He
did try to talk them out of the trip to the foreign watering-place; he
was particularly not suited with the fact that I was to be taken along.
I ought not to be interrupted in my studies; besides, it struck him that
my education in the most important things was very backward. Thus, e.
g., I was not at all skillful with the needle. To be sure I regaled him
every Christmas, and on the day of his patron saint, with embroidered
pillows and slippers that teemed with roses and lilies, if it was not
cat-heads or lion-heads for variety; but I was not capable of knitting
an honest stocking, he knew, and he disapproved. I did not seem to him
pious enough either: I knew the catechism by heart, no doubt, and had
taken my first communion, but yet it did not seem to him that I had the
right zeal for the faith, took the right pleasure in going to church.

As a counterpart to my guardian, Landgrave Fürstenberg, my cousin had
her godfather General Count Huyn. He too had been on terms of close
friendship with her father, and continued always anxious about his
godchild’s welfare. He was more than conventionally pious, he was
exaggeratedly pious. He had carried on long discussions with Elvira’s
father; the Protestant scholar’s philosophy accorded but ill with the
Catholic aristocrat’s religiousness verging on bigotry, but this
divergence had been no detriment to their friendship—it was in the
sphere of the most profound speculation that they conducted their
theologico-philosophical debates, for Count Huyn’s piety was not that of
simplicity but of Scriptural learning, so both of them found
intellectual stimulus in these disquisitions.

Elvira had to write to her godfather every week, and usually received
answers—friendly admonitions, little sermons. He knew of her poetic
activity, but did not approve of it. Literature seemed to him most
unbecoming to women. Virtuous and pious, modest and gentle, industrious,
submissive, unassuming,—these were to be the qualities that it was for
his little goddaughter Karoline (he never called her Elvira) to acquire.
My cousin respected her godfather highly, but did not lay his sermons to
heart. She, who had already read—I will not say understood—Hegel and
Fichte and Kant, was not to be reached by the precepts of the primer. As
a philosopher’s daughter and pupil she had come to take a view of the
world which went beyond the line of creeds and represented deism on a
basis of natural science.

I too, despite my youth, had fed my mind on Kant and Descartes, had
studied Plato’s _Phaedo_ and Humboldt’s _Kosmos_, and along with these
the history of the wars of the Inquisition and of religion; and to the
question “What religion do you profess?” I should have replied with
Schiller, at that time my favorite poet, “None—I am too religious to.”

The first long journey—that brings on an indescribably sweet fever.
Traveling was not indeed so comfortable at that time as to-day (though
the comfort of to-day does still leave a great deal to be desired);
there were then neither dining-cars nor toilet-rooms nor sleeping-cars;
there was much of martyrdom connected with the ride; yet this journey
seemed to me the sum of all enjoyment—nay, more, of all happiness.

When we arrived, our mothers were totally used up; we two schoolgirls
felt nothing but sheer bliss. First a day of rest in the hotel, then
house-hunting; then moving to a villa on the street that runs along the
Kurort to the Dietenmühle; from our balcony one could hear the tones of
the music at the Kur. Visit to the Kursaal. Entrance by a vestibule;
then through a great ballroom with marble pillars, then to the right
into the suite of gaming-rooms. Children were not admitted there; but we
two, Elvira with her fourteen years, I with my thirteen and tall of my
age, were regarded as young girls, and the liveried porters made no
objections. All four of us wandered through the two roulette parlors,
the two trente-et-quarante parlors, and the adjoining reception-rooms.
All this was not at that time so gorgeously furnished as are now the
gaming-rooms of the Casino at Monte Carlo, but was more like the
interior of a castle. After we had seen the halls we went back through
the ballroom and out on the other side of the building, to the terrace
and the park. In the middle of the park lies a large pond, out of which
rises a fountain, and on which dazzlingly white swans float. The
music—an Austrian military band from Mainz—is playing on the terrace;
and below the terrace stand chairs and tables, and there one sees a
numerous and elegant assemblage sitting, standing, walking up and down.
Many uniforms among them. The Prussian and Austrian garrisons from the
fort, and also the Nassau army, are numerously represented there. Our
mothers had a few last year’s acquaintances here; among others, a Nassau
court dignitary with his wife; and by chance these were present on that
first day, so social life was immediately started. That did not at all
suit our mothers though: they had come for a far too serious piece of
work to give themselves up to sociality. But in the forenoons they would
be free, for the patrons of the place did not assemble till the time of
the afternoon music; and perhaps it was even better to take the mind off
now and then from the harassing exertion of the efforts to foresee.

A very tall youth in cadet uniform came up to our group. He was a nephew
of the Court Marshal of Nassau, and begged to be introduced; Baron
Friedrich von Hadeln. The young man saluted respectfully first the older
ladies, then, with equal respect, us two. We thanked him graciously: we
really were, then, already veritable young ladies.

Friedrich von Hadeln—he may have been eighteen years old—had strikingly
noble features, a sort of Roman head. He talked very vivaciously,
addressing especially us two. Elvira could not overcome her bashfulness,
and remained reticent. I reaped the benefit of the conversational
practice in our games of puff, and engaged in a lively dialogue.

The main action of the plot began at once on the next day. Aunt Lotti
betook herself to the roulette table and won. While she was in the
gaming-room we two girls stayed out on the terrace under my mother’s
protection. And when my mother then went about her serious task—likewise
winning on the first days—Aunt Lotti took up the business of watching
over us. My youth fell in a time when a girl of good family must not
stay a quarter of an hour unwatched. Ten steps across the street
alone—that must not happen; by that one would have been, if not lost,
yet irremediably compromised. The chaperon system, from which the young
womanhood of to-day has made its escape by the bicycle, by the
tennis-racket, and by the total change of standpoint in general, was
then in its fullest vogue.

The thriving business of the millions (each had already doubled her
working capital) was carried on only in the forenoon; the afternoon was
filled out at the Kur music, or in walks to the Dietenmühle or the Greek
chapel, and very frequently young Hadeln joined us. In the villa next
door to us there lived an English family, Sir and Lady Tancred, with a
seventeen-year-old daughter named Lucy. My cousin became violently
infatuated with Lucy, but the little Englishwoman preferred me. I
remember a call that the Tancred family made upon us, when the mother
(who, be it said, was expecting very soon to be again a mother) sat down
to the piano and sang an English ballad. The lady, who may have been
thirty-four to thirty-five, seemed to us inordinately old, and the
recollection of her performance remained in our memory for years as a
fearfully comical episode. To be sure, she also sang without any voice,
and with that English exaggeration of accented syllables which in itself
is so unmusical. To choke down our laughter cost us an unspeakable
effort at the time, and for years it continued to be a favorite comic
performance in our circle when I sat down to the piano and sang as Lady
Tancred “Oh—remembrance will come and remembrance will go—oh!”

Every Wednesday there was a ball in the great ballroom of the Kurhaus,
but it was a very mixed company that attended. Every Saturday, on the
other hand, there was held in the small halls a “_réunion dansante_” to
which one had to procure cards of invitation, and in which there came
together only the élite of the outsiders and the leaders of local
society. Lady Tancred meant to take her daughter to one of these. Our
mothers were urged to come too, and to bring us. “Ridiculous!” said
they; “such children at a grown people’s ball! It’s out of the
question.” But the Tancreds kept soliciting them, and we plied them with
the most urgent entreaties, till the scruples gave way. Why, were we
being treated as children here at all? Were we not taken to the Kursaal,
to the music in the park? did not all the people, especially the young
gentlemen, behave toward us as if we were grown up? Oh well, then, so be
it; these little _réunions_ are not formal balls anyhow, and if it gives
the children such very great pleasure....

Meanwhile the great undertaking had fallen off somewhat. The winnings
were gone again. Some blunder had been made, against which they would be
on their guard in the future—you see it is different here from what it
is at home—one gets carried away and plays without regard to the system;
such a thing must not happen again. The thing to do now was, first rest
a few days, and then begin at the beginning again and adhere strictly to
the rules.

The preparations for the _réunion_ were made. We were to wear misty
white dresses, and for ornaments—the idea originated with us children—a
wreath of cornflowers in our hair, a garland of cornflowers outlining
the top of the corsage, and the overskirt caught up with little bunches
of cornflowers. In the villa next door lived a florist; the order was
given to him. I can still remember how I felt in the greenhouse where
the florist took our order: how damp and warm it smelt there, how the
red and white and yellow blossoms flamed round about—but loveliest among
all the gay flower-mosaic the blue of a mass of cornflowers. Would we
not look like elves of the field, so fresh and unassuming and
poetic?—And that in the brightly lighted ballroom! We should make a
sensation, and we were blissful—blissful as ever silly girls can be
before their first ball, which they really have not yet any proper right
to attend. But were we not exceptional creatures altogether, born to
exceptional fates? If the million-factory did go wrong, what of it? The
cornflowers would be a more original adornment than diamonds, and
happiness did not lie in the external world and its treasures; it lay in
us, in our buoyant sense of youth, in our—let me say it—immeasurable
conceit. The one the greatest female dramatist of the future; the other,
if nothing else, at any rate a beauty thronged with adorers—Oh, the
silly, silly girls!

The great day came on. The florist punctually delivered his garlands:
they were fastened to our clothes and into our hair; it really did look
pretty, even if not so celestial as in our eyes. There was still
daylight—for the month was June and the hour for the assembly was
eight—when we, each with her mamma, got into two carriages (in one our
toilets would have been crumpled up too much) and arrived at the Kursaal
with beating hearts. On entering the brilliantly lighted parlors we saw
our image in the ceiling-high mirrors, and observed the fact that the
cornflowers appeared no longer blue but lilac. However, this did not
impair the originality of the floral ornaments.

We met many acquaintances, and new ones had themselves introduced.
Friedrich von Hadeln asked me for the first quadrille. I thought I
noticed that a shade of annoyance flew over Elvira’s face. My vis-à-vis
in this first quadrille of my life was Hadeln’s older sister Franziska.
When her brother told me Franziska was twenty-three years old, I was
amazed that so elderly a young lady still cared to dance, and I felt
pity for her.

Among the Nassau officers who had themselves introduced to my mother and
me there was a Prince Philipp Wittgenstein, who, as far as I can
remember, paid noticeable attentions to me. Was a living game of puff to
begin on this very first evening? Nay, for the young lieutenant did not
especially please me, and I did have sense enough to see that I was
still rather too young to marry. But it is a fact that a week later, on
occasion of the second _réunion_, Prince Philipp Wittgenstein formally
asked my mother for my hand.

My mother laughed: “The child is thirteen years old—under these
circumstances you will not take offense at my declining your offer.”
Thereupon the suitor withdrew. The affair was to me a pleasant little
triumph, but I did not take it to heart.

Our stay in Wiesbaden was prolonged into the autumn, and ended with
recognition of the fact that it is not so easy to break the bank—easier
to break one’s self. After alternations of good and bad luck the capital
that we brought with us was expended, a supplementary remittance was
likewise lost, and the castle of Eisgrub at Brünn and the pink diamonds
went up in smoke.

The two ladies did not on that account doubt their miraculous
endowments; they only conceded that the excitement of real gambling
paralyzes this gift—that one may be clairvoyant enough at home, but at
the green table, where real gold is paid out or is drawn in by the
pitiless rake, this magnetic force ceases to work. It was painful to
renounce the beautiful dream, but against the fact of the fiasco nothing
could be said, so the affair was given up; we went back to our home
somewhat poorer in money, richer in experience. The two mothers were
very much cast down, but the daughters were enraptured with the journey
and with their taste of the pastimes of watering-place life. These
memories would be something to live on for a long time.

Now we moved from Brünn to Vienna. Social life was over. We were
relegated to the schoolroom again, as befitted our age. I devoted myself
with redoubled industry to my studies in languages and the piano, and
made excerpts from Brockhaus’s _Konversationslexikon_. The games of puff
grew somewhat rare, for Elvira lived in a distant quarter of the city
with her mother, and we came together only once or twice a week. She
continued writing poetry. “Delascar,” which had been interrupted by the
journey to Wiesbaden, was now polished and finished. Then came a comedy,
_Der Briefträger_ (“The Letter-Carrier”), and a sequence of ballads
whose collective title I do not now remember.

The young poetess wanted to get the verdict of experts, and sent her
manuscripts to Joseph von Weilen, whose dramas were at that time having
much success in the Burgtheater, and to Feldmann, the writer of
comedies. And she ventured higher yet: she addressed herself to
Grillparzer, who was at the height of his renown, and to Marie von
Ebner-Eschenbach, whose star was then beginning to rise.

These two came to call on Elvira, and it was at our apartments. I can
still see in my mind the old and somewhat morose Grillparzer as he came
into our room, fatigued with stair-climbing. He had a lively
conversation with Elvira, and urged her to keep on writing
diligently—she might come to produce notable work. And young Marie
Ebner—she was twenty-eight at the time—came likewise to return Elvira’s
visit and give her verdict. This too, I believe, was favorable.
Unhappily I cannot recall the details of these interesting visits. I
have retained merely the impression that on that occasion Frau Ebner was
especially pleased with _me_, though I was only a secondary person
there. Later too, when she corresponded with Elvira or met her, she
always inquired with interest for the beautiful (she said “beautiful,” I
cannot help it, and after nearly half a century it is permissible to
claim the long-lost epithet) Countess Kinsky.

Shall I here interpolate a personal description and tell how I looked at
fifteen? Why not? Well, then,—an incredible abundance of hair, dazzling
white little teeth,—Enough, I would rather stop. This self-flattery,
even if it does date back to gray antiquity, has too silly a sound for
me.

One day—it was in the beginning of the year 1858—my guardian came in
looking quite pale.

“Do you know the news?”

“What has happened?” cried my mother. “Why, you are all upset!”

“Radetzky is dead!”

I remember that the news made on me the impression that one of the
world’s darkest catastrophes had come upon it—the great Field Marshal no
more! I knew what adoration Fritzerl felt for him and how painfully this
loss must affect him. To be sure, Radetzky was already ninety-two; but
for that very reason it seemed as if he were not to die at all, or at
least as if he were predestined to come to be a hundred. At any rate the
world, particularly Austria, was the poorer by a treasure. Such a hero!
Such a demigod! My admiration for soldierly fame was devotional. There
was nothing more piously loyal to the military than I. If any one had at
that time had the idea of writing a book with such a nefarious title as
_Die Waffen nieder_ I should have deeply despised the author. Elvira was
just the same. Radetzky’s death put her muse in a painful commotion at
once. That same day a long poem was produced: a poetic wreath of all
plants and flowers to lay on the grave of the victor of Custozza—roses,
immortelles, pansies, but chiefly laurel, a stanza for each species.

With pride and emotion she gave us the hearing of this poem. She wept; I
wept; Aunt Lotti decided, “To-morrow you must send that to your
godfather Huyn and ask his judgment.”

Next day the manuscript went off to Galicia, where General Huyn was in
garrison at the time. The answer arrived after a while,—in verse too.
The yellowed sheet is in my possession, and I will copy it here; not
that it has intrinsic literary value, but it offers an illustration of
the pious spirit that so strikingly characterized the writer.

Stanislau, February 18, 1858

TO KAROLINE

A host of lines thou sendest me,
For critic aid applying!
In prose I’ve shown proficiency,
But not in versifying.

Yet to myself I did confess,
If I am fit to greet her,
I must my little poetess
Address likewise in meter.

Once more, as in the days gone by,
Because the task compels me,
On Pegasus I’ll boldly fly,
And give thee what sense tells me.

The blossoms full of Love’s bright glow
Express their feelings fairly;
And yet their pretty praises go
With that old man’s life barely.

One thing, besides, has been left out
(An error hard to pardon)
That grows most freely all about,
Ev’n in our hero’s garden.

The thorns it is, that interlace
With all through which we wander,
At every time, in every place—
My Karolin’, O ponder!

The Lord has set them in our life
In every shape of sorrow,
That we might from this painful strife
Look gladly to a morrow.

The thorn flower thus upraised its voice:
“Thou fortunate old hero,
In thee let all the world rejoice,
At last _I_ give thee zero!

“This warrior, as he reached his goal,
Finds me with ready warning
To men who fame and glory’s scroll
Crave too much for adorning.

“To all I fain a song would raise,
As from this tomb they sever,
That outward pomp and human praise
Can make men happy never.”

· · · · ·

The world of men goes blindly on,
Deceived by seeming merely;
The higher Judge ascends the throne;
He, He alone sees clearly.

Before the mighty judgment seat,
To hear the final sentence,
Proud kings and poorest serfs will meet,
Relying on repentance.

The dead will heed no song of praise,
No vain encomium paid them.
What will avail thy tuneful lays?
Thy prayers alone will aid them!

My child, up to this lofty height
A God man’s soul hath lifted:
“That we on earth may still unite
With those who’ve from us drifted.”

They who i’ the Faith have found release,
And passed away before ye,
Cry, “Seek within your heart for peace,
Not in this world’s false glory.”

Believe me, ’tis a solemn fact,
When Christians find interment
There’s nothing that will more detract
Than Eulogy’s preferment.

So in thy song of praise make known
How, ’spite of banners flying,
Within the tomb, unrobed, alone,
A hapless wretch is lying;

And he, a sinful mortal, now
His honors seeming hateful,
Will, trembling in God’s presence, bow,
And for thy prayers be grateful.

Then to thy beauteous wreath of fame,
Of laurel and everlasting,
Which to the splendor of his name
On the marshal’s tomb thou ’rt casting,

Choose one more blossom, meek and still,
To soothe earth’s grief its dower,
Which may our hearts with comfort fill—
That is the passion flower,

The symbol of the Cross. When dyes
Of dawn the world astonish,
And the laurel cries, “Here a hero lies!”
This shall to prayer admonish.
J. K. H.

Thus wrote the general about the Field Marshal. Aspergillum and saber!

Elvira was not edified; she had hoped for more appreciation of her
martial hymn.

The summer of the same year we spent at the castle of Teikowitz, the
Moravian estate of Landgrave Fürstenberg. He himself was not there, he
had only put the castle hospitably at our disposal. Aunt Lotti and
Elvira were invited too. There were no other guests, and calls were not
exchanged with neighbors; so we four women spent this summer in real
rural isolation and quiet. The beautiful park full of flowers, and the
near forest, offered us blithe enjoyment of nature. Elvira wrote poetry
more assiduously than ever, I kept up a great deal of reading and
piano-playing. We two drew closer and closer in friendship—exchanged
oaths to be constant in our friendship till our life’s end. Our mothers
found it a little tedious, it would seem, for as a pastime they took up
their experiments again to see if the faculty of presentiment still
worked. Once more numbers were drawn and trente-et-quarante cards dealt,
“but only for fun,” they said. For it was proved that the atmosphere of
the gaming-room suspended the capacity for guessing, even when it had
stood the tests ever so well at home; so we would not allow the great
plans and projects to take another start. But it really would be
interesting to ascertain whether that capacity had been altogether
annihilated by the time spent at the real bank, or whether in the quiet
of merely fictitious play it would reappear.

And lo, it did reappear. Not quite so brilliantly as before, but yet
sufficiently to achieve great imaginary winnings. Should we perhaps risk
it once more after all? Perhaps a second time they would be hardened
against the “agitation” there? But no, that would be temerity. Besides,
gaming is a detestable thing, it really afforded no pleasure at all—so
no thoughts of going to the German watering-places again! But here in
Teikowitz it was just as innocent as it was interesting to test that
occult power.... Elvira, who officiated as drawer of the numbers, often
urged that we should take another trip to Wiesbaden by all means; if not
this year, next year anyhow. That was all the dream of her life, to see
Wiesbaden again—it had been so divinely beautiful there.

Before me lies an old album which belonged to my cousin, and which I
received after her death. On the first leaves there are entries in which
is mirrored a chapter of romance that was enacted between us girls.

On the first page a small painted portrait shows my mother, the giver of
the album: “Your loving Aunt Sophie, May 2, 1857.” Then come a few dried
flowers and album-verses from various friends and acquaintances, witty
inscriptions after the style of “S. N. D. our friendship never,”—

And now begins the romance:

For dear heaven’s sake!
Bertha Kinsky
Past!
8th July:

Remember that day. The 3rd friendship was sworn, the 8th you have
proved it.

And on the next leaf,

Thank you!!

[Dried spray of birch]

Not past any more! These leaves are the witnesses of its ceasing to be
past.

Taikowitz, the 19th July 1858.[3]

Here follows the elucidation of these enigmatical inscriptions:

One day I went into Elvira’s room, and, as was very often the case,
found her sitting at her writing-desk. I came up to her and saw her
hastily cover up the blank-book in which she had been writing.

“What did you hide the book for?”

“I?” and she was suffused with fiery red.

“Show it to me.”

“No, no—”

“Have you secrets from me? Do you call that friendship?”

“You would laugh at me, mock at me!”

“Mock at you, I? You think thus of _my_ friendship?”

“The book has love-songs in it.”

“Well, every poet writes those; there’s nothing to laugh at in that. On
the contrary, I always feel that you write too many ballads, nothing
that sounds personal. Read me one of those love-songs, do.”

She drew out the book:

“All right, you shall hear the first—there are ten of them in all.”

She read. They were glowing stanzas. I do not mean such as many of our
up-to-date young girls print, volcanic outbursts of eroticism; but,
within the range of the permissible, the respectably permissible, they
were enthusiastic outpourings of heartfelt devotion. I thought them
marvelous.

“You must send that to Grillparzer.”

“No, there must never a stranger see these poems—my love is my secret.”

“Your love? Why, surely that is only poetry; we don’t see anybody but
the old schoolmaster and the minister; your verses are addressed to an
ideal—”

“My ideal is alive; look here!”

She pushed the book over to me and pointed to the final poem. The next
to the last line ended with the word _adeln_ (unhappily I have forgotten
the rest of the line), and the last ran

_Weil ich dich liebe, Friedrich zu Hadeln._
(Because I love thee, Friedrich of Hadeln.)

“For dear heaven’s sake!” I exclaimed. It had given me a turn. There
before me was the miracle. A real living love for a real living object.
Elvira seemed to me transformed, and now the remembered figure of the
Nassau ensign too came before my soul bathed in magical light. Yes, he
was in truth handsome, and assuredly there was in his nature the power
to _adeln_, “ennoble,” those who had learned to understand and to love
him, the adorable Friedrich von Hadeln.

To make a long story short, in a few days I too was “in love.” I let
Elvira pour out to me her enthusiasm and her accounts of what had so
greatly pleased her about him, and what she had felt all this time with
this hidden passion in her heart; I called back to my memory the
features of him who was so glowingly admired; and soon I could not
understand how it was that I had not also fallen in love on the
spot—now, now, the fire began to burn in my heart too. I remember
exactly how at a certain time it came over me clearly, the consciousness
that I was equally in love with the irresistible Friedrich. In the night
I had dreamed vividly of Wiesbaden. Again I danced the quadrille with
the ensign, his elder sister vis-à-vis,—I felt the pressure of his hand
in the _chaîne anglaise_ and heard the tone of his voice. In the
morning, on waking, I had the feeling that something new, rich, warm,
gladsome, was inundating my soul. What could this be? For a few seconds
I had no answer to this question, but then, with the recollection of the
dream, I knew what it was: love.

I relate this because this sensation remained so distinctly stamped on
my memory that I have derived from it a piece of knowledge which perhaps
not every one has discovered, or not every one preserved in memory,—to
wit, that in youth being in love comes upon one like something
elemental, like a newly existing sort of material so to speak, and is
then carried around with one as a possession, as a treasure. If it be
even a hapless love, by this very misfortune one feels himself enriched,
elevated, transformed. It may be a suffering, but it is a suffering
which is unspeakably sweeter than all hitherto-known joys. That my love
was a hapless, nay, a tragic love, was a thing of which I was conscious
not without pride. The humorous side of the whole thing did not become
clear to me till long afterward. At the time I saw only the frightful
situation—I loved the same man for whom the friend of my bosom was
burning, therefore I loved hopelessly.

Was I to confide in her, or lock my terrible secret in the depths of my
soul? I decided for the former. I had reproached her too bitterly for
having so long kept silence toward me—and we had then exchanged the
promise that henceforth we would impart to each other everything,
everything. I owed her a confession, therefore, and I made it in the way
of inscribing on the page of her album the lamentable word “Past!” in
English.

But now Elvira showed herself in her whole greatness. She said, “My
friendship shall not only be sworn, it shall be proved too.—I step back,
I renounce—be Friedrich von Hadeln yours.” And I could set down in the
album, “On the 8th of July you have proved your friendship.” For a while
I hesitated to accept the self-sacrificing present, but in a short time
I seem to have given in, since so soon as July 13th I could set down
that it was no longer past. “You are beautiful, you are brilliant,—by
the gift of your hand he will become a thousand times happier than by
insignificant me—therefore I renounce, not only for your sake but for
his.” These reasons she adduced, and such as these; and I took
possession of the sweetheart so nobly resigned to me, took possession so
thoroughly that henceforth our games of puff assumed a new form. I
remained the heroine, but the hero no longer played different parts; he
was always Friedrich von Hadeln again and again, only in different
situations.

But the drollest thing about this schoolgirl romance is that next summer
we really made the journey to Wiesbaden again, that we met Him there,
and that he paid neither of us the least attention. This reality
speedily sobered us. We did not laugh at each other as we deserved, for
we had too much respect for the conflicts of soul that we had undergone;
but we were cured. And in later years we laughed, too, over the story.

III
AN AUTOGRAPH ALBUM
Anastasius Grün · Friedrich Halm · Grillparzer · Wagner · Lenau’s
sister · Military autographs · King Ludwig of Bavaria · Schiller’s
daughter · Liebig · Schücking · Mädler · Körner · Anderssen ·
Meyerbeer · Rückert · Hebbel · Gregorovius · Lamartine · Victor Hugo ·
Manzoni · Dickens

I will still linger over that album. There sounds forth from the book,
as it were, a whole chime of tones from the past; a whole procession of
spirits—right illustrious spirits among them—goes by. Ah, that is the
fine thing about youth, that it operates with as many hopes as old age
does with memories; to it the joyous “will be” beckons from every
quarter—to age the gloomy “has been” shows itself at all points.

So let us turn the leaves. Here is a letter from Anastasius Grün[4] to
Elvira, in its envelope. The poet writes:

Esteemed young Lady:

Your letter addressed to my dear wife bespeaks so unaffected a frame
of mind, so noble an aspiration, and at the same time so tender and
womanly a disposition, that it would in any case come very hard for me
to decline the request addressed—properly speaking, to me—in so
earnest a tone, even were it one less easy of fulfillment. Busied as I
am at this moment, I must to-day limit myself to these few lines, that
I may not again, as I lately did by inadvertency, miss a date set by
you. I hope the opposite leaf [it is not in the album] may meet with a
friendly reception from you.

With deep respect, esteemed young lady, your most humble servant

A. Auersperg

Graz, March 26, 1861.

Now a few more pages:

_Es liebt Vortreffliches sich zu verstecken_

That which is choicest loves to lie concealed,
And many a woman’s heart even to this day
Still hides within it an America
Which could by a Columbus be revealed.

Friedrich Halm

Vienna, July 17, 1861.

_Der Dichter liegt seit lang begraben_

The poet has lain buried long;
The man is living, for even now
The memory of thy sweet gifts of song
Doth me again with my lost youth endow.

Franz Grillparzer[5]

Vienna, April 8, 1861.

_Dem österreichischen Mädchen_

[Music]

Richard Wagner

Vienna, May 14, 1861.

A dry flower, and with it the inscription:

From my unfortunate brother’s grave.

Th. Schurz, sister of Lenau.

I can still remember the acquisition of this leaf of the album. Aunt
Lotti, Elvira, and I had one afternoon gone on a pilgrimage to the
hamlet where rest the ashes of Nikolaus Lenau,[6] for whose melancholy
poems Elvira cherished an enthusiasm. On this occasion we visited the
poet’s sister, who was living in a little country-house not far from the
graveyard. Frau Schurz told us much about the unhappy man’s last years,
spent in incurable insanity, and showed us many relics, silhouettes of
himself and of Sophie Löwenthal, the woman whom he had loved so
passionately with a love not unreturned but unaccepted; and she herself
took us to the graveyard to pick there the twig that I have now before
my eyes.

Is it accident, or did Elvira know that Nikolaus Niembsch once meant to
tear himself away from Sophie Löwenthal and to marry another who was
also one of the great and famous figures of the time? At all events, on
the following page of the album stands the following autograph:

_Ich will, das Wort ist mächtig_

“I will,” the word is mighty;
When spoken staunch and still,
It tears the stars from heaven,
The single word “I will!”

Karoline Sabatier-Ungher

Karlsbad, May, 1861

Yet it seems she did not speak it _ernst und still_ enough, the
beautiful singer, when it came to holding fast the greatly loved and
already affianced Niembsch von Strehlenau; for he let her go and
returned to Sophie.

Now comes a very strongly military leaf. It bears the signatures
Schwarzenberg, Benedek, FML., Fürstenberg, G. d. C., v. Wrangel, Field
Marshal.[7] Alongside Wrangel’s name somebody (the insertion is not in
Elvira’s hand) has inscribed the following brief dialogue reproducing
the famous general’s wooing. It is well known that in spite of all his
victories he never succeeded in conquering the dative and the
accusative, and when he wanted to apply to the father of his intended
for her hand the conversation in all probability developed itself thus:

“Will you call me your son-in-law?”

“I’m sorry, but I have none.”

“Beg pardon—I meant to say, may I call you my father-in-law?”

“Oh, you are married? I did not know that.”[8]

There is furthermore inserted upon that military album-leaf a document
which, as the knot that fastens it informs us, was given to my cousin by
her “dear godfather Huyn.” It is a large folio page of official paper,
with the following not uninteresting contents:

K. K. Landesgeneralkommando in
Verona. II. Sektion Nr. 1064

No. 24

To his Excellency, Royal and Imperial
Chamberlain, Colonel, and Sub-Chief of
Quartermaster General’s Staff, &c., &c.,

Johann Count Huyn

The nature of the remodeling required for the defective
embrasures in the Molinary and Hlavaty works must be determined
by commission.

As chairman of this commission is appointed Lieutenant Field
Marshal Baron Stwrtnik, Director of Field Artillery of the 2d
Army; and as members of it Your Excellency, Lieutenant Colonel
von Swiatkiewicz of the General Staff, and Major Khünel of the
7th Regiment of Artillery.

The time and place for the meeting of the commission are to be
fixed by its chairman.

Radetzky

Verona, October 27, 1856

No. 34

Received at the Royal and Imperial
Quartermaster General’s Staff Division
of the 2d Army
Verona, October 29, 1856
Benedek, FML.

Despite remodeled cannon, despite the installation of the _k. k.
Generalquartiermeisterstabsabteilung der 2. Armee_ in Verona, three
years later this same Verona was to be Austrian no longer, and what
befell this same Benedek ten years later on Bohemian battlefields we
know. Confidence in the necessity and utility of remodeling cannon—just
now it is howitzers—remains unshaken in military circles.

Elvira and I, of course, felt the due reverential respect for these
signatures of generals, and for the complicated technical expressions
and complicated arrangements which meant our country’s fame and safety.

The following page too filled us with respect—the loyal deference which
is paid to the wearers of crowns. Be it known that Elvira, when she was
writing to all the European poets she could think of (I believe she was
one of the first specimens of that species which has since then so
greatly increased, the youthful autograph hyena), had among the rest
sent a letter in verse to King Ludwig I of Bavaria, asking him for a
line. By return mail came the answer, which is fastened into the album
with pink ribbon:

_Ihr, welche Worte wünscht von meinen Händen_

To her who wishes from my hand a word,
The poetess, although unknown to me,
Right gladly now these lines I will accord;
Inhabitants of the same land are we.[9]

Though we each other’s living voice ne’er heard,
Poet in poet must a cousin see.
To those who to the spheres have learned to soar
The earth gives satisfaction nevermore.
Ludwig

Next follows a leaf with a relic of a genuine king of Poetryland. It is
a bit of lilac silk accompanied with the following statement from
Schiller’s daughter:

Greifenstein ob Bonnland, June 20, 1861

Here, my dear young lassie, in accordance with your own wish, comes
something that once belonged to Schiller—lilac was his favorite color,
and this is a bit of silk from his _last_ waistcoat. May it be a sweet
remembrance for you! Your Schiller memorial of November 10, 1859,[10]
in the form of a poem, unfortunately did not come to hand; perhaps you
will send me another copy, and will also mention to me the receipt of
this piece of lilac, that I may be set at ease by knowing that it is
in your hands—by seeing your wishes fulfilled.

I always rejoice with all my heart at knowing that Schiller’s spirit
finds a home in young hearts; remain attached to him through all
stages of life, my dear young lady, and kindly accept this little
memento from me.

Respectfully and sincerely yours
Emilie von Gleichen-Russwurm
born von Schiller

Elvira was as enthusiastic for science as for poetry, so it is only
natural that in her treasury of handwritings she wanted to see
represented also him who was at that time the most celebrated of
chemists. He gladdened her with the following letter:

Your lines of July 8 fill me equally with esteem for the writer and
with joy, for they show me a young lady making earnest efforts to
enrich her mind with the incomparable treasures of science; and it
causes me the more pleasure that my writings are among those which
have attracted your interest and attention. I only wish that my
writings may find many such readers of your sex. Accept the assurance
of high esteem with which I sign myself

Justus Liebig

Munich, July 13, 1861

From Levin Schücking Elvira received three lines dated from Rome:

The Lord give thee a time of stillness, warm air, and a quiet heart.

The next leaf bears inscriptions from three Vienna authors:

_Wenn du dem toten Buchstaben trauest_

If you trust in the lifeless letter,
Then, dear girl, most wrong are you.
In the eye is the sole true language,
In the heart the key thereto.
Dr. I. F. Castelli

_Um zweierlei bin ich bemüht_

Two things have been worth effort in my eyes—
God often sends them both in my life’s span:
That he who knows me not my song should prize,
And he who knows me should esteem the man.
Joseph Weilen

_Sei Dichterin in der Welt der Poesie_

Be poetess in the world of poesy,
But never poetess in life’s practice be.
’Tis fine when thy rich mind the world bewitches,
Yet finer when thy heart a heart enriches.
Leopold Feldmann

Now a bit of starry sky, sent by the world-renowned director of the
observatory at Dorpat:

1925
Feb. 15.
True orbit of the
double star
S Virginis,
calculated by J. H. Mädler.
Principal star
1836
April 11.
Dorpat, in January 1862

All that is great, and all
that is beautiful, is truly great and
beautiful only by being felt
in perceptive hearts.
J. H. Mädler

Once more a letter from Schiller’s daughter:

Greifenstein ob Bonnland, November 27, 1861

Here, honored young lady, is a page of _Theodor Körner’s_ manuscript,
which I have been endeavoring to get for you and which I succeeded in
obtaining for you day before yesterday. A goodly ornament for your
album, and I hasten to dispatch it to you, to afford you this pleasure
while it is still _November_. I would gladly have sent it to you on
the tenth,[11] but on that dear and sacred day it was not yet in my
hands.

Begging that you too, as hitherto, will hold me in a friendly
remembrance which shall bring us warmly together on every Schiller
Day, I am with the deepest regard

Yours sincerely
Emilie von Gleichen-Russwurm
born von Schiller

Beside it, with the note “Original manuscript of Theodor Körner.
Unpublished poem!” a much-yellowed sheet of coarse deckle-edged paper on
which stand several stanzas with deletions and corrections:

_Begeist’rung fasset mich mit heil’gem Glühn_

A holy ardor seizes me and fills me
As the soft harmony of thy accent thrills me;
A ravishment that all my soul entrances
Is in thy glances.

Upon thy breast would I, the world forgetting,
My happy fortunes with the gods’ be setting.
The goal of all my eagerness, love-drunken,
In thee is sunken.

Love brings Leander to a sweet undoing;
It plunges [_illegible_[12]] into ruin.
The fairest lot that heart has ever treasured
To me is measured.

With the hot turmoil of love’s rapturous madness
Life’s sun ascends for me in cloudless gladness;
The Horae’s endless light, the radiant morn,
To me was born.

For boldly in thy glances I might sun me;
Thy image pours all ecstasies upon me;
Grandest and most divine of women, thee,
Thee I might see.

Enamored youth! The poem did not receive its final polish nor its last
stanzas, and was left unprinted; apparently it did not seem to him good
enough to print. It was just dashed off in an hour of intoxicating
happiness. He saw life ascending as a cloudless sun, in the radiance of
youth, in the light of the Horae—and how soon an enemy’s bullet was to
destroy this life! Can it be calculated how much of the beautiful and
valuable that stupid bullet shot away from posterity?

I turn more pages. There follows, from A. Anderssen, the great
chess-player, a twenty-two-move game of chess; from G. Meyerbeer, the
beginning of the overture to the tragedy _Struensee_.

Then once more a verse with an illustrious signature:

_Reines Herz gibt reinen Sinn_

Clean heart gives the man clean sight;
In the pure eye clear and bright
Mirrored lies the world.
Clouded heart gives clouded eye,
World and life and destiny
All in darkness curled.
Friedrich Rückert

And another great poet writes for the album,

_Und musst du denn, trotz Kraft und Mut_

If, spite of strength and courage good,
The thorns your skin will tear,
See to it only that your blood
Does not the rose besmear.
Friedrich Hebbel

A historian too has his say:

Priests place themselves between men and the Deity only as shadows: as
when the eye takes to its help a smoked glass, to see the sun through
this dull medium.

Ferdinand Gregorovius

Rome, February, 1865

Two French letters:

Mademoiselle, vous êtes la poésie même, la poésie vivante et aimante.

A. de Lamartine

Il y a dans votre lettre, Mademoiselle, toute une âme charmante et
c’est avec bonheur que je dépose à vos pieds le nom que vous demandez
pour votre Album.

Victor Hugo

Waterloo, 14 juillet 1861

From the author of _I Promessi Sposi_:

[13]E troppo ricompenso per dei poveri lavori la simpatia d’un animo
gentile e elevato come quello che si manifesta nella lettera ch’ Ella
m’ha fatto l’onore di scrivermi. In un tale animo è cosa naturale che
abbia luogo anche l’indulgenza; e se, in questo caso, essa eccede, è
una ragione di più per eccitare in me una viva riconoscenza. Del
rimanente, l’eccesso dei buoni sentimenti è un inconveniente dei meno
pericolosi in questo mondo. Dio mantenga e ricompensi le nobili
inclinazioni di cui le ha fatto dono.

Voglia gradire la rispettosa espressione della mia riconoscenza e
l’attestato dell’ alta stima con cui ho l’onore di rassegnarmele.

Umil^{mo}, devot^{mo} servitore
Alessandro Manzoni

Under the date “Gads Hill Place Higham by Rochester Kent, Monday
twenty-seventh January 1862,” and on mourning paper, Charles Dickens
sent the transcript of some lines from “David Copperfield.”

The book further contains all sorts of dried plants picked at famous
places, pictures, bits of flags, even a scrap “from the shirt worn with
his wedding suit by Louis I of Anjou,” a little stone from “the ruins of
the palace of Catherine Cornaro, Queen of Cyprus,” another from
“Torquato Tasso’s prison door”—a whole panorama of historical
shadow-pictures. All, all, who are gathered on these pages, are dead—all
but the one who inserted the word “Past.” And this word is the real
leitmotif of the whole book: Past, past—and so I close it with a sigh.

IV
MORE EPISODES OF YOUTH
The War of 1859 · A prank · Elvira’s marriage

So the year 1859 saw us in Wiesbaden again, and there we experienced the
episode, so mortifying after our sacrifices made and accepted and after
all my puff romances of the past year, of the incomparable Friedrich von
Hadeln not wasting on us a word, not a look, beyond the most ceremonial
politeness. So far as I now remember, we did not greatly take this
mortification to heart: Elvira was perhaps glad that she did not have to
witness a rival’s triumph, and I was perhaps relieved at not inflicting
such deep suffering on my luckless friend and at the same time making
such a bad match into the bargain. Nor did the real Hadeln continue to
inspire in me those sensations which his image in memory had inspired.
In short, we spent a very enjoyable summer in Wiesbaden.

And yet it was the summer of 1859, i.e. the battles of Magenta and
Solferino were being fought. Austria, our country, was suffering
defeats. Great bloody fights were heard of. But I know perfectly that at
that time the event was as indifferent to me, as little existent, as it
would to-day be indifferent to me to learn that a volcano had broken out
in a West Indian island whose name I had never heard. An elemental event
at a great distance, that is what the war in Italy was to me. I did not
read the newspapers much either; to be sure we often went into the
reading-room where the papers lay open, but there it was not the
political but the literary papers that attracted us; all the more as
Elvira had written some novelettes which were accepted by family
magazines, and I had in mind the idea of _also_ writing one.—For in the
preceding summer, in the white heat of emotion, I had put into rhyme
three stanzas to the object of my affections. But in my case the next to
the last line did not rhyme with Hadeln (one really must not be so utter
an ape), but with Friedrich.

In the illustrated papers pictures of “the theater of the war” did
strike my eye from time to time, but I did not pause over them: soldiers
and horses lying about, broken cannon, or confused scrimmages, such as I
have seen a great many of in history textbooks, do not make pretty
pictures. I turned over the leaf quickly.

We did not have in the war anybody nearly connected with us, for whom we
might have trembled. My brother, who in the year 1854 had been
commissioned as lieutenant, had left the service a year before the war,
because he had spit blood and because the service in general was in the
highest degree repugnant to him. He was living with us. Mother was
jubilant over her only son’s not being still in the army when the war
broke out.

So I did not concern myself in the least about events in Italy. There
did not arise in me any feeling of horror at the atrocities and misery
that were connected with them (why should one be horrified at inevitable
deaths that do not concern one?), and of all things there did not arise
any feeling of revolt at the waging of war—I was too thoroughly
penetrated with the respect and admiration which are generally accorded
to this form of historical eventuation. I was not disturbed by any
inkling of the shadow of a possibility that one could think of war’s not
being in the world at all. As well might one think of leaves not being
on the trees, or waves on the sea. Why, war is the form in which human
history accomplishes itself: the founding of empires, the settlement of
controversies, are seen to by war. Perhaps I did not even reflect on the
matter so much as that; I only accepted it as something existent and
irreversible, as one accepts the existence of the sun. Many may share
this standpoint even to-day; at that time almost all did still share it.
Not even Dunant had yet written his little book “Solferino” and thereby
given the impulse for the founding of the Red Cross. No one was yet
thinking of the possibility of internationalizing the care of the
wounded in war; who (except a few men like the Abbé de St. Pierre and
Immanuel Kant) would have dared think of endeavoring to obtain an
international agreement not to make any such wounded at all?—In the year
1849, to be sure, a Peace Congress had already been held with Victor
Hugo in the chair; but who, beside the participants, knew anything about
it? Every time, like every man, has for its own a certain field of
thought, beyond which nothing is perceived.

When we returned to Austria the war was over. Austria had lost Milan—and
our two mothers also had losses to record. All systems, methods, gifts
of presentiment and of conjecture, had shown themselves fallacious, and
it was solemnly vowed that henceforth and forever the green table was
done with. The fee for the lesson had had to be paid, but at least they
were now free from the delusion, and at heart glad to be free from it;
for gaming is not only reprehensible, it is really also disagreeable,
repulsive. Now, thank God, there was no longer any need of tormenting
one’s self with the trying duty of utilizing the gift of second sight;
for it had been proved once more, and this time definitively, that the
faculty of presentiment failed to work at green tables.

The fee for the lesson had not been small. Economy was the word now. My
mother gave up her residence in Vienna and rented a little country place
near the city, in Klosterneuburg. Here two years were to be spent in the
utmost seclusion and frugality. After this period I should be eighteen
years old, and a sufficient sum would have been laid by to replace that
“fee” and to come back to the world, into which I was then to be
introduced. Meanwhile this lonely life in Klosterneuburg was not at all
without charms. Aunt Lotti and Elvira were with us, and we two girls
again diligently took up our studies and other occupations. Elvira wrote
new dramas, corresponded, and industriously wrote letters to all kinds
of famous people.[14] I did a good deal of piano-playing and studied
languages. For our recreation there was more puff-playing too: Friedrich
von Hadeln had nothing more to _adeln_ now; once more the most varied
figures were introduced as the heroes of our romances, from American
cowboys to European attachés of legation and on again to Indian
Maharajahs. Once every week came my dear guardian Fritzerl driving out
from Vienna, played his game of tarteln with mother, and told all the
happenings at court and in society. There was also an elderly clergyman
from the Klosterneuburg convent who was often at our house—a _bel
esprit_, philosopher, and jovial associate. We took long walks in the
Danube meadows in Aunt Lotti’s company; my mother was not a good
pedestrian and contented herself with taking the air in our little
garden. It was quite a wild garden, with a brook running through it. I
still remember happy hours spent in dreaming on the banks of that brook;
the water dancing over pebbles, the growth of bushes all along the bank,
among them a few willows with low-hanging branches, all afforded me a
quite peculiar enjoyment that I have never found again in any landscape
in the world.

The winter then, to be sure, was rather monotonous in our country nest.
So once, for diversion’s sake, I played a prank in all quietness.
Without telling anybody anything, I composed an advertisement and sent
it to the Vienna _Presse_, where it appeared; it made a sensation in our
circle.

“I’m going to write to those people!” cried Elvira.

The words of the advertisement were:

“From pure caprice on the one hand, and from the mind’s demand for an
exchange of ideas on the other, a brother and sister of gentle birth,
living in a lonely castle, desire to enter into correspondence with
persons who feel warmly and think deeply. The correspondence will be
supervised by a stern papa who means to show the young enthusiasts how
unpractical they are with their idea of an exchange of souls. Address
_Cela n’engage à rien_, office of this paper.”

“Yes, I’ll write to those people,” repeated Elvira.

“I forbid it,” said Aunt Lotti; “who would answer an advertisement?”

“Oh, let her, aunt,” I pleaded.

My mother fired up: “Perhaps you mean to write too? You’ll do no such
thing!”

“Oh, no, I shouldn’t at all care to,—the stuff is too crazy.”

There was a good deal more of talk back and forth about the
unconventional advertisement, but I did not betray by the change of a
feature that I was the criminal.

In sending in the advertisement I had at the same time written to the
editor of the _Presse_ to collect the answers that came in, and, after
the lapse of some days, to dispatch them to Klosterneuburg, _poste
restante_, under a certain cipher.

Five days later we were going by the post office on our usual walk.

“Please, aunt,” said I, “let us go in; I want to buy stamps.”

We went in. But at the window, instead of asking for stamps, I inquired,
“Is there anything for A—R 25?”

The clerk looked, and handed me a bulky package. My heart leaped into my
throat with joy.

“What does that mean?” cried the others.

“You’ll find out at home.”

When we reached home I tore open the envelope and let about sixty or
seventy letters fall on the table, all bearing the address _Cela
n’engage à rien_.

“Look, these are the answers to my advertisement—I’m the brother and
sister!”

“And there’s my letter too,” cried Elvira, pulling out a missive on
which she recognized her own writing, “that’s mean!” and she tore it
into little bits.

“So you did answer in spite of my prohibition!” said Aunt Lotti in
indignant tones.

“And you send advertisements to the paper behind the backs of us all?”
added my mother, not less indignant. “You are a nice pair of children!”

“Well, to pay for it we now have the entertainment of reading all this,”
I said soothingly.

And the reading did in fact prove very amusing. Some of the answers were
imbecile, but others were witty; and among the witty ones were some so
interesting that we decided to reply to them, anonymously of course, and
this time with our mothers’ permission.

A letter from a lady, signed “Doris in See,” had especially captivated
Elvira. She assumed the rôle of the “brother” in the advertisement, and
entered into a correspondence with Doris in See which soon became very
lively. I too selected some correspondents, but the letters soon petered
out. My cousin, however, wrote Miss Doris longer and longer letters and
poems, fuller and fuller of devotion, and whole treatises too on the
most various topics; and Doris wrote as assiduously to Mr. “Kurt im
Walde”—that was the name that Elvira signed.

A whole year long the manuscripts—they could no longer be called
letters—flew back and forth; the two souls had actually gone out to each
other in full exchange.

Then conscience awoke in Elvira.

“Doris thinks I am a young man; she will be falling in love with me yet;
I must confess to her that her comrade Kurt is a girl.”

And she did. Back came a voice of jubilation:

“Glorious! my best friend, my poet and thinker Kurt, is a young woman,
and Doris—I must tell it now—is an officer in his Royal and Imperial
Majesty’s navy.”

The end of the story was that soon afterward Elvira married Doris, alias
Joseph Tiefenbacher, ensign on a ship of the line in the Austrian navy,
and was perfectly happy in her short married life.

PART TWO
1862–1872

V
ENTERING THE WORLD
Engaged · The engagement ended · Baden · Marietta · Season in Rome ·
Carnival at Venice

And now I was to be taken “into the world.” Our name might have given us
the right to move among the highest aristocracy, for there is doubtless
not a family of the high nobility of Austria with which we were not
connected by blood or by marriage. But one is ill acquainted with this
high nobility if one thinks that name and kinship suffice to get one
received. For this there is required (it was especially so in my youth;
now they have come to be somewhat less exclusive) first and foremost the
possession of sixteen great-great-grandparents; in other words, the
right of admission to court. This we had not—my mother was not
_Geborene_; besides, our means were also very modest; so it was not
possible for us to attain to the first society—the _société_, as it
styled itself—of Vienna. That stung me; oh, what a vain, superficial
thing I was! To think it was essential to the happiness of life to move
among the _crème_, and to think I was suffering an unmerited wrong by
the withholding of this happiness!

Now it came to pass that one of the richest men in Vienna sued for my
hand through the mediation of the author Joseph von Weilen, who used to
call at our house. Mother and guardian declared themselves favorable. To
be sure the suitor was not an aristocrat, and already fifty-two years
old. But he was willing to surround my existence and my mother’s with
the utmost splendor, villas, castles, palaces,—I was dazzled and said
“yes.”

I do not attempt to put a good face on this fact. It is an ugly fact
when an eighteen-year-old girl is willing to give her hand to an unloved
man so much older than herself, just because he is a millionaire! to
call it by its right name, it is selling herself. If I were writing a
novel I should certainly not tell such a story of its heroine, if she
was intended to be attractive; but what I am setting down here is the
experiences of a real person, for whose actions I am not by a long way
so responsible as I should be for those of a figure drawn from fancy.
For the latter would be fashioned according to my own present views and
feelings, while this eighteen-year-old Bertha Kinsky—though it is I
myself—is nothing more than a vague picture in memory. What the original
of the picture experienced is retained in bare outlines in my
recollection; it has also contributed to the shaping of my present
character; but what sort of character that original itself had at that
time appears to me as a thing in which I have as little part as in the
caprices of Cleopatra or Semiramis.

A few pictures from this engagement episode:

The presentation: Herr von Weilen brings the suitor for a morning call.
Stiff conversation in the drawing-room. Each studies the other. Pleased?
No, the elderly gentleman scarcely pleases me—but does not displease me.
Invitation to dinner the next day; Fürstenberg also there. Still stiff.
On the fourth or fifth day a letter to my mother asking for my hand. I
hesitate. That same evening we were to go to a ball—my coming out. An
aristocratic picnic: the _crème_ used to appear at this ball, but not
exclusively—elements of less consequence are also present. I can still
see my toilet, a white dress sprinkled all over with little rosebuds.
Full of joyous anticipation I entered the hall. Full of piqued
disappointment I left it. I had found but few partners; I should have
been left to sit out the cotillion had not a homely infantry officer,
who had had his matrimonial proposals rejected in numerous quarters,
taken pity on me. The aristocratic mothers sat together, my mother sat
alone; the countesses stood in groups and chattered, I knew none of
them; at the supper merry little coteries were formed, I was left out.
On the way home I said to my mother, “Mamma, I have made up my mind now,
I will accept the proposal.”

The next picture: The happy suitor, in possession of my acceptance,
brings me a whole cargo of betrothal presents: a set of sapphires and a
pearl necklace. He also presents to me his nearly sixteen-year-old
daughter (for he was a widower), and she calls me her dear, beautiful
mamma, which is great fun for me.

Next picture: A brilliant ball in the _haute finance_, in which we
participate as affianced lovers. Now I am surrounded, and the most
gorgeous young cavalry officers are paying court to me—one in particular
begs permission to call at my house when I am married. Evidently he
thinks an old man’s young wife may become interesting. But my fiancé is
furious, and makes a scene with me because I propose to go out to supper
on the uhlan’s arm. I laugh, leave my cavalier, and take the arm of the
angry man.

“Oh, I’ll be good,” I say soothingly.

Still another picture: A drive about the city, three of us, my mother
and the engaged couple, to look at house-furnishing goods, carriages,
gowns; also a drive to the suburbs to look at the truly princely villa
that was destined as a nuptial gift for me.

One picture more: An afternoon at our home. My betrothed and I are alone
for the first time.

“Bertha, do you know how ravishing you are?” He puts his arm around me
and presses his lips to mine. The first love-kiss that a man had given
me. An old man, an unloved man.—

With a suppressed cry of disgust I tear myself free, and in me arises a
passionate protest—No, never—

On the next day the presents were sent back; I broke the engagement. My
people had indeed tried to remonstrate: the scandal—the breach of
faith—I ought not to have said yes, I had not been compelled to, but to
draw back suddenly now—I should at least think it over for a while yet—

“No, no—I cannot, _cannot_—I’d rather die!”

And so the letter of dismissal was sent off.

A few hours later the daughter rushed to me and wept at my feet: I must
not treat her father so badly—I must revoke the cruel decision....

But there was no changing my mind now. Stubbornly I clung to my “I
cannot, I _cannot_!”

Soon the whole episode lay behind me like a bad dream which I felt it a
refreshment to have waked from. My engagement and disengagement had
taken place at carnival time; in the summer I was no longer thinking of
them. We spent this summer in Baden near Vienna, where my mother had
bought a small villa. It was a jolly summer, full of picnics,
watering-place music, and dancing parties.

A little circle of society was formed, including a few elegant and
pretty young girls and numerous young gentlemen, mostly officers, and
also the indispensable mothers; we met daily—often three times a day, at
noon in the park during the music, in the afternoon walking to the
Helenental, and again in the evening (if there was not a _réunion_) at
the home of one family or another, or at the evening music in the park.
I had formed an especially intimate friendship with a girl of my own
age, by name Marietta, Marchesa Saibante. She was a striking sight: a
tall and rotund figure (at that time angular thinness was not yet
stylish), raven-black hair and eyes, dazzling teeth, very red lips and
very red cheeks—but withal a snub nose and coarse features in general.

Marietta’s mother, a Baroness Scheibler by birth, had been married to an
Italian, Marchese Saibante, and was a widow of many years’ standing. She
had only this single daughter, and worshiped her. With the two lived
also an unmarried sister of the Marchesa, and this Aunt Helene, as she
was called, worshiped Marietta still more. The two middle-aged ladies
(what a pity there is no German word for the expressively descriptive
English “middle-aged”) did not let their favorite get a step away from
their immediate presence. They were living in very modest circumstances,
but were rather prideful, since they were related to all the illustrious
families of the aristocracy. A deceased third sister had been married to
a Prince Auersperg. They had also a rich uncle, Field Marshal Count
Wratislav, who cherished a particular affection for Helene. This uncle
was constantly being spoken of. Very often, too, mention was made of a
cousin with the proud name Rohan (_Roi ne puis, prince ne daigne, Rohan
je suis_). Cousin Rohan was spoken of only incidentally—not
pretentiously,—“I have a cousin who is a Princess Rohan,”—but there were
told anecdotes and facts that were in themselves worth speaking of, and
that only happened by chance to be connected with Cousin Rohan. Query:
do not most people have among their kinsfolk and friends, or even mere
acquaintances, a person who is in a higher position then theirs, whom
they regard as their “Cousin Rohan” and utilize for the apparently
unintentional embellishment of their conversation?

That summer Elvira celebrated her marriage with Doris in See. Marietta
and I figured as bridesmaids. While the breakfast was still going on the
young couple left Baden for Pola, where the newly married ensign’s ship
was lying at anchor.

Now I was thrown altogether on Marietta. It was a strong contrast. After
my cousin,—the poetess, the scholar,—the Rohan’s cousin, who was a
worldling through and through, with nothing else in her head but the
enjoyments and glitter of social life. She had tasted of them, despite
her limited circumstances; for she had spent a whole carnival in Prague,
and had there, under the ægis of the Auerspergs, the Wratislavs, and the
Rohans, danced at twenty balls and flirted (without results) with many
an _épouseur_. Now in Baden it was dancing and coquetting again;
Marietta and I were the belles of the season. These entertainments were
now “the important thing.”—As if the world had been created for no other
purpose than to be our place of amusement.

The following winter we (that is, my mother and brother and I) spent in
Rome. It had come about thus. The just-dethroned Queen of Naples, with
her suite, had spent this summer at the Weilburg in Baden as guests of
Archduke Albrecht. The historic tragedy that had preceded, the defense
and loss of Gaeta, had made but little impression on me; I only listened
with interest to the stories that were told of it by the queen’s chief
steward, an old _principe_, who often visited us. It was he who depicted
to us the life of foreigners in Italy, especially in Rome, so
temptingly, and urged us so strenuously to come there next winter that
we let ourselves be prevailed upon. The prospect took my fancy greatly.
Yet, to my shame, I must avow that what attracted me was not eternal
Rome with the magic of its historic memories, but the portrayals of
Roman society life. And it remained so during our stay. What made most
impression on me there—what was to me “the important thing”—was not the
Vatican and Castel Sant’Angelo and the Forum, but the Monte Pincio with
its elegant Corso, the Teatro Costanza with its opera season consisting
of two alternating operas (one of them _Il Trovatore_), and the balls
and soirées that we attended in the palaces of the Roman magnates or in
the drawing-rooms of the colonies of foreigners. I did not bring away
deep impressions in any respect from that stay in Rome; it was reserved
to a time many years later for me to take in, with some comprehension,
the enchantment which this classic soil must exert upon any half-way
receptive mind.

Our friend of Baden days, the Neapolitan _principe_, once invited us to
an excursion to his home city, and took us from there to Pompeii, the
Blue Grotto, and the marvelous Capo di Monte, where he owned a villa—but
it was rather dilapidated, as was he himself for that matter. When he
came out next with a proposal of marriage, at the close of the season
when we were already packed up for our journey, I said “no” without
hesitation. I would not conjure down upon myself a second time the fate
which I had newly escaped—that of becoming the wife of an unloved old
man. Oh yes, if my suitor’s twenty-five-year-old son, the black-eyed
Duca di ..., who quite pleased me, had appeared as suitor, I do not
know—but he did not take it into his head; I think he was more inclined
to feel an antipathy to me, for he must have seen into his father’s
plans, and a second marriage on the father’s part would presumably have
been extremely unwelcome to the son. Not till afterward did we learn
that in our circle it had been generally assumed that the elderly
_principe_, who loaded us with attentions, had even in Baden been my
unacknowledged fiancé.

From Rome we returned to Baden, where the life of last year’s season was
repeated; and in the following winter, 1864, we went to Venice to go
“into the world” again there.

Venice! Thee too, marvelously charming, death-pale queen of the lagoons,
I learned only in much later years to understand and love. Totally
insensible to her beauty I was not, to be sure, even at that time; but
yet “the important thing” to me was social life. It did my heart good to
be again in the vicinity of my beloved cousin Elvira. Her husband was
now stationed at Venice, and the couple were living there quite
secluded, but in the profoundest domestic happiness. Only two things
disturbed this happiness: first, the young husband’s prospective early
return to sea service, which threatened them with a year’s separation,
and secondly Elvira’s unsettled health; she coughed much, and was often
seized with the fear that she was consumptive. Those who surrounded her,
and the physician too, would talk her out of this fear, and then she
would once more give herself up to the full gladness of living.

I, meanwhile, was reveling in the enjoyment of the Venetian carnival.
Venice was at that time an Austrian city, and society life moved in
Austrian circles. The houses which we frequented were those of the
Austrian governor, the Austrian consul, and sundry Austrian aristocrats.
A rich English family named Greaves, adorned by a beautiful daughter,
also kept open house, but the Italian families were hostile and held
aloof.

Our life ran this course: at noon a military band played in the Piazza
di San Marco, and there—just as we used to do in the Kurpark at Baden—we
promenaded up and down, accompanied by whatever gallants were at
hand—mostly navy officers—and continued the conversations of last
night’s ball. If it rained, we sat in the cafés under the Procuratie and
had our social intercourse there. At five in the afternoon we called on
each other, and every evening we met at private balls or soirées. A
great fancy-dress ball was given, and once—I think it was in the
Wimpffen house—there was an exhibition of amateur theatricals, and
living pictures with them.

The toilets that I wore on these three occasions I can still see in my
memory. I do not intend to describe them, but only to show by this
confession what it is that makes so deep an impression on a silly girl’s
mind—and, withal, I was not even one of the silliest. They made much of
my intellect—they made much of me in every way that season at Venice, so
that I felt myself one of their queens. An agreeable feeling, at all
events. It went to my head violently, and I took advantage of this
agreeable self-sufficiency to send some suitors off with vigorous
refusals. This brought upon me worldly-wise reproaches from my people;
but how well it is for me that I did this, for otherwise I should be
to-day the wife of some admiral or commodore, and should not have
possessed that husband whose possession was my life’s consecration, nor
should I have come into touch with the peace movement, in which my
activities and endeavors have received their most fervid inspiration.

One may be disposed to stigmatize as frivolity the type of character
exhibited by a young female who is wholly taken up with social
enjoyments, who does not concern herself about the events that move the
world, but who does bestow on her own toilets, worn at festal occasions,
such intense attention that after forty years the memory is not yet
extinct. Well, I would ask an old, ever-so-efficient general if he does
not remember the clink of the saber dragging behind him when he went out
for the first time after he received his commission; I would ask the
most learned professor of the political sciences if he cannot still see
before his eyes the color of the ribbon which he wore on his student
cap.

But in these things—ball bouquet, lieutenant’s saber, students’ society
colors—there lies something additional, quite other than what they are;
the fragrance and clink and gleam is of the symbol; they are admission
cards to the advertised great festival, winning tickets for the hoped
chief prizes of the great lottery,—the Future.

Ball triumphs—I can still remember what intensified feelings of
intoxication they bring with them. I say intensified, for youth in happy
and care-free circumstances is in itself an intoxication. One need not
be “frivolous” by a long way—in the sense of superficial and
brainless—if one then plunges with a certain passionate fullness of
satisfaction in the flood of social amusements; there is vibrating a
peculiar electric fluid full of invisible sparks which mean to discharge
themselves as happiness or as love—or at least as joy. And the warmer a
girl’s emotional life is, the more her mind has been fed on poetic diet,
the more proudly she feels that she has treasures of happiness to
bestow, the more devoted love she feels the force within her capable of,
so much the more sensitive is she to the mysterious crackle of those
sparks. He who does not hear the crackle, to whose head the intoxicating
foam is not rising, through whom the passionate hopes of happiness are
not glowing,—well, he does find the whole business flat and vapid, and
charges the young fools who are giving themselves up to all this with
being superficial.

But after a few seasons a sobering-down comes to everybody. One who lets
himself be forever satisfied with social festivities, even when the
first flush of youth is past and the promises have not been fulfilled,
who does not then recognize “the important thing” in other aims, in new
duties, in serious activity, is indeed irredeemably frivolous.

Besides, I was talking of the feelings of our young girls in society at
the time of my youth. To-day everything has changed greatly. The girl
fresh from a good school no longer, as at that time, finds in the ball
her highest joy and her only opportunity for fulfilling her vocation, a
happy conquest. Dancing is being displaced by sport, and of callings
that are open to women there are more every day. Society life itself has
grown more tedious too: the young men shun the ballrooms; the seasons do
not last so long that people get better and better acquainted and so
enjoy each other’s company more and more; neither in winter in the city
nor in summer at the watering-place does society meet for the whole
season—they fly from place to place, from the mountains to the sea, from
the northern city to the South, from Scheveningen to St. Moritz, from
the Pyrenees to Egypt, up to the not distant time when from the Isle of
Wight they will make excursions to the fashionable Japanese baths.

VI
A SEASON IN HOMBURG VOR DER HÖHE
Our way of living · My first singing lessons · The Princess of
Mingrelia · Tsar Alexander II · Adelina Patti

1864—that was the year in which the Austrian troops, in conjunction with
the German, were waging war against Denmark. When I call up that year in
my own memory, this event plays no part in it at all. Doubtless I must
have heard something of it, but, as no one near and dear to me was
participating in it, what I heard was too faint a tone to leave traces
on my psychical phonograph. And in general the naïve conception of
martial events which was then mine, and is doubtless widespread even
to-day, is that wars are things that take place as necessarily and
regularly and outside of the sphere of all human influence as do
processes in the interior of the earth and in the firmament; so one is
not to get into a rage over them. And if they take place at a distance
it is like the collision of two stars—such a thing does not really
concern one, one will not let himself be disturbed in his occupations
and amusements by it—at most one may find it interesting that “history”
has again become active, and may be anxious to see what new lines its
stylus will engrave on the map. I do not think, for that matter, that I
felt this anxiety. I did not read the political part of the papers when
I read papers at all (my reading consisted only of French and English
books); and if I learned of the victory of the allies, and took pleasure
in it, this was at most brought about by the fact that the
_Düppler-Schanzen-Marsch_ was to be seen in all the music shops, with
the usual pretty picture of charging soldiers on the cover, one of them
in the foreground at the left waving the flagstaff on high, while at the
top the bunting rolls over the whole page in such great undulations that
one positively hears it flap in the wind. The cover of that piece of
music has remained in my memory; aside from this, of the whole
Schleswig-Holstein campaign—nothing.

The year 1864, especially the summer, brought me far other experiences,
which affected me deeply and have remained indelible in my memory.

We had gone to Bad Homburg v. d. Höhe. In causing my mother’s choice to
fall upon this place, the attraction of the trente-et-quarante table was
certainly the determining factor. It was her intention never again to
enter a gambling-room—this she had declared years ago; but now the
hankering had awakened again, and also the idea that perhaps it might
after all be possible to repeat the experiment that had been made at
home, and to harvest a trifle of a million, which is in all cases
agreeable. I did not say no to this scheme, for Homburg was incidentally
a very fashionable watering-place, where I should certainly find
opportunity for entertainment. My guardian did not approve at all; he
thought the gambling-room dangerous for my mother, and the society that
moved there unsuitable for me. Homburg was reputed to be a haunt of the
Parisian demi-monde. And in fact, we used to see on the terrace that
year two notably striking figures whose names are doubtless still in the
memory of those who go back to the time of the second French empire,
Cora Pearl and Léonide Leblanc. I was not unacquainted with the
existence of the _haute galanterie_ of Paris. As a reader of the French
novelists, Alexandre Dumas, Eugène Sue, George Sand, Paul Féval, who
were then the latest thing, I had acquired a knowledge of the life and
luxury of the _grandes courtisanes_, as they were called by those
authors.—Yet, along with such society, Homburg harbored also a highly
respectable community of foreigners who came to take the waters, from
everywhere under the sun—especially Russians and English.

Our apartments had been engaged in advance, in a house that stood
opposite the Kursaal; its owner was a banker named Wormser. Frau Wormser
was a dear, sensible, prepossessing woman. With this mention I send a
greeting to her in the realm of shadows.

I do not know how Homburg has developed since then. I see it before me
like this: a long, wide street leading from the railway to infinity,
interrupted on the right hand by a square where the Kursaal stands;
along the street the houses either are hotels,—the usual Englischer Hof,
Russischer Hof, or other Hof,—or bear a placard reading _Appartements
meublés_. When you get beyond the Kursaal the hotels diminish, the
street leading to infinity takes on the character of a small city, and
into it open the little streets and alleys that pertain to the capital
of the reigning Landgrave of Hesse-Homburg. At that time the last of the
landgraves was seated on this throne; for two years later not only did
his line die out with him, so that the landgraviate fell to
Hesse-Darmstadt, but by the terms of the peace of September 3, 1886, it
was incorporated into the kingdom of Prussia as a part of the province
of Hesse. Hesse-Homburg patriotism, if there was any, must have been
retrimmed in quick succession into a Darmstadt patriotism, a Nassau
patriotism, a Prussian and an Imperial German patriotism.

Where the great street broke off at Kurhaus Square, a side street turned
to the right, running opposite the Kursaal to the park. Here was the
foremost hotel of the place, Hotel Bellevue, and around the corner,
where the park was already beginning, stood the large three-story
Weckerlin house, on the ground floor of which I had many a joyous
hour—of this more anon.

When we arrived we knew nobody, but acquaintances are readily formed in
watering-places. Thus it came to pass that on the very first evening, at
our landlord’s bank, where my mother was having money changed (the
capital for the indubitable winning of those millions), we fell in with
an old gentleman whom Herr Wormser introduced to us as “Banker
Königswarter from Paris.” Then when we came to the music the next
afternoon Herr von Königswarter joined us, and introduced to us several
other guests of the spa, both gentlemen and ladies. Thus we became
acquainted with a Countess Vitztum who lived in Paris, Baron Alphonse
Rothschild from Naples, and several others whom I do not now remember.

We had organized our life thus: mother spent the forenoon at her work, I
stayed at home meanwhile (for it was settled as a fundamental principle
that I was not to enter the gambling-rooms), and during this time I
occupied myself with my piano and with my books. We had immediately
rented a piano and subscribed for six volumes at a time from the
circulating library, which was in the house next door. I was always a
ravenous devourer of books: without three volumes of belles-lettres
(novels in several volumes were the style then), two of Tauchnitz, and
one of German science, I was not to be contented. In all time to which
my thoughts go back, I have always, under all circumstances and in every
situation, led two lives—my own and that of my reading. I mean, the
events that I lived through and those that came to me through
description have simultaneously enriched my store of memories; to the
persons known to me in daily intercourse there have been added the
heroes of my authors; it is under the influence of a double experience
that what I am has taken shape. The stories of the “Thousand and One
Nights” belong to my impressions of the Orient just as much as does my
real stay in the Caucasus, and many a living gallant has quickened my
pulse less acutely than has the imagined figure of Marquis Posa. And
does not one often feel it as one of the experiences of life when from
the words of a thinker or scientist a new truth breaks forth, when
suddenly a fold of the veil that wraps the great mystery “Universe” is
lifted?

—Well, then, I devoted the forenoon to my occupation at home. At one
o’clock my mother came from her work (oh, how laborious and really
hateful she said it was!) and we lunched in our room. In the afternoon
we dressed nicely for the concert; at seven o’clock came dinner at the
Kurhaus restaurant, mostly in company, and after it, three times a week,
opera. Just then Adelina Patti, still quite young but already renowned,
was singing there _als Gast_. She was receiving an honorarium of five
thousand francs for every performance. I heard her in _La Sonnambula_,
_Faust_, _Lucia di Lammermoor_, _Don Pasquale_, _La Traviata_, _Linda di
Chamouni_, _Crispino e la Comare_. It must surely be a divine sensation
to stand there on the boards, the incarnation of an ideal figure, and
with the magic of one’s art to take so many hearts captive, to acquire
so much glory, honor, wealth, and withal to intoxicate one’s self with
the sweetness of one’s own voice,—these thoughts, joined with a certain
feeling of envy, ran through my mind while Patti sang, and now I
understood why my mother had felt it such an impairment of her happiness
in life that she had been hindered from becoming a Malibran. Malibran,
it was affirmed, had been a hundred times greater than Patti; and her
voice (my mother’s) had, she said, been put on a level with Malibran’s
by connoisseurs. Might not I, perhaps, have inherited this divine gift?

We sent for the leader of the orchestra at the opera to come and test
whether I had voice, and if I had, to give me singing lessons. He came,
tested, thought the material was good, and gave me lessons; of course
only exercises for developing the voice. That was somewhat of a bore to
me; I should have liked to learn a bravura aria at once, and I felt it
as a disappointment that when I let a beautiful F or G swell to
fortissimo and then diminish again till it died away, the Herr
Kapellmeister did not spring up to cry out in enthusiasm, “Why, that
beats Patti!” And so we gave up the lessons after a week—the more
readily because to my mother, whose work often failed of success in most
inexplicable fashion, the fee of twenty francs an hour seemed decidedly
too high.

One afternoon, at the music, Herr von Königswarter said to us,

“The Princess of Mingrelia has a keen desire to make the acquaintance of
the ladies.”

We had long known who the Princess of Mingrelia was, since we saw her
daily in the Kurpark and at the theater, and since Herr von
Königswarter, who was on friendly terms with her, had told us as much as
he knew of the story of her life. Ekaterina Dadiani, formerly princess
of the Caucasian country (now incorporated in the Russian empire) of
Mingrelia, was a very elegant lady of about forty-six or forty-seven,
still goodly to look upon, and must in her youth have been a dazzling
beauty of the genuine Georgian type. She had for some years been living
in Europe, alternately Paris and St. Petersburg, for the sake of her
children’s education; in summer she came regularly to drink the
health-giving waters of Homburg. Every morning at seven o’clock she went
to the spring; she often made the round of the gambling-rooms, but never
played; at the afternoon concert she used to sit in a particular place
on the Kurhaus terrace, always surrounded by a whole little court. Her
family consisted of two sons and a daughter. Her oldest son Nikolaus,
called Niko, was at that time seventeen years old, her daughter Salomé
sixteen, and her youngest son André fourteen. Her household (she
occupied the whole ground floor of the Weckerlin house) comprised a
secretary, the governess for her daughter, the tutor for the boys, a
valet, and two maids.

After her husband’s death she had taken the reins of government as her
son’s guardian. Once, hard pressed by the Turks, she herself went
against the enemy at the head of her horsemen. But it had been
impossible for her to hold her ground, and she had to accept the
protection of Russia, a protection that was practically annexation. The
heir was allowed to keep his title of Prince of Mingrelia, and his
lands, but in the form of a _majorat_; the throne he must forego. A
considerable appanage was set apart for the dowager princess, and at the
Russian court she was allowed the rank of a foreign sovereign. She was
content, for those Caucasian principalities and kingdoms—Georgia,
Imeretia, Mingrelia, etc.—were always threatened by Mohammedan enemies,
and under Russian safeguard they could develop peacefully, thrive, and
remain true to their ancestral standards of life, their customs, their
languages, and their dress.

In the princess’s company there were frequently to be seen a few
Caucasian ladies wearing their picturesque home costume; she herself
ordered her gowns from Worth and wore them with all the _chic_ and
elegance of a genuine _grande dame_. She spoke French fluently, even
though it was with a strong Russian accent; with her children she
conversed mostly in the Georgian language.

The desired acquaintance was made. I brought the interesting woman
girlish admiration, and she took me to her heart. Soon I became almost a
child of the house. At first I only sat in the great circle during the
concert; then the princess invited me to accompany her to the spring in
the morning, to come and see her at her apartments, to dine with her. My
mother held aloof: a few formal calls made and returned, that was all.
I, on the other hand, was taken into the intimacy of the princess, who
had a great predilection for young people. Salomé, her daughter, far
nearer to me in years, came in contact with me much less than did her
mother; she, with her hardly completed sixteen summers, was still rated
as a child, and had to stay with her governess most of the time.

By her fellow-countrymen the princess was addressed as “Dedopali”; this
means queen, literally “mother of mothers,” and is in that country the
correct title for every female sovereign. I was generally called by the
family “la contessina.” A friend of the Dadiani household, the Italian
Marchese Almorini, had thus addressed me, and the designation had stuck
to me. He was a comical sight, this Almorini. An old beau, always paying
compliments, always skipping about, always _aux petits soins_ with the
ladies. He did not show his age: he wore a coal-black wig and dyed his
beard. He could relate so many stories and chronicles of times long gone
by that there had grown up a standing joke that he had been centuries in
the world, like Cagliostro.

The princess’s secretary, who was likewise her courier, major-domo,
shawl-bearer,—in a word, factotum,—bore the name of Monsieur Ferry, and
was a Frenchman. He was the picture of devotion. Since one cannot all
the time be bending the upper part of the body forward as in reverential
salutations, he stood with his hip sloping to one side when he spoke to
his mistress, and always addressed her as “Altesse.” He was a man of
about forty, with a reddish imperial and side whiskers. The old valet,
called Monsieur David, a fat, smooth-shaven Swiss, had been one of the
household for twenty years, had served the late prince in Mingrelia, and
was the genuine type of the devoted old servant, possessing the absolute
confidence of his mistress and the love of her children.

Innumerable and clear-cut are the recollections which the hours that I
spent in the Dedopali’s house and in her company have left in my mind.
The oriental, exotic quality, commingled with the Russian and Parisian
tone of high society, spiced with romance and surrounded with the
glitter of wealth, exercised a peculiar fascination upon me; I was truly
downright happy in this relationship, it was to me like the coming true
of indefinite, long-cherished dreams. When I entered her apartments in
the Weckerlin house at any hour I had a glad and buoyant feeling. From
the front room one entered a large dining-room with three windows and a
balcony; at its right there was a corner drawing-room in which the
princess spent most of her time, and back of that was her sleeping-room.
At the left of the dining-room were the children’s rooms. It was only an
ordinary _appartement meublé_, though a high-grade one; nothing of
princely splendor about it; but yet by the many personal objects
scattered about, by the flowers, by the fashion in which the furniture
was placed, the whole had a private and characteristic stamp of its own;
the very odor that filled these rooms—a mixture of orange-flower
perfume, Russian cigarettes, and leather—had something personal about
it. In the course of years I met the Dedopali in many places, and
everywhere that she stayed this same odor hovered about her rooms and
adhered to all her possessions.

I spent many hours in that corner drawing-room and listened to the words
of the princess, who related to me much that was romantic in her career.
She would stay in Europe a few years more, and then return to her own
country with her sons. In the meantime her daughter would doubtless have
married. “And you, too, Contessina, will sometime visit me in the
Caucasus with your husband, will you not? You are already twenty-one,
and so pretty—you must soon make a brilliant match and be right
happy.—Come, I will show you what wedding present I intend for you.”

And she took me into her sleeping-room, commanded her maid to set out
the jewel casket, and showed me her treasures,—a magnificent collection
of pearls, diamonds, and other precious stones. She took out a pretty
little brooch of brilliants.

“See, this is the _cadeau de noce, mais d’abord il faut avoir ‘le
promis.’_”

She questioned me: was there no one who was attentive to me, no one who
especially pleased me? No, my heart was free.—She herself, a short time
before, had been not far from contracting a second marriage. The
preceding summer at Biarritz the Duke of Osuna, the greatest and richest
nobleman of Spain, had sued for her hand, but she could not make up her
mind to it; she was now living only for the future of her children, and
besides she was already taking too much delight in looking forward to
her return to her native land, from which she was banished until her son
Niko should have reached his majority.

One afternoon, during the Kur-concert, we were all sitting on the
terrace once more in our usual places in the Dedopali’s circle. There
was a rumor that the Tsar, Alexander II, was in Homburg on that day:
perhaps he would come into the Kurpark. In fact, suddenly a commotion
arose, and from all sides came the cry, _L’Empereur, l’Empereur!_... And
down below in the park could be seen the tall, imposing figure of
Alexander II, who, accompanied by his aides, was promenading below the
terrace. As soon as his eye fell on the Dedopali he came hurrying up the
steps. The princess arose and moved forward to meet him, and he seized
her hand and kissed it. The rest of us stood at a respectful distance;
but I heard when after a short conversation the Emperor proposed in a
somewhat louder tone and in French, “Shall we not take a turn through
the gaming-rooms?” And he offered her his arm. The rest of us followed.

At the roulette table Alexander II borrowed a few gold pieces from his
companion,—either he had no money with him or else he thought that
borrowed money brings luck,—and threw the stake on the red. He won, let
the money stand a few times, but ultimately it was swept in by the
little rake, relentless even toward autocrats.

Another episode remains in my memory, a call which Adelina Patti paid to
the Princess of Mingrelia. She came accompanied by a lady companion, and
remained a short half hour in the corner drawing-room, while I also
happened to be there. The sort of awesome timidity with which the
autocrat of all the Russias had affected me a few days before filled me
now in a different way, but almost to the same degree, in the presence
of this victorious yet childishly bashful sovereign in the empire of
song—an empire which had stood before my mind as one of the mightiest
ever since my childhood. The conversation turned principally on music,
and when she was asked as to her favorite rôle, Adelina Patti named
Marguerite in _Faust_.

VII
HERACLIUS OF GEORGIA
A disappointed dream of love

One day a new figure appeared in the princess’s circle. A man of about
forty: elegant figure of medium height, regular features with a
melancholy, almost gloomy expression, and a long, narrow black imperial.

“My dear cousin, Prince Heraclius of Georgia—my darling Contessina, of
whom I have told you so much,” said the princess, as she introduced us.

The cousin from Georgia pleased me and I pleased him also. Such a thing
is detected instantly. A lively conversation immediately sprang up
between us. Now we met several times a day, for the prince was
constantly in his cousin’s company, was invited to her rooms for all
meals and for the evenings. In the evening they used to have music—what
is called music: the oldest son drummed on the piano and sang all kinds
of songs from the music-halls and the boulevards; the rest joined in; I
rendered a few real piano pieces,—Chopin nocturnes, Mendelssohn
caprices, and Liszt rhapsodies,—sang a few of the ballads that were
lying around, and reaped a rich harvest of applause. I was admired day
after day as a musical marvel.

I liked to have the Dedopali tell me about her cousin. He was the son of
the last King of Georgia; properly bore the name Bagration, just as the
Russian emperors are Romanofs—he was a “Bagratide.” This designation
sounded to me particularly heroic and classic. He had a palace in Tiflis
and an ancient royal castle in the mountains. He lived much in Europe,
but frequently went back to his home in the Caucasus, where he was still
treated by the population as a king. In temperament he was melancholy
rather than cheerful, the probable cause being his not altogether robust
health—his yellowish complexion indicated a diseased liver. To cure such
ailments he alternately drank of the waters of Homburg, Karlsbad, or
Vichy.

“He would cure his ailments better,” added the princess, “if he would
take a young wife who would cheer him up and make him right happy, a
sweet young wife like you, _ma petite Contessina_—Just try and see if
you can’t turn his head a little; it has long been the wish of my heart
to have him married.”

Such advice turned _my_ head a little. I really found this exotic sprig
of royalty, this dark Bagratide, who was at the same time a thorough
_homme du monde_, in the highest degree interesting. There is yet a step
from being interested to being in love, but not a very long one. The
slightest occasion, and this step is taken. This is the way it happened
with me (I made use of this episode many years later in my novel
_Trente-et-quarante_):

One day I had again been invited to dinner at the Villa Weckerlin. Those
who sat next me at table were an Englishman—Lord Hillsborough—and
Heraclius. After dinner the company repaired to the salon; the mistress
of the house requested me to play something for them. Without being
urged, I sat down at the grand piano and played with bravura a Chopin
valse. Heraclius stood near me.

“You are an artist,” he said when I had finished.

It was now time to break up. The princess’s guests had also taken a box
at the opera for that evening, and it had been agreed that we should go
to the opera together.

I followed the princess into her dressing-room to rearrange, my hair a
little. The locks to be curled, and the faded roses to be replaced with
fresh ones. While Masha, the maid, was doing this work, I looked at my
own picture set in the silver frame of the toilet mirror. How
advantageously this thick polished glass showed the image: or was it the
effect of the champagne that my cheeks glowed so vividly, as if they had
been rouged? I took up the oval hand mirror; it showed the same dazzling
color; and by means of the double reflection I could now also see the
effect of the spray of roses drooping between the dark locks at the back
of my neck.

The princess stood near the toilet table.

“Take a little _poudre de riz_, my love,” she said, and lifted the
silver cover of a round glass jar. I pressed the puff into the fragrant
powder and dabbed it against my face and neck; how cooling it was, how
refreshing to the hot cheeks! And then, after the visible traces of rice
flour had been wiped off with the soft rabbit’s foot, the too deep red
in the cheeks had been changed to a tender rose, the lips glowed the
more vividly, and the eyes sparkled darker than before.

To complete my toilet the princess gave me a sandalwood fan with steel
spangles, and now we were ready.

When we entered the box the performance was already in progress. They
were giving _Rigoletto_. Gilda was just rushing down the steps to meet
her father. _Mio padre!—Figlia mia!_ As it were a flood of delicate
waves of tone came purling down from the stage, and the thickly packed
theater presented a brilliant spectacle. The impressions of life’s
splendor and joy which I was receiving that day kept on crescendo.

Heraclius of Georgia was present in the box. He sat opposite me and kept
his eyes fixed on me. It seemed to me as if the captivating melodies in
the duet between Gilda and the duke expressed what was streaming from
heart to heart between Heraclius and me, still unspoken but already
understood on both sides. I listened to the fiery strains of Verdi, and
slowly moved my fan back and forth, every motion sending me a breath of
sandalwood. Once I slightly turned my head and met the eyes of my
vis-à-vis fixed upon me full of tenderness and admiration. Then I
dropped my lids, but soon, in spite of myself, I lifted them again and
gave the dear fellow a long, full gaze of love.

Now the curtain fell; the princess turned around, and Heraclius stood
up; he made room for various visitors who came crowding into the box,
and went out. Shortly afterwards I saw him on the other side of the
house with his opera glass directed on me. During the rest of the
performance Lord Hillsborough stayed in the box and Heraclius did not
return.

After the quartet in the last act the princess stood up.

“Let us go,” said she; “I do not want to see the coming storm and the
dragging out of the bag with the corpse. Instead, let us take a turn
through the gaming-rooms.”

At the exit of the auditorium stood Heraclius. He came to my side.

“The performance is over at last! Were you very much fascinated by the
Englishman’s conversation?”

“I was fascinated by the Italian’s music,” said I in reply.

A long gallery leads from the theater to the gaming-rooms. Heraclius
walked by my side, and I expected every moment that he would put into
words what had just now been uttered through the eyes; but then the
princess began to involve her cousin in a conversation, which lasted
till we entered the gaming-rooms.

Here we took our stand at the roulette table, and the princess flung
some gold pieces on the _tableau_.

“I am going to make a proposition,” said Heraclius to his cousin.
“To-day is Wednesday, and there is a ball here; let us go to the gallery
and look on.”

The princess agreed, and the little company mounted the steps leading to
the ballroom gallery.

This was full of people. There was hardly a place to be found between
the spectators who were leaning over the railing. We had to separate;
the princess took her place at one end of the gallery, I was at the
other. Heraclius joined me. It was like a tête-à-tête. Crowded by the
people who stood beside us, he had to come so near me that his arm
rested on the railing close against mine. What we said no one else could
hear, for the noise of the waltz music prevented words exchanged at
close quarters from carrying to any remoter place. It was to a Strauss
waltz—the _Morgenblätter_—that the couples on the floor below were
whirling. But, though I looked down, I saw little of the swarm on the
floor; my ball was up above. More giddily than under the maddest galop
time I felt myself whirled onward by the prince’s proximity, by his
words. The atmosphere was oppressive; the chandelier near us poured out
a hot and dazzling light. I kept my fan going incessantly, and with its
sandalwood scent it said something to me—for scents also speak—that
enravished me.

“You are a magnificent girl,” Heraclius’s flattering voice was
whispering in my ear meantime. “You have all the qualities to turn the
soberest heads, to set the coldest hearts to beating. I had no idea that
earth contained a being who could exercise such a witchery as you—”

“Children!” exclaimed the princess, coming up to us, “it is beyond
endurance here; this heat is suffocating, the light makes one’s eyes
ache, the music is deafening, and there is not much to look at in the
dancing of those four or five ill-gowned Homburg girls. Don’t you agree
with me? Let us go!”

Well, we had to go, for it was for the princess to decide, but I
assuredly did not agree with her. The heat-radiating chandelier was to
me a magic sun, the noise of the wind instruments was like the music of
the spheres—a more glorious festivity I had never yet experienced.

The princess and her cousin accompanied me to the door of my house. It
was still open.

“_A demain, chérie!_” said the princess, kissing me on the forehead.
“But not at the spring,” she added. “Come at two o’clock.”

My mother was still up.

“How late you are! The theater was out long ago!”

“We have been looking on at the ball, mamma.”

“How did you enjoy yourself? Tell me.”

“To-morrow, dear mamma!”

I kissed my mother and went to rest.

Rest? “Who ne’er distressful nights upon his bed has sat in tears,” runs
the well-known poem; but whoever has not through a long night, awaking
every ten minutes, kept tossing from one side of the bed to the other,
with a beloved name upon his lips, a glowing beatitude in his heart,—he
also “knows you not, ye heavenly powers.”

A hundred times I started up from my slumber, and if I was not at once
conscious why I was so utterly happy and whom I loved so very dearly,
the sandalwood fan, which lay close to me on the stand, quickly told the
story. Its fragrance played the _Morgenblätter_, poured out the hot
light of the ballroom chandelier, and pressed a sleeve of black cloth
gently and tremblingly against a sleeve of white muslin. Then I would
deliciously go to sleep again, only to be reawakened soon by a powerful
heart-throb. And so it went till morning.

Once again, just as when I was enamored of Friedrich von Hadeln, I was
seized at waking by the consciousness of the rapturous “I love,” and
with it the still more rapturous “I am loved.” Warm, almost tangible, it
gushes from the heart, sweet, tender, full of yearning and yet glad in
possession—for even yearning is a possession. Thus there is on earth
something which yesterday was still unknown, still not in existence, and
which to-day, so to speak, fills the world,—the unspeakably precious
treasure, which is so wholly and completely the “one important thing.”

I was not to see him for three days; he had gone to Paris for that time.
I filled these days with studies regarding the Caucasus and its history.
Not only what the Dedopali could tell me, but also what I found in the
encyclopedia and in Dumas’s book _Le Caucase_, gave me a glimpse into
the distant, fabulous realm whose throne should by right have belonged
to my Prince Heraclius.

On the second day I received from Paris a package and a letter. The
package contained a full bonbonnière from Boissier, the accompanying
letter a few polite lines. There was nothing out of the ordinary in it,
but it intoxicated me outright, for it was signed with the name of
Heraclius of Georgia, and from its thick paper adorned with a princely
crown there exhaled a faint, but peculiarly sweet, fragrance. This
letter-sheet and the sandalwood fan—both told me untranslatable things.

On the third day I went over to the Dedopali’s with quick-beating heart.
I found her in her usual place in the little drawing-room.

“Ah, _bon jour_, Contessina—I have a greeting to transmit to you. My
cousin writes me from Paris.... He was to be here to-day himself, but—I
am not surprised at it in him, he is a man of moods—instead of coming,
he writes to bid me farewell for this year; he left Paris yesterday to
go direct to Tiflis.”

And I—silly thing—I burst into tears.

“For God’s sake, what is the matter, Contessina?”

“Oh, Dedopali,—it is too cruel!”

“What?... that my cousin has gone home? So you are in love with him?...
Perhaps it may be your fate after all,—he may come back again; don’t
cry. No man deserves to have a girl cry for him if he is capable of
passing by his own good luck like that. Besides, all may yet turn out as
your heart desires.”

These words were a balm to me. Merely the right to hope,—that is all
that youth desires. And so I hoped that Heraclius would write me from
Georgia. But he did not.—

VIII
NOVITIATE IN ART
Back to Baden · Singing lessons · Great hopes · A test before Madame
Viardot

However, it was not an inordinately long time before the image of the
Georgian prince had grown dim in my memory. And gradually, once more,
something quite new became the object of my life, the “one important
thing.”

We returned to Baden greatly disappointed—my mother in her great hopes
of gain, which had to be exchanged for no inconsiderable certainty of
loss, and I in my exploded dream of love; and there we proposed to live
very quietly and frugally in our country house, and spend the winter too
in seclusion there.

We had a lodger in our house, an old music teacher, who had been an
orchestra conductor. One day he asked to see us.

“Pardon me, Frau Gräfin, and pardon me, Komtesse,[15] if I permit myself
to make this call; but I consider it my duty—it is perhaps a question of
something great and rare—something extraordinary in the Komtesse’s fate,
something which—” He struggled to find words.

“Well, what do you mean?” asked my mother, and I too was keyed up to a
high pitch. (“Something great and rare”—those who are hungry for life
are always looking for that with yearning eyes.)

“I have often heard the Komtesse sing. She has had no training at all,
but she has a voice such as comes only once in a hundred years, such as
I have not heard since Jenny Lind, and it really quite reminds one of
Jenny Lind’s. The same meltingness, the same power, that same
something,—in short, the Komtesse has millions in her throat, she has a
glorious career before her if she wishes—this I had to say.”

So, then, it might be that glory and fortune were to be mine—I did not
at all distrust the artistic judgment of the music teacher and
experienced orchestra conductor. My mother was likewise entranced. Her
old predilection for the profession of a great singer, the profession
which in youth she had so longed to have as her own, caused her now to
grasp with delight the hope that her old-time dreams might be fulfilled
in her daughter. And the millions which she had had to let dry up in her
throat, the confidently expected millions which the abominable
trente-et-quarante table had denied her, should come flowing to our
house after all! She immediately arranged with the music teacher to give
me lessons every day.

Professor Beranek had in fact been a singing-teacher at the
conservatory, and had trained several important operatic artists; so the
formation of my voice could be intrusted to him. He wanted to instruct
me for a year, make me thoroughly musical, give my voice the right
position and fluency; after that I should have to study a year or two
more with an Italian maestro, and then I might rise above the musical
horizon as a star of the first magnitude. I must take up the Italian
career, that was settled; my mother herself insisted upon that, for the
names of Pasta and Grisi and Malibran still filled her head, and only by
traveling from Paris to London, from Milan to Madrid, from St.
Petersburg to America, could one win the aforesaid millions and that
world-wide reputation which makes artists in song into half-queens.

Ah yes, crowns,—that was what my young ambition craved. Nothing had come
of the royal crown of Georgia; that had faded into air together with the
dream of love; in its place glory should now crown me, and instead of
love should be Art! One can burn as passionately for Art as for a
beloved. Whoever loves Art and is loved by Art—that is, whoever loves it
with the power of achievement—may find life perfectly satisfying.

Now came for me a time, a whole year, when I lived for only one
object,—Song; that had now become the “one important thing.” On the very
day after our interview the instruction began. In order that it might
make rapid progress, and I might in a year advance as far as others did
in a conservatory course of several years, the lessons were fixed at
four hours a day,—two hours in the forenoon and two in the afternoon,
with the requisite interval of rest between. Scalesinging, vocal
exercises, score-reading, the science of harmony: I was to become a
thorough musician; as phenomenal in artistic schooling as in vocal
talent,—simply the greatest cantatrice of the century. Herr Beranek went
into ecstasies every day, and thus kept us fancying that the marvelous
had really come to pass, that an enormous prize had fallen to me in the
lottery of life. Or rather that a treasure-trove was assuredly within
sight, but that it must be dug for. And I dug and dug with a diligence,
a perseverance, a joy, that was unique of its kind. From morning till
night, through the long months of the autumn, of the winter, of the
spring, nothing but notes,—sung, played, read, written notes,—and yet it
was a whole world, full of sweetness and beauty, full of inspiration,
full of proud satisfaction. I do not know (seeing that I never attained
to it) whether a successful career as a prima donna really carries with
it as much happiness as is to be experienced in the preparation for it,
when the time is occupied with study, and triumph seems sure.

As material for study we ordered a whole little music library: Garcia’s
“Method” in two large volumes; the scores of all the operas that were to
form my future repertory—all with Italian text. That was by no means a
monotonous life. On the contrary, it was full of the tragic, of passion,
of ebullient joy, of the tenderest devotion, of the most heroic uplift,
of funereal horror, of epithalamial bliss; in short, of all the feelings
and fates which belonged to the heroines of my operas. Norma, Amina, La
Traviata, Lucia, Linda, I myself was—one after the other, as I sat at
the piano and memorized the text and melody in which were expressed all
the sadness and the joy, the sweetness and the horror, which I tried
with all my might to realize so that I might one day carry it
triumphantly into the souls of my listeners. And the Edgardos and
Manricos, Gennaros and Alfredos, who were destined to accompany my
soprano in harmonious trios and sextets,—these also I saw before me; I
simply _loved_ them. Do not take it that I was imagining the
singers,—they were to remain a matter of indifference to me,—but the
forms created by the dramatist and composer, and all their heroism, all
their poetry. In just the same manner the young girl reading her
Schiller becomes enraptured by the Don Carloses and Posas, the
Ferdinands and Karl Moors,—only in the study of the operas there is
added the ineffable something that wells forth from the magic tones of
the music. Music says things which are not contained in any language.
What can now and then stream forth from a sequence of tones, from a
chord, from a rhythmical crescendo, is as little to be repeated in words
as is the fragrance of flowers, the taste of a fruit. There are melodies
which tell a story, arpeggios which caress, chords which burn; in many
measures one feels as if—now I am endeavoring, after all, to find words
for that of which I have just said that it lies outside of language; it
is in vain. But a hundred times more powerful yet is the enjoyment of
the charm of music when one is filled with it not only as a recipient
but also as a giver, as a creator; when one is himself the transmitter
of this mysterious and ineffable something to the souls of others; when
one feels that thousands of auditors are seized by the same waves of
passion, of rapture, of exultation, or of pain.

To be sure, I experienced all this not as a reality, but only as the
foretaste of a thing to come—but a thing whose coming I did not doubt,
which seemed to me like a boundless wealth that was not indeed in my
hands in the form of gold, but I had in my possession well-secured
drafts for it. Not only did the study of the rôles afford me this
enjoyment, but even the mere practice of scales and the composition of
roulades, the dry work of the technic of my art, gave me gladdening and
enlivening sensations. For the concept “Art” had taken hold of me with
all the power that is inherent in it, that results from the worship of
art in books on the history of art, and from the worship of artists by
the public. When studying for the chosen calling, one feels—at least I
felt—intrusted with a mission which carried with it something priestly,
something holy.

The question arises, Was not vanity also involved? Was I not gloating
rather over the prospect of arousing admiration, of enjoying a
world-wide fame (for I was not expecting anything small, thanks to my
master’s indefatigable praise and expressions of wonder), or else over
the thought that the heroine whom I should represent would be so
graciously personified in me, that the brilliant satin train in the
first acts would make my tall, slender figure so effective, and that my
loosened hair in the tragic final scene would fall down below my knees
in billowy natural abundance? Should I not—apart from the might of
song—also as a woman set all hearts afire?

Oh, but nothing, nothing should or could turn me from my art; all homage
I would put away from me, every discreditable demand the proud lady in
me would spurn, and every enticement to renounce the stage and enter
wedlock would leave the proud artist unmoved. Whoever stands on the
highest pinnacle of Art belongs henceforth and forever to its temple
service.

Such were my thoughts and intentions as I practiced solfeggios or wrote
out my harmony exercises; and I was happy in it.

We lived in absolute retirement; my guardian visited us only once or
twice a month, and nothing of these musical plans was divulged to him.
The first that he should learn was to be the _fait accompli_, when I had
made my appearance in a great theater with overwhelming success. We had
no intercourse with the families that wintered in Baden, and we never
went to Vienna. It was a rigorous novitiate in art; nothing was to
divert me from my studies, nothing else but learn, learn, learn, was to
fill my time. I was no longer so young, and I had to make up in a single
year what other pupils accomplish in four or five years.

There was only a single family which we met socially from time to time;
this was two old ladies, daughters of a general, and their brother, a
retired first lieutenant of hussars, also well on in years, who had a
barytone voice and had missed his calling,—that of an opera singer,—to
his deep regret. I sang Italian duets with him, but without letting him
guess my plans of the future. I should properly say, a duet; he had no
more in his repertory. It was the scene between the brother and the
sister in _Lucia di Lammermoor_. We performed the piece dramatically,
singing by heart and putting in all the action, I carrying myself
forward into my beckoning future and my partner going back to the past
that he had let slip. He was convinced that he would have made a great
singer, exactly as I was convinced of my coming greatness, and most
likely his melancholy conviction was just as fallacious as my joyful one
was.

I remember that our duet cost us much study before we could do it
together. The lieutenant was not especially musical, and did not keep
time well, and I too was very prone to slip, for I had not yet begun to
sing arias at all with my teacher—he insisted strictly on my practicing
nothing but scales and arpeggios; the _Lucia_ duet, which was performed
in the house of the Cortesi sisters, was basely kept a secret from my
master.

After about a year and a half of this preparatory course, Professor
Beranek made the announcement that it was now time for me to finish my
studies under a famous singing-teacher. Our choice fell on Pauline
Viardot-Garcia. Many artists had gone forth from her instruction; and
anyhow, Garcia’s two-volume “Method” having been my gospel, in whom
could I have felt greater confidence than in the daughter of that
incomparable master?[16] So off went a letter to Baden-Baden.

It must have been an exuberant letter. I knew that Madame Viardot was
very particular and refused many who wished to take lessons of her. To
be received by her was an especial favor granted only to those who had
real talent. I tried, therefore, to prejudice her in my behalf by my
letter itself. I could not well speak of my talent (although, resting on
my teacher’s assurances, I felt no doubt of it), so I must have written
all the more of enthusiasm for art, of ardor in my vocation, and such
trite things, and naturally intimated also that I desired to put myself
under none but the foremost teacher in the world. At any rate, Madame
Viardot answered that I might come and let her test me.

My mother and I went to Baden-Baden without delay. On the appointed day
and at the appointed hour we presented ourselves at the Villa Viardot.
We were shown into a small ground-floor salon and told to wait a little
while. I still see the piano in the corner at the right by the window.
There were several music cabinets with scores; on the walls, pictures
and photographs of artists; through the open balcony door a glimpse of
the garden. In the background of this was a pavilion, presumably the
dwelling of Ivan Turgénief, Madame Viardot’s friend of many years.

In this waiting time I was seized by a horrible panic. Something that I
had never yet felt in my life. Something that actually took away my
breath and tortured me. Is this, then, what is called stage fright, _le
trac_? Why, that is not at all unlike what one must feel at going to the
guillotine! How can one—God have mercy!—sing in such a state?

“Mamma,” I wailed, “I shan’t be able to sing a note!”

“Don’t be childish! Who’d be worried, when you have such a voice? Madame
Viardot will consider herself fortunate to get such a pupil.”

The door of the next room opened and in came the dreaded one. A lively,
elegant woman of forty, with features not beautiful but interesting.
There was a little introductory conversation which I do not remember,
and then I was dragged to the block—I mean the piano.

“Have you brought any music? What will you sing for me?”

“All I can do is scales and exercises.”

“One can judge of your voice by those, no doubt, but not of your talent,
not of your degree of ability.”

“Then, please, the duet with the barytone from _Lucia_.”

“A duet?”

“Yes, madame; so far I have not sung any pieces at all; it only happens
that I know this one.”

“Very well.” She found the score and played the introduction.

My throat was utterly choked. I started in a tremble. But after a while
my voice grew firmer, and after a few measures it went to my own
satisfaction. Mother nodded approvingly. I believed that I had given of
my best.

But the great teacher shut up the score in the middle of a measure and
said, “The truth of the matter is, you can do nothing at all.”

It was as if I had been given a box on the ear and a dagger-thrust both
at once.

“Let us have another trial, then, with _notes filées_—in order to see
what might be made of the material—there is certainly voice there—”

And she struck low C. This test was easier for me. Still I could not
give all that I had—the tones were hoarse and my breath was short. After
the two octaves up to high C were tested, she stood up.

“How old are you?” she asked.

“Past twenty,” I replied with a half lie, for I was already twenty-two.

“That is too late to start from the beginning. At twenty, one ought to
be already trained. And tell me, why do you really want to go on the
stage? You have social standing—your name shows it.”

In reply I said something about ambition and love for art.

“That is all very pretty, but I can only advise you not to give up your
position. Your voice is not bad, but it is not extraordinary, and it is
questionable whether you could learn anything.”

“Madame, she has talent,” insisted my mother. “And under your
instruction it would most certainly develop.”

“But I cannot tell to-day whether I will undertake to give her this
instruction. The young lady must first take a few lessons, and then I
will decide whether I will go on with her—yes or no. According to my
impression of to-day, there is little chance for yes.”

“Oh, do not judge by to-day’s test; the poor girl was so nervous—I
really did not know her.”

“If one suffers from nervousness, one is not fitted for the career of an
artist; an additional reason for giving it up.”

“Her timidity will disappear when she gets used to it,” urged my mother.

“Very well, then; come next Monday at the same hour.” And we were
dismissed.

We returned to the hotel, and there I gave vent to my suppressed anguish
in a burst of tears.

“Never, never again will I set foot in that Viardot villa! Let us go
away, mamma; I will never let myself be seen in that woman’s presence
again! It is over—it is all over!” My world lay in ruins. The “one
important thing” was annihilated.

IX
THE YEAR 1866
Return · Elvira’s death · Fürstenberg’s death · The war · Homburg once
more · Back to Baden · Baron Koller

We journeyed back to our Baden villa. Professor Beranek was indignant at
Madame Viardot. For a long time I would sing no more. But at length he
brought me to it.

“You will not have been the first,” he said consolingly, “who has failed
of recognition at a trial and has then put the false prophets to shame
through greatness fairly won.”

But my self-confidence was too completely crushed. It did not so quickly
wake to new force. At the same time a hard sorrow befell me. Word came
from Venice that my cousin Elvira was very ill, that her lung trouble
had taken a turn for the worse, and that she was confined to her bed.
Not many days later there came the news of her death. For the first time
in my life I learned how it feels to lose a dear one. An
incomprehensible emptiness, an unintelligible shuddering....

The bereaved mother came to us. She was on the verge of despair. Now of
course all singing was hushed in the house.

The year 1866 brought me still another severe loss, that of my
much-loved paternal friend Fürstenberg. He departed this life after a
brief illness at his residence in Vienna. And one thing more that
unblest year brought,—war.

I am ashamed to say it again, but this event made no impression upon
me—none at all. I took knowledge of it just as one learns by hearsay
that somewhere in the distance floods have set in, or fires broken
out,—elemental events, of a very lamentable nature, but they will pass
by. And at bottom the thing is not uninteresting—it is something
historical. The Prussians will of course get a thrashing; and if we
should lose the game, there would be peace again after it anyhow. We had
no one dear to us in the army, so we were not anxious. I read no
newspaper; and the stories that they told,—victories of the Prussians in
Hannover, at Frankfurt, later also in Bohemia (but not much of it came
to our ears, and if anything did I have forgotten it),—nothing of all
that has remained imprinted on my memory: a proof that it was heartily
indifferent to me.

To-day I cannot understand how I could be so stupid. Even apart from my
future ardent sentiments in behalf of peace, which ought at that time to
have been already dormant in the young woman of twenty-three and to have
been awakened on this occasion, such a tremendous event should at any
rate, even from the ordinary point of view, have stirred me, should have
filled me with some kind of emotion, either patriotic enthusiasm or
tingling human sympathy or, if nothing more, anxiety and terror; but
there was nothing, nothing.

It would not be necessary to set down in these reminiscences the
confession of such a fact, doubly humiliating for a future opponent of
war, but the incongruity that is here apparent is a thing that
distinctly deserves scrutiny. The most interesting thing for the reader
of memoirs, I think, is always the opportunity to observe how and
whereby certain destinies, talents, or deeds, which are known to pertain
to the writer of the memoir, have been prepared for and developed; one
wishes to trace out what inner aptitudes, and what outer influences,
have contributed to the formation of the total product. From this there
always result useful lessons and bits of knowledge. Provided, of course,
that the autobiographer is entirely sincere: useful lessons are to be
drawn only from unfalsified facts.

Here, in bringing to my present consciousness the conception of war that
I then had, I myself find occasion for an interesting observation, an
instruction worth taking to heart. Human society as a whole passes
through just such stages of shifting ideas, knowledges, conceptions, and
judgments, as does an individual man. Should not I to-day fully
understand, and fully pardon, the fact that the generality of men in
their preponderating mass take as cold and unconcerned an attitude
toward war (when it does not lay hold directly of their own lives) as
did I myself a few decades ago? Should I be amazed that this same
generality regards the occasional breaking out of wars as a matter of
course, a thing involved in natural law, which one may possibly sigh
over, but which one cannot condemn and cannot antagonize? Against the
inevitable one raises no voice of blame, strikes no blow.

And as the individual (in the case in hand, I myself) may under the
influence of experiences and considerations come to have quite altered
views, so may and will the generality obtain new insights and act
accordingly.

When to-day in certain circles I meet with case-hardened misconception
of the peace movement, when they try to show me the obvious naturalness
and historical necessity of the scourge of war by arguments at which
wrath and discouragement threaten to take possession of me, all I need
to do, that my wrath may subside and my courage rise, is to think back
to my own past. Moreover, in the matters of war and peace the generality
is not even in such a state of stupidity any longer, for by this time
almost every one has at least heard something of the movement, and the
number of those who sympathize with it or even take an active part in it
is growing every day. A greater and greater number of people are taking
sides on the issue, either for it or against it; but at the time of
which I am now talking the fact was that no one knew anything about the
peace movement, because there was none; for the sporadic emergence of
individual minds who took a stand for the abolition of war cannot be
called “a movement.”

We spent the summer of 1886 once more in Homburg vor der Höhe, and
although the war penetrated into our very near neighborhood there were
no indications of it to be detected in the life of the bathers and
gamblers at that cosmopolitan watering-place. The official band played;
Patti sang; the Spaniard Garcia, who had become famous for his luck at
gambling, continued to make his harvest of a hundred thousand francs a
day at the trente-et-quarante table—until one fine morning he did begin
to lose, and gradually put in all the millions he had won, and something
of his own besides.

The Princess of Mingrelia was there again with her family, and I spent
many hours of the day in her company. Her daughter, Princess Salomé, was
by this time eighteen and released from the nursery, and I now kept up
as lively an intercourse with her as with her mother. In age we two
girls were actually better mates; an additional point was that we took
riding lessons together, and every morning we used to go for a ride side
by side in the roads of the park, under the oversight of the
riding-master. That was a fine occasion for chatting, and we soon formed
a cordial friendship.

Salomé was to be presented at court at St. Petersburg the following
winter, and to be introduced into society there—she looked out into the
future with joyous hopes and plans; I, on the other hand, assumed rather
a melancholy and resigned aspect, as one who no longer expected much
from life. The two deaths by which dear ones were taken from me had
really made me low-spirited; and the collapse of my artistic dreams had
left me in a bad frame of mind, but of this matter I told her nothing. I
confided to my new friend only the fact that two years before I had been
in love with her uncle Heraclius—now, indeed, I had got the unhappy
passion out of my mind, but yet there remained a certain dejection.
Salomé only laughed at me for it.

“How could one ever fall in love with such a sallow, bilious old man!
No, no, Contessina, you will yet find a much better one.”

The Dedopali’s two sons also had now grown up into tall, handsome young
men. Prince Niko, the older, once caused us all a fine fright. He was to
have a duel. He had been pursuing a little lady from Paris too ardently,
and a rival had got into a rage over it; ugly words were exchanged, and
the other man announced that on the following day he should send his
seconds. The scene had had witnesses, and the old princess learned of
it. Weeping and trembling she told me about the misfortune that had
befallen, and I wept and trembled with her. Nothing was to be done about
it: duels also belong to the unavoidable dispensation of things in this
world—what young nobleman could refuse to take part in them?

It was a sad business, of course, but no one in our circle dreamed of
such a thing as harboring a mutinous thought against the absurdity of
it. There was at that time as little talk of an anti-dueling league as
of a league in opposition to duels between nations. To be exposed to
murdering and being murdered was simply one of the chivalric and
patriotic necessities that life brings to men. And when that is the case
women can do nothing else but weep in timid admiration.

But the duel did not come off: I cannot recall now whether the opponent
had left town or whether the witnesses had succeeded in effecting a
reconciliation. I only know that the threatening cloud passed over, and
that we were all very happy. My really deep-felt and spontaneously shown
sympathy had brought me much closer yet to the Mingrelian family; and
especially Prince Niko himself, as long as he lived, never forgot that I
had so taken to heart the danger to which he had been exposed.

When we went home that autumn the war was a thing of the past. We took
still another lodger in our Baden villa, a Saxon officer. He most
courteously came to make us a call. I do not think that we talked much
about the campaign just ended, for I remember only that at the Herr
Lieutenant’s second visit, which was his visit of farewell, I sang
something for him; I can also remember what it was,—the adagio from the
grand aria in _La Sonnambula_, “Ah non credea.” The Saxon officer was
enraptured.

“Oh, most gracious countess, you sing like Patti!”

“That young man has a great appreciation of art,” remarked my mother,
when the lieutenant had taken his departure.

“And are you really going to stick to your decision that you will
renounce an artistic career,” she added after a while; “is that
reasonable, is it courageous?”

“But Madame Viardot’s decision—” I opposed hesitatingly.

“Madame Viardot is not infallible; and if you had only kept on with her
for a while—”

“Not for the world would I have come into her sight again!”

“But there are other great singing-teachers; we will ask Beranek.”

Herr Beranek was still our lodger, and naturally he was ready at once to
take up the proposition of resuming the musical plans. He spoke of
Lamperti in Milan, Duprez in Paris, and Marchesi in Vienna as among the
greatest teachers. I would not hear of Vienna, but in the very act of
pronouncing this limitation I had already tacitly acknowledged that
perhaps I would be content, either in Milan or in Paris, to pick up the
thread which had been so abruptly broken off in Baden-Baden.

And to that it gradually came. I no longer gave a decided “no” when any
one spoke to me of an artistic future, and I resumed my singing lessons
with Beranek. The old love of song, the old ambitious plans, the old
self-confidence awoke and gathered strength once more. The resolve to
persevere in my studies, and to continue them under some famous master,
matured in my mind. I wrote to Maître Duprez in Paris to ask him if he
would be willing to accept an ambitious, enthusiastic pupil; he replied
that he would, and so it came to pass that my life had once more found
the “one important thing.”

There was living at that time in Baden an old bachelor, a former
ambassador, with whom we constantly associated. His name was Baron
Koller. He was tall and very thin, closely shaven, extremely correct and
elegant in his attire. He owned a house near the Kurpark, externally
insignificant, but furnished in exquisite taste within. Here he
frequently gave us little dinners.

The contemplation of the beautiful mementos which he had gathered about
him in his rooms was a great pleasure to me. I “turned the leaves” in
these rooms as in an interesting book of memoirs. All those fabrics,
weapons, trinkets, female portraits, had stories to tell of distant
journeys, of high life at courts and in society, and of intimate love
affairs. And the master of the house himself: _ancien régime_ in his
manners, sparkling with wit in his conversation.

There developed between the old gentleman and me a sort of—what shall I
call it?—_esprit_-flirtation, a tossing back and forth of conversational
shuttlecocks. He took special delight in my mastery of the elegances of
the French language, and, because I realized this, I wrote in that
language a whole booklet about his home, associating with the various
trinkets and pictures imaginary stories and all sorts of observations. I
copied it neatly, tied it with a blue ribbon, and sent it to him. He
then gave it back to me, as a loan, with his marginal notes. He wanted
me to see what keen pleasure the reading of it had given him,—a pleasure
which was expressed in underlinings, exclamation marks, and a few brief
sentences.

One time he honored me by the gift of a cup of old porcelain with the
inscription _Respice finem_. To this I made answer in a few rhymed
lines, the text of which I find jotted down in the diary which I was
keeping at that time:

RESPICE FINEM

Zu fluges Wort, ein hemmnis dem Beginnen,
Das fühne Taten scheut in zauderhastem Sinnen;
Das mit berechnend faltem Geist
Das heute wegen Morgen von sich weist,
Und das manchen, der zu viel ans End’ gedacht,
Verzagt und flügelnd um sein Glüd gebracht.

Wagen und Beginnen liegt in jedes Menschen hand—
Das Ende hat fein Weiser noch erfannt.
Es trifft nicht in die vorgedachte Bahn,
Wie sie ersonnen hat des Grüblers Wahn;
Drum hat sich arg getäuscht, wer an das End’ gedacht,
Wenn er zu lichten wähnt der Zukunft dunkle Nacht.

Des Daseins höchste Frag’ ist: Werden und Bestehen,
Es wirke alles ohne Sorge ums Vergehen.
Die Blüte denkt ans Welken nicht,
Ums Löschen unbekümmert strahlt das Licht;
Im Weltenplan hat Gott ans Ende nicht gedacht,
Denn was er schuf, hat ohne Ende er gemacht.

THINK ON THE END

Too shrewd a phrase, by which the start is checked!
It shuns bold acts and dallies to reflect,
And, coldly calculating, thrusts away
For some To-morrow’s sake the sure To-day;
It brings the chance of happiness to naught
For many, who too much upon the end have thought.

Daring, beginning, lies in each man’s hand;
The end no sage’s eye has ever scanned.
It does not come by such a course at last
As by the purblind reasoner was forecast.
Therefore he sadly errs who on the end has thought,
If to light up the Future’s darksome night he sought.

To grow, to hold our ground, is life’s supreme affair.
No anxious thought of perishing should enter there.
The flower on fading does not think,
The light does not in fear of quenching sink.
God, when he planned the world, upon the end ne’er thought,
For endless did he make the universe he wrought!

He often sent me books from his library, and I wrote down for him my
impressions regarding them; and so back and forth went messages,
flowers, bonbons, and manuscripts,—a real flirtation! But it was wholly
without erotic background; for the gallant diplomat might have been my
grandfather.

X
RESIDENCE IN PARIS
Singing lessons resumed · Maître Duprez · The school in the Rue Laval ·
In the house of the Princess Mingrelia · In the imperial box at the
opera · Summer at Duprez’s place in the country · Return to Paris ·
Princess Salomé’s engagement · Prince Achille Murat · The wedding · With
the young couple · Off to Baden-Baden

At the beginning of the year 1867 we traveled to Paris.

But, I remember, of the powerful impression which it must produce on
every one to come for the first time to the mighty metropolis about
which one has heard and read so much,—of this impression I felt very
little, my mind was so full of the “one important thing.” Even the
prospect of the pleasure of meeting the Dadiani family of Mingrelia
again here did not come so close to me; the only thing that I could
think about, that made me tremble with terror and excitement, was the
question, How will Maître Duprez judge of my voice, what progress shall
I make, and what shape will my artistic career take?

The maestro owned a mansion on the Rue Laval, in which was a hall with a
stage. Adjacent were small study-rooms in which the maestro and his son,
Léon Duprez, gave private instruction. Every Friday the more advanced
students gave arias and scenes from operas on the stage, and the little
theater was filled with an audience of their friends and of strangers
from outside. On the other side of the court was a small _hôtel_ used as
a residence by the Duprez family, which consisted of the father and
mother, the son and daughter-in-law.

At our first visit in the Rue Laval we were conducted into the theater
building. First we went into a small waiting-room, around the walls of
which ran bookcases full of opera scores. Students of both sexes were
sitting and standing about, chatting. In the theater too a few scattered
individuals were sitting and listening to the performance of a quite
young girl who, with the accompanist of the establishment, Monsieur
Maton, was practicing the Rosina aria, _Una voce poco fa_. Monsieur
Maton had written out most artistic colorature for her; it purled and
warbled like anything.

So then this school enables one to reach such a bravura! It inspired me
with courage and the resolution to be very industrious.

Still, what verdict would the maestro pass on me after the test?—surely
not like the severe Viardot. With quaking heart I mounted the steps to
the stage, behind which was the room where M. Duprez was waiting for me.
A benevolent old gentleman, well along toward eighty, but lively and
vigorous, came to meet me. He had white curly hair, ruddy cheeks, and
smiling eyes.

“Well, mademoiselle, so it was you who wrote me that enthusiastic
letter, was it? You want to be something great or else nothing at all,
do you? Well, then, let me hear how your voice sounds, and see if you
can read notes.”

He handed me a book of original solfeggios and sat down at the upright
piano. This time the test resulted favorably.

“Beautiful voice; I shall be able to make something of you—in two years
you shall be _la première force_.”

I was happy, simply happy! Now the hours of instruction were settled; I
was to have lessons twice a week. That was not enough for me.

“I should like to come every day, maestro.”

“You may do that; on the other days my son or M. Maton will practice
with you. But I have only two hours a week, that is to say, half hours,
to spare; that is quite enough.”

We rented and furnished a small flat in the Rue Laval, and forthwith
began for me an active epoch of study, bright with hope. I spent all my
forenoons in the theater building of the Hôtel Duprez, always
accompanied by my mother, a thing which seemed rather tiresome and
superfluous to the others who frequented the school. I put myself wholly
into the _do_, _re_, _mi_, and into a little aria which the maestro had
composed and which he gave me to study for my first piece. But I felt
especial interest in my fellow-pupils, who were on the most various
levels of ability; and the Friday performances, as I did not yet
participate in them, were to me a great enjoyment. When later I myself
had to sing up there it was an agony to me, to be sure; for the old
nervousness came over me again, and I won no applause. But this did not
take place till after the lapse of some time; for the present I was
busied only with learning, and I went at it in joyous mood.

In the public recitals there participated also some of the maestro’s
finished pupils who were already filling engagements at the theaters and
had attained celebrity: the tenor Engel (known as Angèl); Mademoiselle
Marimon, the _chanteuse légère_ of the Opéra Comique in Paris; and
Jeanne Devriès of Brussels,—all three artists of the first rank. A young
sister of the last-named, Fidès Devriès, had begun taking lessons only a
short time before, and was the favorite of the maestro, the admiration
of the whole class. She filled me with green-eyed envy. She was pretty
as a picture—I could have forgiven her that, but she was sixteen years
old, which put my twenty-three to shame, and she was making such rapid
strides that although she had been in the school only a short time she
already sang like a virtuoso and without the slightest nervousness.
Ultimately she was engaged at the Paris Grand Opera, where she made her
début as Ophelia with huge success. When I witnessed with what facility
young Fidès learned the most difficult coloratures, with what
correctness she read at sight, what peculiar magic dwelt in the timbre
of her voice, and with what freedom and assurance of victory she moved
on the little stage, always greeted and rewarded with the applause of
the listeners and teachers, I was compelled to say to myself: “_That_ is
talent, that is the special gift, that is the something that lies beyond
ambition and industry, which one cannot attain but must _have_, and
which I have not....”

I was in and out of the house of the Princess of Mingrelia a great deal.
I did not divulge to her anything of my artistic plans. She supposed the
“Contessina” had come to Paris merely for the sake of being with her and
her daughter, and she invited me to all her dinners and receptions.
Together with her family and a numerous body of servants she occupied a
suite in the Hôtel du Louvre, with private entrance and private
stairway. In the long array of reception rooms, and especially in the
salon filled with flowers and bric-a-brac where she usually kept
herself, there was once more the odor of Russian cigarettes and orange
flowers. I felt myself transported back to the Weckerlin villa at
Homburg, and could not help thinking of my infatuation for the Georgian
prince, the Bagratide Heraclius. I inquired about him.

“What! Is his picture still alive in your heart, little Contessina?
Well, he is soon coming to Paris ... and if you can’t have him, we will
find another husband here for you, for it is high time you were
married—twenty-three already, that is almost being an old maid! I shall
marry off my Salomé before she gets to be twenty; only it is a pity,
dearest, that you have not a good big dot. That is the main question
here in Paris. Grace and beauty do not suffice. Salomé is to get an
income of fifty thousand francs, a present that her brother Niko gives
her; with that it will be an easier matter to find a good _parti_. And I
already have my eye on some one, a member of the imperial family.”

“Of Russia?”

“No, of France.”

The princess and her daughter never missed any of the Empress Eugénie’s
_petits lundis_, and the Empress herself had proposed the marriage plan
to which the Dedopali referred. She would not say anything more definite
about it just then, and even Salomé, whom I questioned, professed to
know nothing at all of the matter.

The imperial box at the opera was frequently put at the disposal of the
two ladies, and they often invited me to accompany them. One morning,
when I came to my lesson at the music school, young Madame Duprez called
to me:

“Were you at the opera yesterday evening?”

“Yes; Madame Sass was a splendid Valentine.”

“So that was you, was it? In the Emperor’s box?”

“Yes,” I replied, inwardly amused, in a tone as if it were my usual
habit to occupy such places and no others at the theater. I felt that
the incident made an impression on the whole school; evidently they were
not in the habit of seeing the pupils in the monarch’s box. In the
Mingrelian salon, on the other hand, my musical performances made a
great impression again; there they were evidently not in the habit of
seeing dilettantes sit down to the piano and treat the company to
concert waltzes and colorature arias. Little—say, petty—gratifications
of vanity.

The expected Prince Heraclius of Georgia did not come to Paris. Probably
if he had come the flame in my heart would have flared up again, and the
ambitious dream of becoming a great lady might have displaced that of
the “great artist”; all the more because doubts about my talent kept
growing upon me, the wretched nervousness refused to be overcome, and
when I performed on the experimental stage I was unable to make a real
success. Only my mother kept stimulating my courage and ambition; the
maestro, too, promised that in a year or two of study he should form me
into a superior artist, and I persevered.

The next summer (the Mingrelian family had gone off to the German
watering-places again) we betook ourselves to the Duprez country estate,
to continue the instruction there, it being interrupted in the school at
Paris. In October we went back to the city, and the Mingrelian family
too moved into the Hôtel du Louvre again. The old life of the preceding
year was repeated: artistic interests and enjoyments in the Rue Laval,
social interests and enjoyments with my Asiatic friends.

One day toward the end of the winter I received from Princess Salomé a
dispatch: “Enjoy my good fortune with me; I have just become engaged to
Prince Achille Murat.” On the same day she had sent me a card by mail,
which I received a few hours later than the telegram. The little
yellowed forty-year-old card is still among my old papers. I reproduce
it in full:

Princesse Salomé Dadiani
de Mingrélie
Ma bien bonne Contesco, venez demain
à deux heures précises—vous passerez
la journée avec nous. J’ai une foule de choses
très pressées à faire et je m’adresse à
vous comme à _mon amie_ dévouée, pour vous demander
votre aide. Ne m’oubliez pas auprès de Mme.
votre mère. Soyez bien exacte.

I joyously obeyed the summons—there is nothing in the world more
interesting to young girls than an engagement—and found the whole house
in happy excitement.

I was told how it all came about. The affair, contemplated during the
preceding winter by the Empress Eugénie and the Princess Ekaterina, had
been brought to a satisfactory conclusion the week before. The Emperor
undertook to provide his nephew with an allowance of fifty thousand
francs a year, which excellently comported with the bride’s similar
income; he also agreed to pay the young man’s debts.—Well, yes, debts—it
was known to the whole town that he was one of the most extravagant
high-livers in Paris. Among the diamonds of the then so celebrated
“belle Hélène,” Hortense Schneider, were many jewels which Prince
Achille Murat had laid at her feet. The prince was regarded as one of
the handsomest of the young people in high society. The son of Prince
Lucien and an American woman, he very much reminded one of an Englishman
in his manner, in his accent, and in the blond type of his face. All
this I knew from hearsay before the news of the betrothal came to me.

I found the fiancée busily engaged in sending announcements of her good
fortune to all her St. Petersburg and Parisian acquaintances, and I must
needs help her address the envelopes. She was really happy. To be sure
the whole affair was arranged by the relatives on both sides, and she
had seen her fiancé only three or four times; but in those circles,
especially in France, they are used to having marriages contracted in
this way. And the dazzling appearance of her suitor when introduced to
her had thrown a spell over her: she was genuinely in love with the
young man, and heartily enjoyed the thought of becoming “Princesse
Achille Murat.”

Now she had before her also the interesting task of making up the
trousseau, of superintending the appointments of a little _palais_ in
the Elysée quarter, and of receiving the wedding gifts, the first
installment of which had appeared that very day in a “river of diamonds”
that her own mother had given her, and a pearl necklace which her fiancé
had laid at her feet. So she had, as the old song[17] puts it, “diamonds
and pearls”; she had beautiful eyes as well, a twofold princely crown, a
hundred thousand francs of income, her nineteen years, and a handsome
husband: “Darling, what more would you have?” To me also all this seemed
at that time like the pinnacle of human happiness, and I honestly
rejoiced with my friend. Later, much later, I learned that there is
something “more” than all that, that there is a happiness which in its
inward depth, even in very limited circumstances, is more radiant than
any external glory, any affluence. Oh, my unspeakable married bliss ...
but I will not anticipate.

On that same day I became acquainted with Salomé’s fiancé; before that
time he had been no frequent visitor at the house. The first call which
he had made, a few days previously, had been connected with the
ceremonious proposal for the hand of his chosen. “Chosen” is the wrong
expression; I should have said “the lady intended for him.” He pleased
me very well—twenty-one years of age, exceedingly tall and slender in
figure, a thin blond imperial, dazzling teeth, faultlessly elegant and
assured behavior. It must be confessed, not a trace of tenderness: as he
preserved a severely correct, not to say chillingly ceremonious,
behavior toward every one, so he did even toward his betrothed.

Every morning, from that time forth, came the traditional great bouquet
of flowers, sent to the house by a messenger, and in the afternoon
appeared the suitor himself to _faire son cour_ for a brief hour.

The wedding was celebrated in the early days of May, 1868. A wedding
which embraced three separate ceremonies,—first the civil service in the
_mairie_, then a forenoon wedding according to the Catholic rite in the
Tuileries, in the presence of the Emperor and Empress, and at nine
o’clock that same evening in the Greek church according to the Orthodox
rite. I participated in this last ceremony as first bridesmaid. My
function consisted in holding a crown over the bride’s head during the
whole marriage service. An illustrious company filled the brightly
lighted, flower-decorated chapel. The ladies’ toilets were of great
magnificence. The bride wore a veil which had been made for her at
Brussels, with her family arms, the Golden Fleece, woven into its
fabric. It flowed down from a diadem of diamonds, the Empress Eugénie’s
wedding gift. The bride’s mother was adorned with the stars and ribbons
of various orders. Among the jewels that were here displayed, I was
especially struck by the historic set of emeralds which the bridegroom’s
sister, the celebrated beauty Anne Murat, the wife of the Duc de
Mouchy-Noailles, had put on in honor of this solemn occasion.

And is it not to a certain extent humiliating that I myself on this
occasion allowed the parade of toilets and jewelry to sink so deep into
my mind that at this day I can still see it all? I will even confess
that I remember what I myself wore,—a gown made by Worth, of white gauze
over rose-colored silk lining, garnished with innumerable little
_volants_ from the waist to the train—it is to be hoped that at that
important and solemn hour when my friend stood before the altar to be
dedicated to an unknown destiny, I thought of something besides those
many little spangles; but it is a fact that I still see the rose-pink
shimmer rippling through the white threads of the gauze.

After the wedding there was a small ball at the princess’s. The
innumerable _volants_ had an opportunity to whirl around in the dance,
and I remember that my partner in the first quadrille was a Prince
Bourbon. The newly wedded pair had disappeared from the festivity early
and unobserved. They had decided not to take a wedding journey; they
took up their residence at once in their newly furnished _petit hôtel_
in the Rue de Pressbourg.

There I spent many hours. Salomé usually invited me to dinner, and I was
expected to come an hour earlier so that we might have time to chat
before the husband and the guests should appear. After dinner,
especially when we three were alone, we usually went to some one of the
so-called _petits théâtres_, which Salomé was not allowed to attend
before she was married, and which it now gave her much amusement to
become acquainted with. I ought not by rights to have been taken along
either, being still unmarried; but, in the first place, now that I was
twenty-four years old I was no longer included in the category of young
girls, and in the next place, in the _baignoire_ we were invisible to
the general public.

My friend seemed to feel very happy; at least she was always cheerful
and in good humor, and took delight in all the festivities and
receptions that were held in her honor in the circle of her new family,
at court, at her husband’s parents’, at the Mouchys’. She took me with
her to her relatives, and so I shared in many of these entertainments.
But the season soon drew to an end, summer was upon us, and society
scattered.

The young couple went first for a few weeks to the ducal château of
Mouchy, and planned to be at Baden-Baden for the rest of the season.
Hereupon I urged my mother that we too should go to Baden-Baden. During
the last part of the time I had greatly neglected my singing lessons in
the Duprez school; it was becoming clearer and clearer to me that I had
not such great talent as I had imagined, and I hoped in my secret heart
that a sojourn in the great world’s splendid watering-place, where I
should be included in my friend’s circle, might perhaps turn my fate in
a different and happier direction. My mother may have cherished the same
hope, or else she felt a drawing to the trente-et-quarante bank in order
once more to test whether the old gift of divination might not make its
appearance even now; in brief, we started off for Baden-Baden.

XI
SEASON IN BADEN-BADEN
Resumption of trente-et-quarante · Baroness Seutter · Acquaintance with
King William I of Prussia · A letter from the king

We took up our quarters in the large Villa Mesmer, situated opposite the
Kursaal, where Queen Augusta of Prussia was accustomed to lodge during
her yearly visits to this watering-place. She was not to arrive till a
few weeks later, and in the meantime we were assigned to a part of her
suite, including the large drawing-room, the windows of which gave upon
the park. Impatiently I awaited the arrival of the Murats, who had
already engaged rooms at the Villa Stéphanie. The interesting life would
begin only when my friends should make their appearance.

While waiting for them I made the acquaintance of a charming woman who
was domiciled in Baden-Baden—the Baroness Seutter. She conceived a great
predilection for me and frequently invited me to her house, where the
local society of the city were accustomed to gather.

My mother, who long ago had passionately abjured all gambling, began
again—merely out of curiosity, just for once—to risk a gold piece or
two. And lo and behold, the results of the early tests followed! Could
it be that the marvelous gift had awakened again? We could at least try
it and see, as long as it would last. And in reality the luck held; the
originally wagered ten louis had grown into a little pile of
thousand-franc notes—if this would only hold out for a couple of months,
with gradually increasing stakes,—and why not?—then would _la réussite_
be made. All the extinguished hopes flamed up again.

One day I received the disquieting news that the young Murat couple had
changed their plans and would not come that summer to Baden-Baden; the
rooms in the Villa Stéphanie were given up. We also were now compelled
to leave our quarters, as Queen Augusta’s arrival was imminent. It would
have been reasonable of us to go home, since the object of our coming—to
be with the Murats—had failed; but we preferred to remain. The laborious
business of winning in the Kursaal had indeed for a time dropped off,
then started up again, and again dropped off—this last time, however,
only from blunders which might be avoided later, and so it seemed
necessary to make further tests. And I had many opportunities of
amusement in consequence of my acquaintance with the Baroness Seutter;
so I also would rather remain in brilliant, wonderfully beautiful
Baden-Baden than return to our own simple Baden. In place of the rooms
which we were compelled to vacate in the main villa our landlord gave us
pleasant quarters in a _dépendance_.

Shortly after Queen Augusta’s arrival the old king, William I, also came
to Baden-Baden with the intention of staying about a week. From our
windows we could see the main part of the villa and the king’s working
room. He sat there every morning at his writing-table, which was moved
up close to the open window, and he could be seen there as he worked.

Nay, it was my lot before very long to see the victor of 1866 close at
hand and to make his personal acquaintance. I ought properly, as an
Austrian, to have cherished patriotic resentment against our vanquisher;
but I confess that I felt nothing of the sort—only a huge respect for
these very victories. The idea of a winner of battles, a conqueror of
countries, was to me still, as my history lessons had made it, the sum
of all greatness, of all glory. Of course some one must suffer damage in
order that victories and conquests may be attained; that in this case it
happened to be my native country that was hurt, was a circumstance which
could not make the king less lovable—I certainly would not wish to be so
egotistically unfair. Moreover the old man was well known to be
fascinatingly affable and thoroughly kind-hearted; in short, I could not
cherish any patriotic rancor against him.

Frau von Seutter invited me one evening to accompany her to her box. It
was the performance of an Italian opera, but I cannot remember what work
was presented. I only know that we sat next to the grand-ducal box, and
that King William was one of the occupants of it. He nodded a greeting
to Frau von Seutter and kept looking across at us. On the following day
the baroness proposed that I should go with her to a musical matinée at
Madame Viardot’s—there the most fashionable public was sure to be found;
but I would not be persuaded. I never wanted to be seen by Madame
Viardot as long as I lived! In the afternoon Frau von Seutter told me
that the matinée had been most brilliant. Among those who were present
was the King of Prussia. He had asked her who that young lady was, at
the opera the evening before; he thought he had recognized his neighbor
whom he had often seen from his window.

A few days later I saw the king again at a soirée which a great society
lady—I cannot now recall her name—had given in his honor. Living
pictures were a part of the entertainment. In the course of the evening
Frau von Seutter presented me to the old monarch.

“Oh,” he cried smiling, as he extended his hand, “we have known each
other for a long time—from our windows!”

From that time forth it very frequently happened that the king addressed
me in the Kurpark, where, during the afternoon music, he used to walk up
and down before the Kursaal, in the midst of the guests, and that he
then continued his promenade for a while at my side, chatting with me. I
have no diary of that period, and therefore cannot reproduce the tenor
of these conversations. I remember only that I asked him for a
photograph, which was courteously furnished with his autograph on it. I
was required to give him mine in return, but the king found it a poor
likeness and asked for another. After a few days he departed from
Baden-Baden. On the morning of his departure I sent over to him the
desired photograph with an accompanying note. What its contents were I
do not now know, but I must have made some reference to
conquest—possibly with an allusion to 1866. The answer that he sent back
is in my possession. It was put into my hands by a special messenger
just as I was on the point of going with the Baroness Seutter and a few
other ladies to the railway station to present the departing king with
some flowers. Here is a copy of the letter:

Baden, 23. 10. ’68

I have just received your photograph, gracious countess, _somewhat_
better than the one which you were kind enough to hand me yesterday.
In permitting myself herewith to express my most sincere thanks for
it, I must likewise do so, and still more feelingly, for the kindly
lines that accompanied the picture. In the passage about conquest an
error seems to have crept in; you probably meant to say that you knew
very well that you had made a conquest, the conquest of a graybeard in
his seventy-third year, whose sentiments still often receive very
lively impressions, especially when, though only too infrequently,
they are kept fresh by a vis-à-vis!

Most earnestly recommending myself to your continued remembrance, I
remain, gracious countess,

Your very devoted
Wilhelm Rex

XII
PARIS AGAIN
Return to Paris · Renunciation of an artistic career · A dream of
Australian gold · Betrothal of Heraclius of Georgia

The Baden-Baden season was coming to an end. The Princess Murat wrote me
that, as her plans for the summer had fallen through, we must return to
Paris again in the ensuing winter, and there make up for what had been
missed; she would give me many opportunities of enjoyment with her. We
obeyed this suggestion, and journeyed back from Baden-Baden to Paris.

I refused, however, to go on with my lessons at the Duprez school.
Singing had ceased to be the “one important thing.” Now that I had lost
the conviction that my talents could raise me to the highest pinnacle of
that art, I would give up the thought of practicing it publicly, and
hereafter would merely exercise it for my own private enjoyment. My mind
was now more and more directed to “high society”; association with all
the princely, imperial, and royal personages had perhaps gone to my
head. At any rate, the democratic tendencies which have marked my
maturer years had not as yet been awakened.

During the last part of our stay at Baden-Baden a young man had managed
to obtain an introduction to me, a very young man, who paid me notable
attentions; every day he used to send me a magnificent bouquet. He was
an Englishman, but born in Australia, where his father, it was said, had
enormous possessions. I had not given further thought to this handsome
youth, who, being apparently eighteen or nineteen, scarcely seemed a
suitable candidate for marriage with me now that I was twenty-five,
until one day he sent in his name at our Paris residence and begged
permission to bring his father, who had just arrived from Melbourne. We
consented, and the next day we received a call from an elderly
gentleman, who was so lame that he had to be carried upstairs.

“Ladies,” his discourse began, “I am going to tell you without
circumlocution what has brought me to you. In all probability I have not
long to live, and I have an only son whose happiness in life I would
gladly see assured. To be sure he is young to be married,—twenty years
old,—but with us early marriages are not rare. He has fallen
passionately in love with you, my dear young lady, and begs me to ask
you for your hand; this I accordingly do with all formality. You will
perhaps find this somewhat presumptuous on such a short acquaintance;
but in the first place I have a very brief time before me,—I may be
called away at any moment,—and in the second place I have so much to
offer that there is no undue pretension in my acting as I do. I am the
richest man in Australia. Among other things I own a whole street in
Melbourne. My boy is my sole heir,—but even during my lifetime I am
ready to settle upon him and my daughter-in-law a kingly fortune. The
choice of the place where they may decide to live is left entirely to
the young lady. At all events a _hôtel_ in Paris shall be bought. It is
of course necessary that you be able to obtain information about us:
apply to the house of Rothschild, to which my letters of credit are
directed. And now I beg of you to take a week to decide this question,
and meantime to permit my son to spend an hour or two every afternoon in
your house, so that the young people may become better acquainted. I
myself am too ill to repeat my visit very often.”

After this pretty discourse, to which I made no reply and my mother only
spoke a few words about “surprise” and “thinking it over,” the old
gentleman bade us farewell, and we were left alone with our amazement.
That same evening I related the circumstance to my friend and her
husband.

“What fabulous good fortune, Contessina! You must seize it....”

I made some protest: “But I scarcely know the young man, I do not love
him, I am too old for him....”

But my friends parried these objections. Especially Prince Achille threw
himself into the matter. He offered his services to make the necessary
inquiries, and, through his real-estate agent John Arthur, to see to the
purchase of a magnificent _palais_. He ventured the prophecy that I
should have the finest salon in Paris. Even if the young man did not
boast an aristocratic name—_I_ contributed that; and millions, so many
millions, mean far more nowadays than rank and title. All this sounded
very pleasant to me; my mother regarded the affair as a great stroke of
luck, the young man was elegant and handsome and seemed to worship
me,—so we said Yes.

Then the father appeared a second time and invited us to a drive which
put me into a genuine Arabian-Nights frame of mind. We drove through the
Champs-Élysées; it was for me to select one of four or five splendid
palaces which were for sale. My choice fell on the Hôtel Païva,—a
regular jewel casket, which Count Henckel-Donnersmarck had set up for
the beautiful Madame Païva.

From the Champs-Élysées we drove to the Rue de la Paix. My future
father-in-law had us stop in front of a great jewelry establishment. His
valet lifted him out of the carriage and assisted him into the shop,
where an easy chair was put at his service. The rest of us stood near
by. He ordered them to show us the richest jewels that were to be had.
The complaisant jeweler brought out his most magnificent wares, and the
velvet caskets as they were opened disclosed to my eyes the prismatic
sparkle of solitaires and the mild glory of pearls as big as peas.

“What is the price of this _rivière_?” asked the Australian.

“Two hundred thousand francs,” was the answer.

Then turning to me, “Does that please you?”

Yes, it pleased me! And now he took up a pearl necklace.

“That is not bad,” he commented, “but it has only three rows; could one
not have five?”

“Of the same size? That would be difficult to obtain,” replied the
jeweler.

“Well, we will not decide to-day,” said the old gentleman, and we left
the shop.

“I want to go to a few other jewelers,” he said, when we took our seats
in the carriage, “but not to-day. I now know what your taste is.
Moreover, I have brought with me from Australia some stones which are
far finer and larger than those we have seen here. I will have them
mounted as a diadem.”

I rejoice to this day that I had that drive in Paris. I experienced
thereby a sensation which it is vouchsafed to few human beings to
enjoy,—the feeling of having immeasurable wealth at one’s command; of
being able to secure, by merely nodding, anything that money can buy. At
the first moment it is an intoxicating sensation, but—this observation I
also value: the intoxication soon passes away and gives place to a
certain sense of surfeit; it comes over one like a weariness, “If one
can so speedily have everything that one wishes, what then is left to
wish for?” And then, above and beyond the treasures that money provides,
how many treasures there are which are not purchasable,—love, glory,
honor, lightness of heart, health—what good did his row of houses in
Melbourne do the poor lame man? And I, instead of belonging to a strong,
influential, well-beloved husband, to whom I might look up, on whom I
could rely—this lad....

Prince Achille came to us in order to make the acquaintance of my
suitor. I think he did find him rather insignificant, but that seemed to
him only one thing more in his favor.

“You will make of him whatever you want; you will be able to twist him
around your little finger!”

He invited him to dinner for the next evening. But the next evening,
after we had been waiting for our guest a quarter of an hour, a message
came: “Mr. F. is ill and begs to be excused.” The next day the
indisposition had fortunately passed away. Inquiries at the Rothschilds’
brought no detailed information; the head of the house was at Nice, and
the clerks could only report that a letter of credit bearing the name in
question had actually been presented and honored. And now the betrothal
was to be solemnly celebrated. Prince Achille’s parents had the
friendliness to offer their house in which to hold the banquet, and they
sent out the invitations. Arrayed in a sky-blue toilet which I had had
fashioned at Worth’s for the occasion, and with a throbbing heart, I
entered the salon. The carriage had been delayed on the way, and so
we—my mother and I—got there rather late. The whole company was
assembled, but the future bridegroom had not as yet arrived! A painful
quarter of an hour elapsed, and then, the one expected still failing to
appear, we went out to dinner. I was seated at the right of the aged
head of the house—the place at my right remained vacant for the time. We
had reached the third course, in a very painful frame of mind, when a
note was brought: “Mr. F. begs to be excused; he has been suddenly taken
ill.” After this the dinner went off very stupidly. Of course the
engagement toasts had to remain undelivered, and the champagne glasses
were drained only to the speedy recovery of the absent one.

I foreboded nothing good. This repeated excuse to my friends, and at the
betrothal banquet above all things, and in such a cool tone,—what could
it signify? The mail brought me the next morning an explanation of what
it meant: a letter from the father,—only a few lines, with the tidings
that the two men had gone to England. They had come to the painful
decision that the engagement must be broken. The disparity of ages was
too great, for the young man was—it had to be confessed—not twenty but
only just eighteen. “Farewell, and may you be as happy as you deserve.
Yours truly.”—

And that was all! The whole fairy-tale dream blown away! Later we
learned that all that row of houses in Melbourne, and the rest of the
millions, were only figments of the imagination.

Of course for a time I was hurt and humiliated on account of this
episode. I felt that I had been made a mock of before the whole Murat
family. Still my friends endeavored to sustain me and kept assuring me
that all the discredit fell on the two Englishmen, and that it was
really a piece of good luck to be rid of those erratic people. And soon
I really became reconciled.

The same winter I had another experience which lives in my memory. One
day I received a note bearing the signature “Princesse Annette
Tschawtschawadze,” inviting me to call upon this lady at the Grand
Hôtel, where she and her two daughters, Lisa and Tamara, were
sojourning. At Homburg I had known Princess Annette, who was a
sister-in-law of the Dedopali, and I was delighted to see her again.

An interesting incident in her life had often been told me. The
notorious Circassian leader Shamyl had once abducted her. It was at the
beginning of the fifties. The young woman was sitting with two of her
younger children and a French governess on the veranda of their villa in
Kachetia, when suddenly a band of horsemen fell upon them. The men
leaped off, tied the women securely, and lifted them up on their horses.
The two children were put into Princess Annette’s arms, and away went
the troop. In addition to her terror, the young woman experienced the
fearful agony of having one of her children slip from her arms as they
kept growing weaker, and seeing it crushed under the horses’ hoofs. The
whole abduction was for nothing but ransom. The ladies were treated with
the most scrupulous respect in Shamyl’s abode; only he set a very high
price on their release—not a price in money, but some political
concession or other. The ransom was granted, and Princess Annette was
given her liberty; but never in her life could she recover from the
horror that she felt at the moment when her child fell from her arms.

I found the lady in her hôtel salon, and among the visitors (oh,
surprise!) I perceived Heraclius Bagration, Prince of Georgia. And still
greater was my surprise when Princess Annette presented to me her
seventeen-year-old daughter Tamara and the elderly gentleman
as—affianced!...

It did give me a shock; but my feelings for him had long ago cooled
down, and so I was able to offer tolerably unembarrassed and sincere
congratulations.

XIII
THE YEAR 1870–1871
Resumption of music study in Milan · Outbreak of the Franco-German War ·
My double existence in the world of books · Return of the victorious
troops to Berlin

Prince Achille Murat was an officer in the French army; in this capacity
he received orders to take up garrison duty at Algiers. Of course his
wife went with him, and consequently Paris once more became empty for
me. My heart also was empty, and the plans for the future had gone to
wrack and ruin. Our small property had dwindled sadly with all these
costly lessons and the other expenses of a luxurious existence ... and
so it came about that I turned my attention to singing again. We
journeyed to Milan for the purpose of studying opera parts under Maestro
Lamperti and, if possible, to make my _début_ at the Scala. Lamperti
gave me an examination—found my voice marvelously beautiful—but I should
have to study with him for at least a year before I could venture to
think of appearing in concert or opera. Very good—on then with the do,
re, mi, fa, sol, la, si....

I studied and practiced diligently, but the “one important thing,” the
world-filling thing so to speak, which at the beginning of my
apprenticeship I found in hoped-for mastery of my art, had vanished from
me.

And now the Franco-German War broke out. I received word from Salomé
Murat that she had given birth to a son in Algiers, and that he was born
on the first of July, the very day when war was declared. I had not seen
the tempest coming, and when it broke it aroused as little interest in
me as did the storm of 1866. I was occupied with far more serious
troubles: I could not make a success of my artistic career. Whenever I
sang at a test, nervousness closed my throat and I made a failure. The
“Singsang” was becoming a torment. But I struggled on, for the others
kept assuring me that this nervousness could be conquered, and that then
my talent would come out victorious. Under the stress of this I paid
little heed to the mighty tragedy which was at that time convulsing the
world. Other woes than mine were there suffered; my contemporaries there
were trembling with other anxieties! Once more did I let this elemental
event pass over the horizon without any inward revolt. The repeated
victories won by Germany filled me with great respect, while at the same
time the fall of the Napoleonic dynasty, with which I had come into such
close contact, aroused my sincere sympathy; on the other hand, I was
glad for my delightful royal vis-à-vis that he was to wear the proud
imperial crown.

About all the distress and the horrors which followed in the wake of the
Franco-German War I heard little—or would not hear anything; I put it
aside with my habitual fatalistic _C’est la guerre_. Politics did not
interest me in the least; I did not read the newspapers. This gave me
all the more time for books. Books carried me into another world in
which, along with my own individual life, I led a second life. In my
early childhood I had been seized by the passion for reading and
learning; through my intercourse with Elvira, poetess and daughter of a
savant, it was still more fanned into flame, and never, under any
circumstances, has it left me. Whether at home in Baden or off
traveling; whether studying at the opera school or moving in high life
amid joys and festivities; whether in love and engaged and disengaged
again; whether my existence was offering me splendor and pleasures or
care and worriments,—I always spent many hours every day in the company
of books.

At the time of which I am now speaking, what I had read would have
filled a stately library. All of Shakespeare, all of Goethe, all of
Schiller and Lessing, all of Victor Hugo. The last-named,—a world in
himself,—who had already made such a mighty impression upon me as a
child with his _Ruy Blas_, I felt called upon to know in all his works;
and I was intoxicated with his command of language, with the sunward
flight of his genius. Anastasius Grün, Hamerling, Grillparzer, Byron,
Shelley, Alfred de Musset, Tennyson, among poets; and of the novelists I
knew all of Dickens, all of Bulwer,—better say at once, all of the
Tauchnitz collection. In French the novels of George Sand, Balzac,
Dumas; the dramatic works of Corneille, Racine, Molière, Dumas _fils_,
Augier, Sardou.

Yet scientific writings interested me as much as elegant literature,
perhaps even more. I read works on ethnography, chemistry, astronomy;
but my favorite branch was philosophy. Kant, Schopenhauer, Hartmann
(“The Philosophy of the Unconscious”), Strauss, Feuerbach, Pascal,
Comte, Littré, Victor Cousin, Jules Janet, Alfred Fouillée,—the three
last named in the _Revue des deux mondes_, which I regularly read from
the first page to the last,—these and many others, all of whose names I
cannot here enumerate, were my intellectual comrades, in whose company I
led a happy double existence quite apart from my personal doings, and in
this my soul expanded most comfortably.

The period of iconoclasm had not then arrived, with immense zeal to
throw discredit on the works of the earlier poets, and one could rejoice
with undiminished pride in the lofty circle. In science, on the other
hand, the really noblest of all—I mean natural science—had not as yet
attained to the height, the influence, and the revolutionary effect on
intellects which it has since won through the theory of evolution. Its
application to spiritual and social phenomena was still unknown to me. I
knew nothing then of social philosophy and sociology. To be sure, Darwin
had already published his “Origin of Species”; the economic problems had
already been propounded in the works of Lassalle and Engels; Buckle had
already brought out his “Introduction to the History of Civilization”;
the battle over Büchner’s “Force and Matter” was already on; Herbert
Spencer’s principal works were already issued; yet thus far nothing of
all this had reached me. I received with avidity whatever books told me
of nature and human society as things existent, but I did not conceive
them as things nascent; and, above all, I lacked the idea that social
conditions are destined to become _different_ and that man with his eyes
open can militantly coöperate toward this evolution.

When the Franco-German War was ended we chanced to be sojourning in
Berlin. My studies had brought me to the Prussian capital, for the
reason that I desired to make some experiment also in the German method
of singing. From an Unter den Linden balcony I saw the entrance of the
victorious troops returning from France. The picture remains in my
memory full of sunshine, enthusiasm, fluttering banners, scattered
flowers, triumphal arches,—a lofty, historic festival of joy. How
different would my impression of it be at the present time—but the
history of this change will come much later.

XIV
PRINCE WITTGENSTEIN
Duet practice and betrothal · Art journey and—end · Letters from Castle
Wittgenstein

Now follows another episode from the days of my youth,—again an
engagement romance. When I say “days of my youth,” that is relative; for
the romance ran its course during the summer of 1872, when I was already
twenty-nine years old, and this age is not called “young” in a girl.

It was in Wiesbaden. A young man—Adolf, Prince
Sayn-Wittgenstein-Hohenstein was his name—sought our acquaintance. It
appeared that he was favored by nature with a phenomenal tenor voice and
was passionately devoted to singing. This naturally formed a basis of
acquaintance, and later of attraction. He had once heard me as I was
singing by an open window, and this had induced him to make my
acquaintance. We asked him to call and bring his music. He willingly
acceded to this request. I was astonished that the pieces which he
brought were not only songs, but also and for the most part opera airs,
and he was no less astonished to find that I too had a supply of scores.
The first thing that he sang for us was the aria from _Faust_,—“O dimora
casta e pura.” I accompanied him on the piano. When he had finished the
aria—he had sung it wonderfully—I opened my score of _Faust_ and began
to sing the soprano part of the duet; he immediately joined in, and we
sang the duet through like two regular opera artists.

“Have you been preparing for the stage, Countess?” he asked in
amazement.

“I might ask you the same question, Prince.”

The question remained this first time unanswered. We had each found such
pleasure in this assured and accurate part-singing that we arranged to
have music together assiduously. He now came to our house every day, and
the duet from _Faust_ was followed by the duet from _Roméo et Juliette_
and then by the duet between Raoul and Valentine.

Soon the young man confided to us that he had indeed the intention of
devoting himself to the art. Within a month he proposed to start for
America, and there, under an assumed name, to appear in concerts or
perhaps on the stage. It had been a difficult matter to extort
permission from his parents, but his passion for singing was so
overmastering that he would have been willing to renounce everything in
order to make his beloved art his profession. He also had hopes of
winning great pecuniary rewards. Being a younger brother of the heir of
entail, he had no expectation of inheriting wealth, while in America
first-class tenors always reaped an abundant harvest of dollars.

Thereupon I told him also what plans I had cherished, and that they had
been wrecked merely on account of my insuperable nervousness, which
crippled me whenever I was about to sing before a numerous company or at
a decisive test. He had experienced the same thing, but had in the
course of time succeeded in getting the better of it.

And so we understood each other perfectly. Our voices blended
splendidly, and the end was—does not every one suspect what the end was?
For a fortnight, for hours every day, to declare to each other in major
and minor, in tender and passionate tones, _Io t’amo—Je t’adore—will
sterben—gern ... für dich_—“will gladly die—for thee”—cannot be done
with impunity, especially if the two are sympathetic. And so it came to
pass that we agreed to unite our fortunes, which were so similar.

Prince Adolf Wittgenstein sued for my hand and his offer was assented to
by my mother. My assent he had already obtained in the kiss with which
one of the duets, dying in sweet thirds, had ended.

Our plans were thus formulated: The trip to America should be made—more
than ever was the acquisition of a competency needful; he would
immediately inform his parents of the betrothal; as his recognized
fiancée I should remain in Europe, and if his venture succeeded then he
would return and carry me back. A letter of approval speedily came from
his parents, and so we became _Bräutigam und Braut_. In this
relationship the singing of love duets grew twice as delightful. To be
sure, the sadness of the quickly approaching separation was mingled with
our happiness. Only a fortnight more and Adolf would be obliged to go to
Bremen; his passage on the steamer was already taken, and the concert in
which he was to make his début in New York was already announced. So
have courage: a few months would soon pass, and next spring we could
enter into the alliance of love. We exchanged rings and vows, and my
betrothed set out for Bremen, where he was to sail, while we returned to
Austria. We betook ourselves to Graz, where a sister of my mother’s had
settled with her children. There we proposed to live in quiet retirement
until Adolf’s return. Our Baden villa was sold—song and the infallible
clairvoyant power had swallowed up almost everything. My mother had her
inalienable widow’s portion left, and I enough to provide a suitable
trousseau for my approaching marriage.

I looked to the future now not with quietude, to be sure, but still with
joyful anticipation. Not with quietude—for what if Adolf failed in his
plans, or what if he should change his mind while over there ... such
things do happen! And with joyous anticipation—for it would be likely to
be an interesting, happy life by the side of a fellow-artist, who bore a
great name, too, and was a dear, poetic, good-hearted man, to whom I
was, if not indeed passionately, yet cordially, attached!

From Bremen had come a farewell telegram full of love, and now several
weeks must pass before I could get a letter from New York.

But news of him reached me sooner than I expected,—terrible news. I
found in the paper an item only a few lines long, with the heading:

DIED ON THE PASSAGE

A cable dispatch received by the family of Fürst Wittgenstein, at
Castle Wittgenstein, reports that Prince Adolf Wittgenstein, who was
on his way to America, suddenly died on board and was buried at sea.

I uttered a shriek, and spent the whole night kneeling by my bed and
sobbing.

The next morning, with the forlorn hope that possibly the tidings were
false, I wrote to the family, and received from Adolf’s twin brother the
following reply:

Schloss Wittgenstein, November 20, 1872

Liebe verehrte Gräfin Bertha,

How infinitely hard it is for me to send you these lines, for they are
to tell you that the report which you read in the papers is true.

Alas, you cannot believe, dear Countess, what unspeakable grief we
all, and I especially, feel at the tidings of the sudden death of our
dear, good, generous-hearted brother. His heart has ceased to beat!
Poor Adolf died, as we learn through the office of the Imperial
Chancery, suddenly, on the 30th of October, in consequence of some
physical injury apparently caused by terrible seasickness; his dear
body was buried at sea. So runs the fatal telegram which reached
Berlin from New York on the 6th of November and was transmitted to us
on the following day. I cannot tell you, dear Countess, what we felt
and suffered at this report; and even now I am not able to realize and
believe the frightful fact. I do not know why the God of infinite
goodness summons my dearest-beloved twin brother, now in the full
bloom of his youth, just as he was on the point of attaining the goal
of his desires! O God, how infinitely painful for us who are left
bereaved! I know, dear Countess, what grief will fill your heart at
these tidings. You too loved my good brother so dearly. Ah, if he had
listened to me, he would have remained in Europe and gone to Italy,
and later to London. I had all but brought it about. You may perhaps
remember, in his letters, how inconsolably he wrote that people did
not want him to be happy. One who has no firm faith, and does not
assure himself that whatever God does is well done, could not but
despair at this so unspeakably sad event. If we might only call our
dear Adolf back, if only he could be with us again! The last token of
life that my father received from him was from Southampton. On the
23d, I believe, the ship went on from there; on the 28th it reached
New York, but without our dear brother—we have not even his beloved
body; that thought, that it is in the depths of the sea, is terrible!
Three days before the ship arrived, our dear brother departed. I
cannot write any more to-day, forgive me, honored Countess. This very
week we expect details from the captain and the ship’s surgeon;
perhaps also a message of farewell from dear, good-hearted Adolf. My
mother has just received your letter; she will certainly write you. I
should have been glad to write you, but I did not know your address.

So good-by for to-day. Try to be submissive to the blow, as we try;
and may God, who is all-powerful, who inflicts wounds and heals them,
grant you strength to endure the grief for him who is lost.

I kiss your hands, dear and honored Countess, and, with cordial
greetings to your mother, I remain, in sincere and faithful
attachment,

Your mourning friend,
Wilhelm Prinz Sayn-Wittgenstein

Then came the promised letter from the old princess:

My dear Countess,

Alas, if I could only tell you that the news which has shocked you,
that our dearly beloved Adolf perished on his sea trip, was not true!
No, my dear Countess, God called away the dear, beloved, angelic son.
Why did he have to leave us? That question we keep asking, and for all
answer can only say, that for three years and more it had been his
most ardent wish to devote himself to art; that in numberless letters
he has said again and again, “If you want to see me once more happy,
contented, and well, as I was ten years ago, then grant my request and
let me go to America.” The prince could never make up his mind to
grant his wish; only after he was fully persuaded that he would be
miserable here, did he at last yield and grant him the desired
permission.

I feel that you, my dear Countess, will mourn for our dear son with
us, and preserve an affectionate remembrance of him; for your letters
to the dear departed have told me that you loved him from your heart.
It would have been a great consolation to me if my beloved Adolf had
been able to have you with him in his journey to that distant land—yet
how terrible for you, if it had been so! Ah, I thank God for having
made the last weeks of my dear child’s life happy through your
friendship; he went away with such joyful anticipations—he believed
that he should see his home and family again, and bring you to his
home, dear Countess,—alas, it was not to be; we must lose him for this
short hand-breadth of life which God still lets us live; but we shall
find him again there, where is no more pain, no more disappointment,
no more parting!

I shall always be glad to hear that you are happy, and I assure you of
my sincere sympathy as

Your devoted
Amalie Fürstin Sayn-Wittgenstein

Schloss Wittgenstein, November 22, 1872

A few weeks later Prince Wilhelm wrote me again:

Most honored Countess,

At last I am able to send you, as I promised, the particulars
regarding Adolf’s last days. Pardon me for any delay in doing so; I
have been obliged to make the transcripts for all the absent brothers
and sisters, and I have recently had to assist my father in many other
matters.

The princess was much rejoiced over your last letter of sympathy, and
thanks you heartily for it. My late brother’s effects have not as yet
come; things take a long time when transacted through the office of
the Imperial Chancery. The steamer _Rhein_ was back from New York long
ago, and on the 14th of the month sailed again for that port.

We have received the sincerest sympathy from near and far, from high
and low, and only one voice has been heard regarding my dear brother:
he was loved, honored, and respected by every one. Our good Adolf
passed away, it seems, while asleep. He died in the night of the
29–30th of October, having been on deck in good spirits and full of
jokes the day before. He did feel very weak during the last days, and
had suffered severely from seasickness; but it did not manifest itself
as in other people—he only suffered infinitely, and that brought about
his sudden demise. He had no forewarning of it; on the very evening of
the 29th he talked a great deal with his fellow-traveler M. de
Neufville, and with the captain in his cabin. Neither the captain, nor
the steward who waited on him and was on the watch that night, heard
the slightest thing. On the morning of the 30th M. de Neufville
thought he was still sleeping, and sat down on his bunk, never once
dreaming that he was beside the dear dead. Let me break off from this
sad theme. I am somewhat calmed and strengthened. I cannot thank God
sufficiently for having been so kind to my dearest brother. I hope to
meet him again in the life to come. I inclose a charming poem
dedicated to my brother Adolf’s departed spirit, composed by some one
in Wiesbaden, who signs the name “Glücklich.” It will surely please
you.

How is it with you, dear Countess, and with your mother? Do you intend
to stay in Graz all winter? I may possibly visit my youngest brother,
Hermann, in Berlin for a few weeks, or, if it should be too cold here,
go to Wiesbaden where our Crown Prince and his wife are staying. As
soon as my departed brother’s effects arrive I will send you some of
his song books as a memento. Perhaps you might suggest one or another
that you especially care for.

Of course we are spending the holiday season very quietly. I will now
close, so that the letter may get off to-day, and that you may at
length receive the long-desired details with whatever power they have
to set the mind at ease. Remember me most cordially to the Countess
your mother, and keep me in your friendship.

With hearty greetings, liebe, verehrteste Komtesse,
Your most respectful and devoted
Wilhelm Prinz Sayn-Wittgenstein

Schloss Wittgenstein, December 19, 1872

From Adolf’s fellow-traveler, M. de Neufville, mentioned repeatedly in
the above letter, I received a long memorandum about the voyage and the
sad ending; whereupon I wrote him, and received the following reply:

P. O. Box 2744, New York, March 12, 1873

Hochverehrte Gräfin,

Your friendly and confiding letter of February the sixth reached me a
few days ago, and I should have replied sooner if time had permitted.
All the more I have thought about you, highly honored Countess; for it
is so easy for me to enter into your feelings of grief,—and permit me,
while expressing my best and sincerest thanks for your confidence, to
use this phrase, _La douleur fait facilement fraternité_.

I have known only too well what it means when one must suddenly give
back to the Lord the loved ones whom one has cherished here below and
from whom one has expected so many pure delights. Yet it is infinitely
encouraging to know that they are only being kept safe for us, and
that they are in a place where there are no disappointments and no
partings. How thankful we must be that we have this assurance within
us at a time when unbelief is gaining ground so frightfully and is
sweeping along one wavering soul after another.

I am very sorry that I can only partially answer your various
questions, because many a dear and true word spoken in regard to you
by the late prince has escaped my memory during the four months and a
half that have elapsed, though not without leaving forever in my heart
an exalted impression of your personality. He told me on the very
first Saturday evening—we were scarcely an hour out of Bremen—about
your musical talent and your great love for art, and on the very next
day we were given a chance to admire his splendid tenor voice: he sang
the _Tannenwald_, and a song the title of which I do not know; I think
it began with _J’aime toujours_. He sang this song several times; he
persuaded me to play the Abt songs on the ’cello, and could never hear
them enough; likewise Mendelssohn’s _So ihr mich vom ganzen Herzen
suchet_ (“If with all your hearts ye truly seek me”) he sang with
piano and ’cello accompaniment. On the 29th of October, at noon, we
talked together confidentially for the last time. He was in his berth
and I sat near him; he spoke of our living together in New York, of my
taking part in his concerts, and suddenly he turned the conversation
to his betrothed (he had your picture in his hand when I went into his
cabin). He told me of your delightful association in Wiesbaden, and
then he added, in a troubled tone, “I think, so many times, How will
it be when I get back again—will she love me then just as dearly as
she did before my departure?”

Fortunately I was able to free our dear, never-to-be-forgotten prince
from these disturbing thoughts by giving him to read a poem which had
been sent to me at Bremen by a beloved hand. It is Spitta’s (?) _Was
macht ihr, dass ihr weinet und brechet mir mein Herz?_ [“What mean ye,
to weep and to break mine heart?” Acts xxi, 13]. It is so beautifully
carried out,—how we all are united in the love which comes from God.
We talked about that poem, and then I thought it was better to let the
prince rest, and I went away.

Alas! this was the last hour when we could talk alone and
confidentially. May a faithful memory be the bridge that unites this
hour with the joyful meeting again.

I hope that on another occasion I may have more time to write to you;
to-day I had to use for that purpose a few moments in the office.

Thanking you again from the bottom of my heart for your trust in me, I
remain with perfect respect and reverence

Your devoted
Ch. de Neufville

And that was the end of a painful and yet beautiful episode of my
life,—a short romance of the magic of song, and of melancholy
resignation. On board the _Rhein_ a mourning flag was raised, a choral
was sung, the ship’s engines were stopped, and a body was lowered into
the ocean with salvos of guns. On the silent heart of the man who there
disappeared in the waters—an artist, a prince, a good-hearted man—was
laid the photograph of his betrothed, and the billows of the ocean
murmured a sobbing wedding song to the dead and my picture.

PART THREE
1873–1876

XV
IN THE SUTTNER HOUSE
Resolve to take a position · The Suttner family · Artur Gundaccar von
Suttner · Life in the Vienna _palais_ and in Schloss Harmannsdorf · The
Exposition year · Secret love · Letters from the Princess of Mingrelia ·
Marriage of Prince Niko · Zogelsdorf quarry · Three happy years · I tear
myself away · Departure

Summer, 1873. The brief romance was not forgotten, but the sharp pain of
it was assuaged. The love borne “on the pinions of song” had not made
too deep an impression on my heart; the whole affair had passed swiftly
by and vanished like a dream. I spent a few weeks in deep, genuine
grief; then the tears began gradually to dry up, and life again made its
rights prevail—and all the more powerfully as the necessity was upon me
to earn my own livelihood. Our property was quite used up; I was obliged
to leave home. My mother could live on her widow’s portion, but I did
not want to be a burden upon her, although she entreated me to stay with
her and once more attempt to take up my artistic career. Of that I would
hear positively nothing more. Thirty years old—that is no time to begin
an artistic career; and the remembrance of the pangs that I had suffered
through nervousness, the various fiascoes connected with my tests, made
the mere thought of “Singsang,” as I called it, detestable. Neither was
I willing to remain inactive at home in narrow circumstances, and grow
sour. I wanted to see more of the world; I wanted to accomplish some
work. With my perfect command of French, English, and Italian, with my
superior artistry in music, unusual in one not a professional, with my
extensive acquirements in other branches of knowledge, I could make
myself useful and brilliant in the outside world.

So I took a position that was offered to me as instructor and companion
to four grown-up daughters in the baronial house of Suttner.

Here was I first to win the crown of my life. Blessed be the day that
brought me to that house; it was the bud from which the hundred-leaved
rose of my good fortune opened out. That day also opened the door
through which there could enter that Bertha Suttner whom, with her
experiences of the purest married bliss and the deepest woes of
widowhood, with her participation in the critical issues of the time, I
feel myself to be to-day, while that Bertha Kinsky of whom I have
hitherto been writing hovers before me like a figure in a picture book,
whose adventures—in vague outlines—are indeed known to me, but do not
affect me.

The Suttner family occupied their own _palais_ in Canova Street, Vienna.
One side looked out on the Karlskirche across the Vienna River, the
other on the Musikverein building. We—that is to say the baron, the
baroness, the four daughters, and I—occupied the first floor; in the
mezzanine lived the oldest son Karl, who had been married a few months
previously to a marvelously beautiful woman born Countess Firmian, and
the third and youngest son Artur Gundaccar. The second son, likewise
married, a former captain of cavalry, who had fought in Bohemia in 1866,
lived on the manor of Stockern.

“Papa” Suttner, at that time fifty-one years of age, a goodly man, an
Austrian cavalier of the old school, conservative—not to say
reactionary—in his political ideas, always welcome at court. “Mamma”
Suttner, about the same age, with traces of great beauty, somewhat
formal and cold in her bearing. The daughters, Lotti, Marianne, Luise,
and Mathilde, aged twenty, nineteen, seventeen, and fifteen, each
prettier than the other. Especially Mathilde, the mother’s favorite, had
a truly angelic look with her wavy blond hair, her dazzling complexion,
and her regular features. Two other living beings belonged to the
family,—Schnapfel, a yellow-haired _Pintscher_, a constant companion to
Papa and Mamma; and Amie, a wise white poodle with a laughing
physiognomy, the confidante of the girls.

It was a great establishment; the household servants were a valet, a
chasseur, serving men, a lady’s maid, housemaids, a cook, a scullery
maid, a coachman, and a porter. Carriages and opera box. The dwelling—I
still see it before me: antechamber with Gobelin tapestries on the
walls; a suite of three drawing-rooms, one green, one yellow, and one
blue; the mother’s bedchamber in lilac; the father’s office, which
served also for a smoking room, with leather-covered furniture and
wooden wainscoting. Then two other chambers for the girls,—Lotti and
Marianne slept together, and so did Luise and Mathilde; my room was next
to theirs.

The girls and I were soon the best of friends. I did not play my rôle as
instructor too strictly; a few hours in the morning were regularly spent
in the study of music and the languages, but the rest of the time was
nothing but enjoyment, joking, and jollity. I did not parade the dignity
of my thirty years, nor yet the authority of my position. We five were
playmates. Our days were fairly regular: in the morning, before
breakfast, a walk in the neighboring city park; at nine o’clock, coffee
together in Papa’s office (in connection with which Mamma made inquiries
about the progress of the lessons and laid down all sorts of rules of
behavior and other good advice); from ten till twelve, lessons; at noon,
_déjeuner à la fourchette_ all together in the dining-room; from one
o’clock on, music, school tasks, etc., alternating, until it was time to
dress for the five-o’clock dinner.

The occupants of the mezzanine floor, Karl with his wife and Artur, were
present at the dinner. Artur, then a young man of twenty-three, was the
special favorite of his sisters. Not only that, he was the favorite of
every one. I never knew any one, not one, who was not delighted with
Artur Gundaccar von Suttner. As rare as white blackbirds are those
creatures who radiate a _charme_ so irresistible that all, young and
old, high and low, are captivated by it; Artur Gundaccar was such a
person. I purposely do not translate the word _charme_ by “enchantment”
because the French word gives a hint at the derivative _charmeur_, an
expression which would be very inaptly rendered by “enchanter.” What
such a _charme_ consists in, is hard to say; it is not so much a complex
of characteristics as it is a characteristic in itself. It operates by
an inexplicable and irresistible magnetic and electric force. One thinks
it needful to explain why some persons are so attractive and pleasing
and inspire such confidence and affection in others, and ascribes this
to their cheerful disposition, their friendly spirit, their good looks,
or their talents; but that is all a mistake: others have the like
characteristics, perhaps even to a higher degree, but the same effect is
not produced, for they are no _charmeurs_. They are not sunshine-people.
Artur Gundaccar was. When he entered a room it immediately grew twice as
bright and warm as it was before. This does not mean that I fell in love
with him at first sight; I only shared the delight which the four
sisters felt when the favorite brother joined in their jests and
diversions, when he sat in our midst chatting, when he chanced to take
part in our entertainments and excursions. He could not do this any too
often, for he had to drudge in preparation for a civil-service
examination; this, to be sure, he did as little as possible, for he
learned very easily but not with avidity. Zeal for the study of law was
not one of his strong points. “A lazy dog” his former tutor, now his
private secretary, complainingly called him; his father dubbed him “a
frivolous good-for-nothing”; “He is a real affliction,” sighed his
mother; and at the same time they all worshiped him. He was handsome and
elegant beyond all comparison. He had an incredible gift for music;
without having studied, he played everything by ear and composed
ravishing melodies. And the basis of his character—is this perhaps the
secret of the sunshine effect?—the basis was kindness.

I have wandered from my account of the order of our day. After dinner
Mamma used to drive in the Prater with some of her daughters. Mathilde,
the youngest, was readiest for this; the others had no pleasure in this
slow promenade back and forth through the “Nobelallee.” However, the
rest of us too went down to the Prater to the Exposition. For the year
1873 was the year of the World’s Exposition; it was also the year of the
“crash.” In this crash Baron Suttner senior suffered serious losses, but
he kept it from the knowledge of his family. It was only discovered at a
later period.

The excursions and the visits to the Exposition gave us many enjoyments.
On Sundays we brought them into the forenoons, and then Artur Gundaccar
and some of his friends used to join us. In the evenings we went twice a
week to the opera, taking turns in using the box; almost every day
callers came to tea. Then we had music, played social games, and talked,
until eleven o’clock. This first summer, as the Exposition was open, the
family remained in town until the middle of July, when we went into the
country to Castle Harmannsdorf. Moving-day was a gala day to all of us,
for the girls liked ten thousand times better to be in the country than
in Vienna, and so did the sons. There is nothing more delicious than to
leave the hot, dusty city, and arrive at a beautiful castle where in
every room there is a scent of freshness; where you are surrounded by
park and forest; where you look forward to a long period of recreation
and enjoyment of nature.

Harmannsdorf possesses a beautiful old castle with a central and two
corner towers; a vast stone terrace gives into the park, of which the
foreground, laid out in the French style by Lejeune, the creator of
Schönbrunn, is richly adorned with vases and statues. You pass from it
to walks shaded by pine trees many centuries old, and into grounds laid
out in English style; of these, one quite wild in character is called
_Das Wäldchen_,—“the little forest.” But we liked the real forest still
better. There we used to go often afternoons, taking along a pony cart
drawn by donkeys and loaded with edibles and drinkables—we had
invariably the feeling of an excursion to the country, although we were
in the country already. And how happy, happy we were!

Artur Gundaccar was the soul of these festivities. And gradually and
blissfully it dawned upon us that we loved each other. The sisters gave
their laughing benediction. The parents knew nothing about it; there
could of course be no question of our being married, so they would have
put an end to the affair most speedily. Why destroy the innocent
happiness, why banish the “Midsummer Night’s Dream” mood? And so we
guarded our secret, and the sisters helped us to guard it. It was a
delightful time. Not without melancholy, because we knew that a life
union was impossible for us; but as yet we refused to think of the
separation—for the present we would be glad in the divine gift which was
ours because our hearts kept time in their beating, because their flames
streamed together into one. Guilelessly, unselfishly, unreservedly, with
utter trust, with tender devotion, we loved each other.

From the first I had announced that in three years I was going to leave
Europe and we should be obliged to part. This was the way of it. I had
kept up a lively correspondence with my Caucasian friends and told them
of the change in my worldly circumstances. The old Princess of
Mingrelia, who had now returned home, offered to take me into her
family, but not until she had finished building and furnishing a castle
in her home town of Zugdidi. The old castle, which the prince had
furnished in European style and with great magnificence, had been
destroyed by the Turkish bands when the Dedopali was compelled to take
flight, and now she had in mind to build a new one still finer.

I had seen the plans and had often been told the details of the
decoration. There was a hall in Persian style, another in the style of
Louis XIV; furniture and hangings and works of art the princess had
gradually acquired during her residence in Europe, and had dispatched
them to Zugdidi. Enormous packing cases were piled up there and were
waiting to be opened. Once I myself was charged with procuring something
for her: a big music box (I might go as high as fifteen thousand francs)
which should play orchestral pieces. I remember that I had Artur go with
me to make this purchase. A music box was wound up and played a waltz as
a test.

“Perhaps I shall dance to this waltz in Zugdidi,” I said.

“As if I would let you go!”

“It will have to be; I have made up my mind.”

“Let us not talk about it.”

I had also kept up a correspondence with Salomé. She lived in the
vicinity of Paris and was now the mother of a second little boy. The
Empress Eugénie was his godmother, and he was christened Napoleon.
Nikolaus of Mingrelia was aide to the Emperor of Russia and living in
St. Petersburg. Here is a letter which the princess wrote from a halting
place in her journey to her home land:

Yalta, September 12, 1873

My dear Contessina,

It is now a fortnight since I came here. I am occupying a charming
villa situated on the gulf and giving a view of the whole place, as
well as of Livadia, the _palais_ of the Empress, on the mountain
opposite me. Last Sunday, after mass, I was invited to breakfast at
their Majesties’, and there met the Grand Duke and Grand Duchess
Mikhaïl,—he is governor of Caucasia,—the Queen of Greece, and others.
I have discovered that the Grand Duchess Maria Alexandrovna, the
Emperor’s only daughter, has grown considerably and is prettier than
when I saw her last. Her fiancé, Prince Alfred, is expected here next
week. Niko and André are in Mingrelia, where they are anxiously
expecting me. Salomé is coming to Yalta on the 24th; she will spend
some time with the Princess Orbeliani,[18] my cousin’s widow, who has
a little estate near by, and will then join us in Mingrelia. I leave
Yalta on the 3d of October and reach Poti four days later. Adieu,
dearest Contessina; I wish you as much happiness and good fortune as
you deserve.

Your very devoted
Ekaterina

In the spring of 1874 the princess with great delight informed me that
her son was betrothed to the daughter of Count Adlerberg, a lifelong
friend of the Tsar’s.

One of the next letters brought the description of the wedding, and in
one that came still later the arrival of the young couple at Gordi, the
summer residence of the Mingrelian family, was depicted. I insert the
description here, for it gives a vivid picture of the country in which
later I was destined to spend so many years with my husband.

The journey of the newly married couple went off in excellent shape. A
special ship was put at their service to bring them directly across
from Odessa to Poti, and from there a special train brought them to
Kutais. The whole trip was one endless ovation. The inhabitants lined
the way, and at all the stations they were received by the princes,
nobles, and residents of the district with songs, shouts of joy, and
salvos of musketry. They were compelled to stop and repair to floral
temples where refreshments were ready, and there again began songs,
dances, and other diversions.

At Kutais the travelers remained two days, where the banquets, balls,
and receptions threatened to last forever, so that the young couple
had to steal quietly away in order at length to reach Gordi.

At the entrance of the mountain pass is a bridge which leads over a
rushing stream. There the carriages are left, since the heights can be
reached only on horseback or in palanquins.

So, as soon as the equipages were emptied, they all crossed the
carpeted bridge, which was roofed with a continuous arbor of flowers
and adorned with a triumphal arch marking the boundary of
Mingrelia.[19] Thereupon they took their way to a tastefully decorated
pavilion, where the young couple were received by a delegation of my
son’s officials and servants, as well as by all the princes and nobles
of the region. After the health of the newly wedded couple had been
toasted, all those who had been on horseback mounted so as to make a
cordon around Mary’s palanquin, and the imposing procession started
out along the road which leads up the mountain for seven kilometers.

At the first cannon shot which announced their arrival I went with my
suite to the balcony of their dwelling, where I first received the
cavalcade of the prince from the Letchgum, who, under the leadership
of Prince Gregor, Niko’s uncle, were riding ahead of the newcomers;
then I caught sight of the young couple, who, amid the ringing of all
the bells, the music of a march played by the military band, and the
roar of cannon echoing from the mountains, approached and received
from the steward at the head of his people the bread and salt in
accordance with the custom of the country.

Then they hastened up to me and knelt before me, to receive my
blessing, with the holy picture, on the threshold of their new
dwelling. This moment was so affecting and so solemn that the tumult
of the billowing throng suddenly changed to the deepest silence. Tears
stood in the eyes of all; Mary showed herself especially moved, so
that I had to conduct her into the house to give her time to recover.

At last we proceeded to the church, where the _Te Deum_ was
celebrated, and the archimandrite, together with my almoner, delivered
appropriate addresses. After the religious solemnities were finished I
conducted my daughter-in-law into the great hall and there presented
her with my gift, a parure of diamonds. As regards the dwelling that I
have prepared for them, I can truly call it a jewel casket.

We rested for a while; then the festivities began, and lasted till
late at night. Orchestral performances, national songs and dances,
firing of guns, games, athletic sports, alternated. The number of
guests came to three hundred, of whom a part ate under the great trees
in the park. On the next day it began again, for we celebrated Mary’s
birthday; and for this occasion I had prepared an evening
surprise—fireworks, and an illumination of the mountains with Bengal
lights, which furnished a magical spectacle.

Whenever I received such a letter I read it aloud to the Suttner family,
and it was taken as a settled thing that as soon as the castle was
completed I was to go to the Caucasus. This work was continually
delayed, but we were perfectly satisfied that it was. Life, alternating
between Harmannsdorf and Vienna, was so happy! Harmannsdorf, especially,
offered us a whole succession of delights. During the hunting season
came a throng of guests, and there were dancing and theatricals. In the
park was a large hall with stage and dressing rooms. There we performed
various dramas and comedies, which were witnessed not only by the
Harmannsdorf public and the inhabitants of the neighboring castles, but
also by the peasants of the surrounding villages, who came flocking in
and filled the theater. Then the harvest and vintage festivals, the
excursions to the neighboring Stockern, where also a jolly throng of
young people sojourned, and above all the favorite donkey-wagon parties
and the stolen moments of confidential tête-à-têtes. The only
dissonances that made their appearance in the house sprang from
unfortunate business transactions. On the estate of Zogelsdorf, which
belonged to Harmannsdorf, were quarries which were operated actively but
unprofitably. The new Vienna museums were built from the Zogelsdorf
stone, and the statues of Hercules that adorn the Burgtor were chiseled
from it; yet a dishonest overseer was the cause of this business
resulting in serious losses instead of profit, But the burden of this
anxiety rested more on the parents; the children heard little about it
and did not take it to heart. The brilliancy of our outward life was not
diminished, and our gay and joyous activities went on as usual. Artur
Gundaccar and I had sad moments only when we could not succeed in
banishing the thought of our approaching separation....

“Oh, no more of that,” one or the other of us would say after such an
outburst of grief; “nothing endures forever; let us thank fate for
granting us this bit of heaven.”

I confided this love story to my mother, who had remained at Graz with
her sister. Of course, she urged me either to insist on a marriage or to
leave the house; but I quieted her.

At last, however, his mother too began to have her suspicions. With icy
coldness but with all delicacy she gave me to understand this. And I had
always known that on that side sanction for marriage was not to be
expected. I had not thought of it myself either. I saw the
unreasonableness of such a match. Absolutely penniless, seven years
older ... and he still without employment, also without means, but
qualified and assured to make a brilliant marriage—all the girls were
crazy about him—should I stand in the way of his future? That had never
been my plan—there must one day be a parting, and now that the secret
was half disclosed the moment had come for me to tear myself away. I
mustered up all my courage and said to the baroness: “I am going to
leave the house. I cannot go to Mingrelia yet, the castle will not be
finished for another year. Could you not give me a recommendation to
London? I should like to find a position there in the meantime—far from
Vienna.”

“That is right, my dear child,” she exclaimed warmly, “I understand
you.... See, in to-day’s paper I have found an advertisement for
something which would perhaps suit you; would you like to answer it?”

The advertisement read: “A very wealthy, cultured, elderly gentleman,
living in Paris, desires to find a lady also of mature years, familiar
with languages, as secretary and manager of his household.”

So I wrote offering my services, and received a reply signed with the
then to me unknown name Alfred Nobel.

I showed the letter to the baroness; she made inquiries and learned that
the person in question was the famous and universally respected inventor
of dynamite. Mr. Nobel and I exchanged several letters. He wrote
cleverly and wittily, but in a melancholy tone. The man seemed to feel
unhappy, to be a misanthrope, with the widest culture, with deeply
philosophical views. He, a Swede, whose second mother tongue was
Russian, wrote in German, French, and English with equal correctness and
elegance. My letters too, for whatever reason, seemed to have a very
stimulating effect on him. After a brief delay an agreement was reached:
I was to take the position. The day of my departure for Paris was set.
Now for saying farewell, separating from what is dearest ... _Scheiden
tut weh_: the truth of that popular proverb I experienced.

I can still call up from the past those hours of parting. It was on the
evening before I was to leave. I had been for several days at the house
of an acquaintance in Vienna, to make my preparations. The last day
Artur also came in from Harmannsdorf to be with me for the last time. My
hostess left us alone—she knew that we still had much to say to each
other. But it was hard to talk. We clung in a close embrace and wept.
“To part!” Is it possible? Have we the strength for it? It must be—what
could we do if I remained? Ah, it would have been too beautiful ... it
could not be.... And again two salt-tasting kisses, again sobs and new
laments, new grief-trembling words of endearment. Before he went he
knelt before me and humbly kissed the hem of my gown:

“Matchless, royally generous-hearted woman—I thank thee, thank thee from
the bottom of my heart! Through thy love thou hast taught me to know a
happiness which shall consecrate all my life. Farewell!”

XVI
THE ZENITH OF HAPPINESS
Arrival in Paris · Alfred Nobel’s personality · Unendurable agony of
separation · Two dispatches · A plan of action · Arrival at Vienna ·
Blissful meeting · At last and forever united

I reached Paris early in the morning. Mr. Nobel came to meet me at the
station and took me to the Grand Hôtel on the Boulevard des Capucins,
where rooms had been engaged for me. He left me at the door and said he
would call a few hours later after I was rested. I could not as yet take
up my quarters in his little _palais_ in the Rue Malakoff, because the
suite that I was to occupy was just being carpeted and furnished for me;
so for the time I should have to stay on at the hotel.

Alfred Nobel made a very pleasing impression. He was not indeed an
“elderly gentleman,” as the advertisement gave us to understand and as
we all imagined him, gray-haired and feeble—not at all. Born in 1833, he
was then forty-three years old, rather below the medium height, with
dark, full beard, with features neither ugly nor handsome; his
expression rather gloomy, softened only by kindly blue eyes; in his
voice there was a melancholy alternating with a satirical tone. Sad and
sarcastic, such was his nature. Was that the reason Byron was his
favorite poet?

After a few hours, then, when I had rested and refreshed myself and sent
a dispatch to Harmannsdorf, he came to see me. The letters that we had
written to each other caused us to meet on a different footing from that
of entire strangers, and the conversation was immediately put on an
animated and stimulating basis. After _déjeuner_, which we took in the
dining-room downstairs, we got into his carriage and drove through the
Champs-Élysées. Then he showed me his house, and the rooms that were
reserved for me.

But those rooms I never occupied. Before they were ready I had left
Paris again. This is the way it came about. I was unhappy—ever so
unhappy. Homesickness, the bitterness of longing, the agony of
separation, made me suffer as I had not thought that any one could
suffer. Dispatches from Artur and letters from him and his sisters came
speeding to me every day. The sisters wrote that no one would know
Artur, that he never spoke, that he seemed to be suffering from
melancholia. When I was alone all I could do was to weep or write home
or groan with heartache.

When I was with Alfred Nobel I was for the moment diverted, for he could
chat and tell stories and philosophize so entertainingly that his
conversation quite captivated the mind. To talk with him about the world
and humanity, about art and life, about the problems of time and
eternity, was an intense intellectual enjoyment. He kept aloof from
social life: certain forms of shallowness, of falsity, of frivolity,
filled him with wrath and disgust. He was full of faith in the abstract
ideal of a coming loftier humanity,—“when once people come into the
world with better-developed brains,”—but full of distrust of the
majority of the men of his day, for he had had to make the acquaintance
of so many low, selfish, insincere characters. He was distrustful also
of himself, and bashful even to the point of timidity. He regarded
himself as repulsive; believed that he was incapable of inspiring
sympathetic feelings; was always afraid that people were merely
flattering him because of his enormous wealth. That was doubtless the
reason why he had never married. His studies, his books, his
experiments,—those were what filled his life. He was also a writer and
poet, but never published any of his poetical works. A philosophical
poem a hundred pages long, written in the English language, he gave me
to read in manuscript; I found it simply splendid.

He must soon have discovered that I was burdened with a secret sorrow.

“Are you fancy-free?” he asked me one day.

“No,” I answered honestly.

He pressed me further, and I told the whole story of my love and my
renunciation.

“You have acted bravely; but be completely courageous, break off the
correspondence also—then let a little time pass ... a new life, new
impressions—and you will both forget—he perhaps even sooner than you!”

Break off the correspondence? I could not; it was my consolation. What
was I to do in my lonely hours if I did not write to my dear one—tell
him everything minutely, all my experiences and all my feelings?

Alfred Nobel could give me only one or two hours a day, for he was tied
to his work. He had another new invention in mind.

“I wish I could produce a substance or a machine,” he said to me, “of
such frightful efficacy for wholesale devastation that wars should
thereby become altogether impossible.”

About a week after my arrival Mr. Nobel was obliged to go for a short
time to Sweden, where a dynamite factory was being established; the king
himself had summoned him.

I was now quite alone. The yearning for the man of my heart grew beyond
endurance. Then I received two dispatches. One was from
Stockholm,—“Arrived safely, shall be back in Paris in a week”; and the
other from Vienna,—“I cannot live without thee.”

And my soul gave a cry, “Nor I without thee!” and I had to act
accordingly. Another sleepless night, during which a plan of action was
matured, and on the next day I wrote to Stockholm that it was impossible
under the circumstances for me to take the position in the Rue Malakoff.
I thanked him for all the confidence and friendliness which had been
shown me, but I must return to Vienna.

I owned a valuable diamond cross, an inheritance from my guardian
Fürstenberg; I went out to dispose of this, and the price which I
received for it was sufficient to cover the hotel charges, to buy a
ticket for the next express train for Vienna, and to leave me some ready
money. I acted as if I were in a dream, as if under irresistible
compulsion. I did have flashes of consciousness that this was folly,
that perhaps I was running away from a good fortune and into the arms of
a misfortune; but I could not, could not do otherwise, and the bliss
which I expected to feel in the instant of meeting again outweighed
everything else that might come, even were it death.

I had not announced my coming—I wanted to take him by surprise. I drove
from the station to a hotel, and sent to the Canovagasse a note in a
disguised hand, begging Herr Baron Artur to come to the Hotel Metropole,
Room No. 20, where a lady from Paris had a message from Countess Bertha
to give him.

He could be there in half an hour. With throbbing heart I listened to
every step in the corridor. I had not long to listen till I recognized
the beloved footfall; there was a knock at the door; I tried to say
“Come in,” but my voice failed me. Nevertheless the door opened and—it
was he!

I flew to him with a cry of joy.

_Du, du selber!_—“It is your own self!” he cried, and we were once again
sobbing in each other’s arms, just as on that evening when we parted,
only this time not with feelings of pain but rather of unbounded
happiness.

“I have thee, I have thee again—I will never let thee go.”

“No, never again!”

We sat down on the sofa, nestling close, and we began our story. What he
had suffered, what I had suffered ... how he had already begun to think
of suicide.... “No, no, we belong together, nothing shall ever part us
again....”

But what now?—what was to be done?

“Leave planning till later,” I besought. I felt so completely satiated
with bliss by this festal meeting that I could not attend to questions
and doubts and the making of projects. Of all tender speeches such as
are used by lovers and poets, “Thou art an angel,” “Thou art my all,”
and the like, the loveliest and most significant is _Du bist die Ruh_!

But he awakened me from “Rest.”

“We must talk about the future,” he said. “One thing is clear,—it must
never happen again that we let ourselves be parted, or that we actually
separate of our own accord for wretched considerations of worldly
wisdom. We will be married,—that is settled.”

Yes, that was settled. We had honestly tried to separate, and had seen
that it was impossible, simply impossible. To have each other forever
was unspeakable happiness; to renounce each other forever was synonymous
with dying. With this choice set before us, there could be no further
hesitation. To live, to live and be happy!

And so we did begin planning. We would be married—secretly—and then out
into the world! We could surely make our way: we would work, put our
talents to profitable use, find a situation.... To the Caucasus!—was my
proposal. There I had powerful friends. The Dedopali had years and years
before made me promise to come and make her a visit with my husband.
Thither, then, should be our wedding journey. Through their relations
with the emperor of Russia it would be possible to secure a position in
the Russian court or state service....

The plan was carried out. No one was allowed to know of my return from
Paris; I went into hiding for a few weeks with a family in
Lundenburg—very dear people. In the meantime My Own—I never called him
Artur, but My Own, so I shall do the same here in these
recollections—provided for the publishing of the banns, secured trusty
witnesses who would hold their tongues, made everything ready that was
necessary, documents, traveling money, luggage, etc. Fortune favored us;
the family got no wind of the banns published in a remote suburban
church, and one fine morning—it was June 12, 1876—I drove in my
traveling dress and hat to Gumpoldskirchner parish church; my betrothed
was waiting for me there with his witnesses and mine, and in a side
chapel a priest of venerable years united us. We were man and wife.

PART FOUR
1876–1885

XVII
WEDDING JOURNEY
On the Black Sea · Jason mood · Arrival in Asia · The hotel in Poti ·
Kutais· Count Rosmorduc · Reception at Prince Zeretelli’s · National
dances · Journey to Gordi · Prince Niko with escort comes to meet us ·
Arrival at Gordi · Ceremonious reception

I see us next on board the steamship that was to take us from Odessa
across the Black Sea to the port of Poti. It was My Own’s first sea
voyage in all his life; he passionately loved the sea, had always longed
to take a voyage, and now he reveled in the fulfillment of his wishes.

Our goal was the land whither Jason went in his quest for the Golden
Fleece. I think there was much of the Jason mood in us both at that
time: a mingling of delight in adventure, confidence of conquest, the
intoxication of hope. Before us lay a world of things new and
surprising; we were going to set foot on a land consecrated by the most
classical legends, and experiences which we could not even well imagine
beckoned us onward.

We knew that we were expected and should be received with open arms. I
had written from Vienna to the Dedopali, and to Prince Niko, who also
was at that time sojourning in the Caucasus, telling our whole romance
and announcing our visit. A joyous “Welcome” was wired back to us. We
both thought it likely that my old friend Niko would secure for My Own a
position as aide to the emperor or something of the sort. And altogether
we were so inordinately enraptured at being together, our bold stroke
had aroused in us such an intense feeling of happiness, everything thus
far had gone so _sur des roulettes_, that we looked forward to a
constant increase in our good fortune. One day we should return home in
triumph; but it would be a long time before we should want to return
home; for the present, out into the wide, beautiful, rich, wonderful
world! we were after the Golden Fleece. Nor did we need it—that was the
best part. Whatever treasures the world might grant or deny us, we had
in each other measureless riches. And My Own felt all this even more
keenly than I. He was only twenty-six years old, and this was his first
journey into the Unknown. I had already experienced so much
disillusionment, and had already, with my thirty-three years, emerged in
a measure from that state of intoxication which is called youth; but I
caught the contagion of his youthful enthusiasm, and was as childish as
he.

After a calm passage our steamboat landed us on the Asiatic shore. A
different continent—it fills the comparatively inexperienced traveler
with a peculiar pride, a pride upon which old globe-trotters look down
with a smile. My Own set his foot on the un-European soil with the
haughtiness of a conqueror.

“So,” said he exultingly, “here we are in Asia!”

Whether Asia or Australia, whether earth or Mars, cried the exultation
within me, we are together, and that is the main thing.

A messenger from the princess was on the landing-place to meet us. He
handed me a letter from his mistress with a renewed welcome and the
request that we should delay our arrival at Gordi—the summer
residence—for a week, till our hosts, who as yet were still at Zugdidi,
had had time to establish themselves in their mountain abode. We were to
trust ourselves to the direction of her messenger, who would conduct us
to the town of Kutais, where we might put up at the hotel for the time
being. So we turned the arrangements over to this factotum, a Georgian
steward, who spoke a little broken French. He wore the national costume:
long caftan, cartridge shells across the chest, bashlyk on head, dagger
in belt.

There would not be another train for Kutais that day, hence we had to
spend the night at Poti. The place had only a very simple inn, to be
sure, but _que faire?_—This phrase, adopted from the Russian _chto
dyelat_, often came to our ears in that country; it imports that
resignation, coupled with a shrug of the shoulders, which does not so
much enunciate the question what one is to do in order to contend
against something as intimate rather that nothing can be done.

The inn was in truth very simple: we spent the night in chairs because
the beds proved to be too thickly inhabited, and when we wanted to make
our toilets and looked for a washstand there was none to be found. I
rang for the chambermaid. One appeared in the form of a barefooted
peasant with a scrubby beard and a forest of curly black hair. We could
not make him understand what we wanted, and called to our aid our
factotum, who had also put up at this palace hotel of Poti. Then it was
made known to us that the house possessed only one tin washdish, which
was carried from one room to another as it was needed, and with it the
towel—in what a condition!

Not especially refreshed by this resting-place, but in unruffled good
spirits, we continued our journey the following morning in order to
reach our next stop, Kutais, the capital of the province of the same
name. There another messenger from the Mingrelian family was also
awaiting us—the young prince’s intendant, a portly, tumultuous Armenian,
who likewise could speak broken French, and wore the European dress. He
conducted us to the best inn of Kutais; this was certainly not a palace
hotel either, but might be so regarded in comparison with the hole where
we had been the day before, for here each guest had his own washbasin
and even his own towel, and the rooms and beds were clean. But
everything we saw and heard—and smelt—seemed to us so terribly exotic:
the strange types of people, the strange costumes, the strange
architecture of the buildings, and—as to the sense of smell—a quite
peculiar and not disagreeable odor of sundried buffalo dung. The
buffaloes themselves, which are used here to draw loads and as milch
cattle, and which we had already seen idling in sundry mudholes on our
way to Kutais, were an exotic phenomenon to us.

The heat was frightful. One could hardly endure it in the rooms, and we
spent our days and took our meals (consisting of mutton, mutton, mutton)
on a wooden balcony which ran around the house over the court.

After two days our Armenian took his departure, and a third messenger
came to be our guardian and protector. This time it was a family friend
of the Dadianis, an old French nobleman _de vieille roche_, with the
fine manners _de l’ancien régime_. His name was Comte de Rosmorduc. Born
in Bretagne, he had come to the Caucasus some twenty-five years before
(for what reason I do not know) and had settled down there for good. He
had married a Mingrelian woman, and owned a house which he had himself
built at Zugdidi. He was a welcome associate of the princess and her
children, and later became a dear friend of ours also.

He now did us the honors of Kutais. He introduced us at the home of
General Zeretelli, the foremost house in the city. The Zeretellis were
Caucasians and relatives of the Dadianis. They showed themselves very
obliging, even arranging for a great reception in our honor on the
following evening, to which all the notabilities and aristocratic
families of the place were invited. The daughter, Nina, was a famous
beauty, but as she was twenty-five she was regarded already as an old
maid. Girls in the Caucasus usually marry at fifteen or sixteen. The
Countess Rosmorduc, who was then thirty-five, had been married for
twenty years. She also was a great beauty; but we did not make her
acquaintance until the next year.

The soirée at the house of the Zeretellis left an ineffaceable
impression on our minds, because it was the first time that we got a
glimpse of the social life of the country. Here we saw ladies in their
national costume and witnessed for the first time the performance of the
national dance—the _Lesginka_. We also participated for the first time
at a banquet where the fiery Kachetin wine was poured from slender
silver flagons into great drinking-horns, and where a toastmaster,
chosen to this honorable office, proposed the healths—on this occasion,
as first of all, the health of the guests from Austria. The host and
hostess did not sit down at table but helped serve. Among those present
we found many who spoke French, and where that was not the case Count
Rosmorduc, who had learned the language of the country, served as
dragoman.

In the salon stood a piano. My husband sat down at it and played some of
the waltzes which he had himself composed, and the Caucasian society was
full of admiration and danced to this music with perfect grace. But they
were most pleasing in the _Lesginka_. This dance is usually executed by
only one couple, while the rest sit in a circle and clap their hands in
time to the music. The accompaniment is provided by a small native
instrument which endlessly repeats a certain melody three bars long, and
by tambourines adorned with little bells, on which skillful hands thump
with an increasingly lively rhythm. The dance itself is a pantomime of
the immemorial play of love: pursuit, flight, enticement. The men
perform artistic _pas_; the women fairly float along the floor, the
long, heavy silken garment concealing the feet so that they look as if
they were rolling on invisible casters; the veil which is attached to
their headdress flows behind them, and from the arms, stretched out in
circling gestures, float the long double sleeves. As a conclusion to the
festivity I treated the company to an Italian bravura aria and then to
Auber’s Laughing-Song—Carlotta Patti’s show piece; the laughter in the
song infected everybody, and the whole ended with a chorus of laughter.

And now the next morning we started for the goal of our journey, for
Gordi, situated on a high plateau among the mountains. Count Rosmorduc
chartered a troika and escorted us. It was jolly riding behind that
spike team; the more the springless vehicle shook us up, the more fun we
had out of it. The way was splendid; all the hedges were abloom with
cascades of wild roses. At the same time the heat was frightful. All the
more delightful the prospect that we were going among the mountains,
where, as Count Rosmorduc assured us, cool and almost raw winds blow all
the time.

After a journey of several hours across the plain we came to Pompey’s
Bridge; this is that place where one must leave the carriage and ride
horseback the rest of the way. We were now at the entrance of the
defile, and the peaks of the mountains which we were to climb stood out
steeply against the azure sky. The stream which roared and foamed under
Pompey’s Bridge roared perhaps twice as loud in our ears because it had
been described to us as the “Hippus” of the ancients; what classic
craft—doubtless even Jason’s _Argo_ when he went to capture the Golden
Fleece—must it not have rocked on its billows! This was the place, I
remembered from the Dedopali’s letters, where the young princely couple
on their home journey had dismounted from the carriage, where the bridge
had been spread with a carpet, and a triumphal arch of flowers had
marked the boundary line of Mingrelia.

There was no triumphal arch awaiting us at Pompey’s Bridge, but there
was a pleasing surprise: Prince Niko, accompanied by a great retinue,
had ridden down to the threshold of his dominion to welcome the
“Contessina” and her husband. Under a tent a table was spread with
refreshments. There we had breakfast first and a toast of welcome was
drunk, and then we addressed ourselves to the ascent. Horses were in
readiness also for us and Count Rosmorduc; for me a gentle pacer. Prince
Niko lifted me to the saddle, and now we had to ride up the seven
kilometers of serpentine road, while the cavalcade of the princely
escort, in their picturesque costume, were around us performing all
sorts of feats of horsemanship in their high saddles, springing up and
down the steep sides of the pass, and offering a perfectly wonderful
spectacle.

And as we rode upward the temperature grew cooler and cooler, and the
prospect over abysses and valleys more and more magnificent. The sun had
already disappeared behind the mountains when we arrived at our
destination. Gordi is situated on a great plateau, in the background of
which, buttressed by a mountain wall, stands the prince’s castle, a wide
edifice flanked with towers and adorned with numerous balconies and
terraces. On the right and left at intervals were small, neat wooden
villas. One of them was occupied by the dowager princess; one by Niko
himself, because his castle was another that was not yet completed; one
was for us; and the rest served as quarters for the other guests and
neighbors.

The Dedopali was standing on the terrace of her villa to welcome us.
Around her stood her women, her almoner, her private secretary, and her
bodyguard. She took me into her arms and bade me welcome.

“Présentez-moi votre cher mari, ma petite contessina, ou faut-il dire
‘baronessina’ maintenant?”

She kissed my husband on the forehead, in Russian fashion, when he bent
over her hand after the introduction.

We were soon conducted over to our little house, where we were to rest
and dress for dinner. The small guest villa, built on a level with the
ground, consisted of a sitting-room hung with gay cretonne and provided
with furniture of the same, a bedchamber, and rooms for the man and maid
who had been put wholly at our disposition. The dinner was served at the
Dedopali’s villa, on a broad open veranda. After dinner the
company—there had been about thirty at the table—went out on the
plateau, which lay in full moonlight; and now dances were performed,
rockets were set off, choral songs were sung, and not till midnight did
we retire.

That was our reception at Gordi.

XVIII
IN KUTAIS (1877)
Lessons · Rumors of war and outbreak of war · Red Cross fever · The
plague on the horizon · Bad times · Conclusion of peace · Mathilde ·
Beginning of literary career

Our wedding excursion to the Caucasus lasted nine years. A long
honeymoon!

The first summer we spent uninterruptedly in Gordi, where we were kept
until the family themselves went away—Niko to St. Petersburg, the
Dedopali to Zugdidi. But the illusion regarding a position at the
Russian court had shown itself to be an illusion. At first Niko took
kindly to the idea, but soon it became apparent that if an attempt
should be made to turn it into a reality, impossibilities would be
encountered. So what was to be done? That life of nothing but pleasure
and festivity which we had led there in the mountains could not be kept
up without end, and to be forever “an always welcome guest” is really
not a vocation. We had broken with Harmannsdorf—or rather the parents
had broken with us: they could not pardon us for our reckless step.
Neither did we seek pardon. We had defiantly announced that we would
make our way, and now we had to do it. We had kept up a most
affectionate correspondence with the brothers and sisters, but the
parents sent us a wrathy letter of reproach and repudiation, and never
another word. My mother, to whom My Own had made a visit before our
journey, had not indeed approved of the whole match and of the erratic
elopement; but in a few days she had taken My Own into her heart, and
her blessing accompanied us.

We now decided to settle in Kutais, and, for the time being, until
Prince Niko had found a suitable situation for us (which he still
treated as a possibility), to earn our living there by giving lessons in
music and the languages. A cousin of the princess, who had been visiting
at Gordi with us and whose home was in Kutais, promised to get pupils
for us in her circles. These were certainly not exhilarating prospects,
but our inner exhilaration was invulnerable. The whole life, the whole
country seemed to us so interesting that the intensified sense of travel
and adventure with which we had started out remained ever vivid; and,
moreover, we were so unspeakably happy in each other that really (just
as there are conditions in which one envies all people) we pitied all
people who were not ourselves. The most delightful thing was that we
felt our love not only not diminishing, but all the time increasing.

So, after the general breaking up of the party at Gordi, we went to
Kutais, where another friend of the Dedopali—General Hagemeister—took us
into his house as guests to remain until we should find a house and
pupils. In a few weeks we were established in a little home of our own,
and a number of the daughters of noble families in Kutais had presented
themselves to me for piano and singing lessons. My Own gave a few
lessons in German.

Now rumors of war began to buzz through the air. The year before an
insurrection had broken out in Bulgaria. (It was asserted in other than
Russian countries that this was fomented by Russian agents.) Russia
demanded of Turkey reforms and guaranties for the safety of the
Christians. Now the great powers met in conference—from November, 1876,
until January, 1877, in Constantinople; in March, 1877, in London; but
their decrees were refused by Turkey. Would Russia now declare war? This
portentous question was on every tongue. The troops were waiting in
expectation on the border.

And, sure enough, on the 24th of April came the Russian declaration of
war, and, simultaneously, the crossing of the Pruth and of the Armenian
border. The news was the more exciting for the reason that the Caucasus
itself served as one of the two theaters of the war, and an invasion of
Kutais by the Turks was one of the possible dangers.

I do not remember that we felt anxious. Nor did I have any feeling of
protest against war in general, any more than in the years ’66 and ’70.
My Own likewise looked upon the war that had broken out as merely an
elemental event, yet one of especial historical importance. To be in the
midst of it gives one personally an irradiation of this importance.

We received from my mother, from my sisters-in-law, letter after letter,
telegram after telegram: we must make our escape! We did not think of
such a thing; on the contrary we wanted to make ourselves useful, and we
offered our services to the governor, Prince Mirsky, as voluntary nurses
of the wounded. Only one condition we made,—that we should work in the
same place, if possible in the same hospital. That was not possible;
they wanted to use him here and me there, and so we withdrew our offer.
For to separate, especially in such perilous circumstances, no price
would tempt us! So we remained in Kutais. Our sympathies (at that time
we still had “sympathies” in war) were with the Russians. The word was,
“to free our Slav brethren”; that was the common talk all around us, and
we accepted it in perfect faith. Moreover, a second watchword was in the
air, raised by the Mohammedans living in the Caucasus, by the wild
mountain tribes, Shamyl’s comrades: revolt—shaking off the Russian yoke.
All this sounded very heroic. But no insurrection broke out; the
Caucasus proved to be satisfactorily Russianized and loyal. The sons of
the land, looking very handsome in their Cossack uniforms, went to the
front as one man to beat the Turks. “Sotnias,” as bodies of a hundred
mounted noblemen were called, joined the army as volunteers, and we saw
them riding away under our windows.

The first death announced in the war bulletins was that of a young
fellow whom we knew in Kutais, the only son of a Russian general’s
widow.

Of course, in all the neighborhood everybody who remained behind was
seized with the Red Cross fever: making bandages, sending off supplies
of tea and tobacco, treating the regiments that went through with food
and drink, collecting money, planning and executing enterprises of
beneficence,—all for the good of the poor soldiers. To-day it seems to
me there might be something still better than this good,—not to send
them out! To-day, too, we know from Tolstoi, the man who has the courage
of truth, what the case was with the “dear Slav brethren” at that time.
He writes thus in his book “Patriotism and Christianity,” which came out
since the war:

Just as is now the case with the love between the Russians and the
French, on the eve of the Turco-Russian war we had a sudden view of
the love of the Russians for I know not what Slavonic brethren. These
Slavonic brethren had been ignored for centuries; the Germans, the
French, the English, were and still are infinitely nearer to us than
these Montenegrins and Servians and Bulgarians. And at that time we
began to celebrate solemn festivities and organize receptions under
the puffing of men like Katkof and Aksákof, who are very properly
regarded in Paris as models of patriotism. Then, as now, the talk was
of nothing else than the sudden love with which the Russians were
burning for the Slavs of the Balkans.

First—exactly as was just now done in Paris—people gathered in Moscow
to eat and to drink and to talk nonsense to one another, to melt with
emotion over the noble feelings which they had, and to say things
about peace and harmony, passing over in silence the main point—the
project against Turkey. The press magnified the enthusiasm, and little
by little the government took a hand in the game. Servia revolted;
diplomatic notes and semi-official articles began to appear. The
newspapers produced more and more lies, inventions, and grew so heated
that at length Alexander II, who really did not want the war, could
not help giving his consent. And then what we know took place:
hundreds of thousands of innocent men were lost, and hundreds of
thousands were reduced to savagery and robbed of every Christian
feeling.

Well, at that time we two believed in this Slavonic brother love. My
husband sent to the _Neue Freie Presse_ at Vienna a series of letters
about those events of the war of which the echo reached us. These were
gratefully accepted for a time, but at length were found to be too
pro-Russian—the _Neue Freie Presse_ took the side of the Turks—and were
declined.

As far as I was concerned, since I could not take care of the wounded,
at least I helped diligently in the enterprises got up by the ladies of
Kutais in their behalf. I remember an evening garden-party which
assembled the inhabitants of the city on the “Boulevard,” as a promenade
in the middle of the town, shaded by trees, is called. There were
Chinese lanterns, orchestral music (“God save the Tsar,” a potpourri
from Glinka’s opera _Zhizn dlya Tsarya_, the Balkan March, Slavonic
songs, and the like), sale booths, and a tombola. Between two trees,
brilliantly lighted up, had been placed a great painting of a touching
scene on the battlefield: in the foreground a wonderfully beautiful
Russian sister of charity, with tears on her cheeks, bending tenderly
over a wounded Turkish soldier, whose head she was raising in order to
give him nourishment; in the background a tent, powder smoke, dead
horses, and bursting shells. I myself shed a tear or two as I stood in
front of that picture; and at the tombola, where I bought chances till
my pocketbook was drained, I won a small earthen vase, which I had them
raffle off again. And thus I believed that I had paid my tribute of
sympathy for the tragedy of the Balkans.

The war took its course. We received very sad letters from the Dedopali;
she was worried about her two sons, who had gone with the army.

Suddenly there arose the rumor that the plague had broken out in a place
not far away. That filled us with real dismay. When the news came I
burst out in self-reproaches.

“Oh, where have I brought you? It is my fault that you came here, My
Own.”

He comforted me: “Not for a moment have I regretted it. If only nothing
happens to you! But even if we must perish now, still we have had our
share of happiness.”

The pestilence, however did not spread. The fate of being carried off by
the terrible angel of destruction, to which we had resigned ourselves,
was spared us.

In other respects things were going very badly with us. In the disorder
caused by the events of the war no one any longer thought of taking
lessons, and we were fearfully pinched. There were days when we actually
made the acquaintance of the specter Hunger. But everything that befell
us, whether joy or sorrow, brought us closer and closer together, and
later we were grateful to Fate for having enriched us with such
experiences. Without doubt they were essential to the strengthening of
our characters, and to educating us into that sympathy with the sorrows
of humanity, with the wretchedness of the people, which in days to come
formed the basis of our united work in the service of mankind, and which
awakened in each of us feelings that gave delight to the other.

The war moved toward its end. On March 3, 1878, the Peace of San Stefano
was signed. The Dedopali’s two sons had come out unscathed; the
older—with the rank of colonel—had fought at Plevna in the emperor’s
suite; the younger, then a captain, had taken part in the storming of
Kars. In Kutais many families were in mourning. The returning sotnias
(“hundreds”) did not return as hundreds.

Our family at home were greatly rejoiced that the war had spared us. My
mother-in-law had gone with her two daughters Luise and Mathilde to
spend the winter in Florence, because the latter was ill with a severe
cough and the physician had prescribed a mild climate. In the spring, on
their way home, they stopped at Meran, and from there came the news that
Mathilde’s condition had grown worse; that she was suffering from severe
attacks of fever, and her life was in danger. A few days later came the
tidings of her death. Not yet twenty years old, and so beautiful and so
worshiped by her mother ... how could that mother bear such a blow!

They say she looked like an angel on her bier with a wreath of roses on
her golden hair unbound and streaming down on both sides. The remains
were brought back to Harmannsdorf—it must have been a sad journey for
the poor mother—and from there were transferred to the family vault in
Höflein.

The news brought us deep grief, and we wept bitterly for the sister so
prematurely snatched away from us, with whom we had spent many happy
hours, and who had always stood lovingly by us.

As I say, it was ebb tide in the lessons. So my husband tried his hand
at writing. The war correspondence published in the _Presse_ had been
much praised, and in producing it he had discovered in himself a talent
for writing a light and picturesque style. He now composed some
descriptive articles on the Caucasus and its people, and sent them to
various German weeklies. These contributions were gladly accepted and
paid for.

Was it envy or was it imitativeness? I wanted to see if I could not
write something too. I had never felt the call within me. When I was
sixteen—at that time it was envy and imitativeness, awakened by Elvira’s
successes—I had indeed written a short story entitled _Erdenträume im
Monde_, and a periodical which long since had suspended publication,
_Die deutsche Frau_, had brought it out and through the editor’s
correspondence department had asked for further contributions: “I should
not bury my talent.” Since that time, however, with the exception of
letters (which I was tremendously fond of writing), I had written
nothing.

So now, in the year 1878, I made my first (the _Erdenträume_ did not
count) attempt as an author. I composed in all secrecy a feuilleton
entitled _Fächer und Schürze_—“Fans and Aprons”—and sent it to the old
_Presse_ at Vienna, and lo and behold! almost by return mail I received
a copy of the paper containing it, and twenty florins. Oh, that first
honorarium of an author! What a proud satisfaction its receipt
gives—indescribable! The little work was signed with the pseudonym B.
Oulot, a word formed from the nickname “Boulotte,” which had been given
to me at the Suttners’; and when I saw these six letters in print under
the feuilleton, which really seemed to me a very good one, I had the
impression that about that time Central Europe must be stirred by the
question, Now who can this B. Oulot be?

And from that moment I have gone on writing without interruption up to
this day.

XIX
TIFLIS
Another summer in Gordi · Business projects · Removal to Tiflis ·
Princess Tamara of Georgia · Our manner of life · Double position ·
Continued authorship · Illness

In the summer of 1878 we were again guests at the Mingrelian summer
residence.

The two sons for whom the Dedopali had trembled had now come to Gordi
also, decorated with various orders; likewise Prince Niko’s wife Mary.
And, in addition to these, Achille Murat with his wife and their two
boys. It afforded me great pleasure to see my friend Salomé once more,
and we had again a delightful time in this dear and merry circle. Count
Rosmorduc contributed not a little to the entertainment. This old
Frenchman had the gift of relating endless anecdotes from his life,
exciting, witty, and touching, and of never repeating himself.

We still found that nothing came of the position for My Own. There was
all the more of making plans and building castles in Spain. Businesses
were to be taken over, colonists to be imported, a trade in wood to be
started. Niko and Rosmorduc were especially inventive of such projects,
in which my husband was always to have lucrative functions. Various
things were actually entered upon: negotiations were begun, extended
correspondence was carried on, but in the end nothing came of it.

So winter approached again, the colony at Gordi separated, and this time
we decided to try our fortune at Tiflis; it was there that we could
avail ourselves of the best recommendations. Here was the home of
Princess Tamara, the widow of Heraclius of Georgia. He had died after a
long illness, during which he is said to have been unendurably
capricious, and his beautiful young widow had the most important house
in Tiflis next to the grand-duke-governor’s. There we were received with
the greatest kindness.

Tiflis is a city half Oriental, half West-European. In the European
quarter the same sort of life prevails as in our great cities: European
toilets, European manners, French cooks, English governesses, _jours_,
_soirées_, conversation in Russian and French. Princess Tamara had her
own _palais_, furnished with exquisite taste, and in her salons met the
cream of the local society, consisting of dignitaries of the grand-ducal
court,—the grand duke himself often used to come there,—of various
governors and generals, and the great people of the city. Tamara’s
younger sister, as beautiful as she herself, had married a general and
also lived in Tiflis.

Our social position there was something quite peculiar. We had to be
earning something, so that we might live,—hence in the forenoons I went
to several houses giving music lessons, for which I was well paid; my
husband had a place under a French wall-paper manufacturer and builder,
as bookkeeper and especially as designer of new patterns. For this
service he received a salary of one hundred and fifty rubles a month,
and moreover we had board and lodging in the pretty private house of the
manufacturer, Monsieur Bernex of Marseilles. The bell for work rang at
five o’clock in the morning. Then My Own, My Own who at home had been so
spoiled and in truth shamefully lazy, had to get up. He did it right
gayly; then he went to the press-room to oversee the workmen. At eight
o’clock he sat down with the owner and the bosses to the early
breakfast, consisting of a pail of weak coffee with milk, and black
bread—it tasted good to him!—then he had to go to the office and figure
and design till one. Meantime I had given a few lessons, and we all ate
dinner together at the Bernex table. In the afternoon My Own had to go
on business errands, to customers, to the customhouse, to the railway
station, all long distances; he did it with pleasure. But after six
o’clock in the evening we were free, put on full dress, and almost every
evening dined _en ville_, now with the Princess of Georgia, now with her
sister, and with all the great families of the city. Our romance was
generally known, also our close relations with the Dadiani family; and
in society we were not treated as the factory employee and the music
teacher, but as a sort of aristocratic emigrants, not only on a footing
of equality but with that peculiar courtesy which is usually shown to
illustrious foreigners. We could not help laughing about it.

I kept up my literary labors as far as my time permitted. I wrote
novels,—_Doras Bekenntnisse_, _Ketten und Verkettungen_,—and carried
about with me the scheme of a larger work, _Inventarium einer Seele_. My
husband got very little opportunity for writing, for now his employer
had set him to work also at designing architectural plans. And he did
it. How he made a success of it I do not understand to this day; but it
is a fact that several houses and castles in the vicinity of Tiflis were
built from his plans. As he played the piano without having taken music
lessons, so he made architectural designs without having studied
architecture. He had already picked up enough of the Georgian language
to be able to get along with the native workmen and contractors. In the
meantime I was perfecting myself in Russian, which I had already begun
to study in Vienna with a view to the prospect of residing in Zugdidi as
the Dedopali had planned for me. That castle, by the way, was not even
then finished; nor was it finished during the lifetime of its mistress.

During our sojourn in Tiflis I underwent an illness, the only one in my
whole life. The period of this illness is among my sweetest, dearest
recollections. I could not eat: my stomach refused everything that I
took. I could not walk: if I tried to take a few steps, I fell down.
Certainly that does not sound as if one were bringing up sweet, dear
recollections; and yet God knows it was a happy time. I was in a state
of half-stupefied faintness, lying down gave me a comfortable sense of
rest, and My Own’s care and assiduity and tenderness cradled me into a
deep quiet consciousness of bliss. This lasted about six weeks; then I
was well again, and we two were a good bit more in love with each other
than ever.

XX
ZUGDIDI
The capital of Mingrelia · Our little house · Labors on the Murat
estate · Social life at the Murats’ and the Dedopali’s · Lonely summer
at Zugdidi · New literary labors · Prototype of _Es Löwos_ · New
horizons · Study together

We changed our residence from Tiflis to Kutais again, then to Gordi and
to Zugdidi, and to many other places; I cannot here recount in
chronological order and in detail all the migrations that filled up our
nine years of the Caucasus. Nor was it external events that were the
“important thing” for us; it was inner experiences, there in our exile,
that made of us two wholly new persons,—two happy persons, two good
persons.

We spent a few lovely years in the little town of Zugdidi, the
Mingrelian capital; only a village, although a capital. A long row of
Oriental houses with open shops, stall on stall; for that reason the row
was called “The Bazaar”; but it was also called “The Boulevard,” because
the street was planted with a double row of tall trees. And what trees!
Nothing less than mimosas, if you please. When they were in bloom the
whole place was filled with drowsy fragrance. Besides this Oriental row
there was a bunch of little peasant huts occupied by—Württemberg
peasants: this was “the German colony.” Then, scattered about in larger
and smaller fenced grassplots or fields of Indian corn, one-storied
houses in the style of the Caucasus,—that is, built of wood and
surrounded with verandas; also, in a garden, Count Rosmorduc’s villa;
then the Princess’s provisional dwelling on the border of the great
park, in the midst of which rose the unfinished magnificence of the
castle,—this was Zugdidi.

There was to be something else added. Achille and Salomé Murat had
decided to take up their residence in the Caucasus. A large uncultivated
domain was assigned to them, and upon it a country house, farm
buildings, stables, flower and kitchen gardens, greenhouses, and
cultivated fields were to be created. And all this we actually saw
created in the course of four years.

For ourselves we had rented the cottage of a German colonist. Paradisal,
according to our ideas; in itself it was not so very pretentious. Level
with the ground, three low-studded rooms and a kitchen. A wooden veranda
in front of the entrance. The first room was our drawing-room. We had
got at the bazaar a sufficient quantity of a very inexpensive red
material, and we used it to tapestry the walls of the drawing-room and
to provide the windows with hangings. We were our own upholsterers. The
material was cut and sewed together, then tacked up, and it was done.
For furniture our red drawing-room had a very large table which served
both of us as a writing-table, a few chairs, another table, and a
_takhta_. This is a piece of furniture which is never lacking in a
Caucasian room,—a long, wide divan, uncovered and without a back. A rug
is thrown over it and forms the covering; four long bolsters covered
with carpeting serve as the back and arms. One can add a few fancy
pillows, and it makes the most comfortable contrivance for sitting,
lying down, or lounging. With the aid of a few bookcases, a few vases
kept always full of fresh flowers, a mirror over the fireplace, and a
carpet on the floor, the red drawing-room assumed an almost elegant
appearance. We were to the last degree proud of it.

The two other rooms were arranged with corresponding luxury as a
bedchamber and dressing-room. Our corps of servants consisted of the
daughter of our Swabian landlord, who lived in another little house
situated behind the grass-grown court; we also had a _fundus instructus_
consisting of five geese. These marched forth independently to pasture
every morning and came dignifiedly home toward evening. Of course they
had been acquired for culinary purposes; but having watched them every
day from our balcony returning home so unsuspiciously, we felt it so
hard to betray their confidence that during our whole residence there we
left them in possession of their lives. One may enjoy roast fowl, but it
should not be personal acquaintances.

The reason for our settling in Zugdidi was that Prince Achille Murat had
engaged my husband as overseer and assistant in the construction of his
buildings and other improvements. Designing plans and directing workmen
had become his specialty. Prince Murat himself was a sort of amateur
architect, amateur farmer, and amateur gardener; so the two shared in
making and executing plans. Gardens were plotted, wooden ceilings
painted, ditches dug, wall-paper put on, horse-thief-proof stalls
constructed, all with combined forces; I frequently saw the two, owner
and manager, together enthroned on the top of a ladder or wading in the
depths of a drainage-ditch. And now and then, in a short dress of rough
cloth, the princess herself, armed with paint-brush, spade, or shovel,
also gave her aid. I had another field of labor: for two hours every day
I taught German and the piano to the two little boys, Lucien and Napo.

The princely couple’s servants did not take existence so easily as their
masters; there was constant changing and friction; the correct English
coachmen and grooms, the exquisite French chefs, could not put up with
these primitive, inchoate conveniences. They would not remain in the
wilderness and disorder. Except for a faithful valet of long years’
standing and a chambermaid of the same kind (and even these felt that
they were martyrs), all rebelled. Then, each time, new regents of the
kitchen and stable would be imported, for Prince Achille could not live
without the finest French cookery and without sportsmanlike English
appointments for his horses, his carriages, and his hunting.

Twice a week we used to eat in the villa on which they were working, and
after dinner, at which, in contrast to the forenoon’s workaday garb, all
appeared in evening dress, the evenings were spent in chatting, music,
and chess-playing. Great amusement was afforded also by the caricatures
which my husband made and brought with him; they presented a complete
chronicle of the calamities which had attended the building operations
and a whole portrait gallery of exaggerated but speaking likenesses of
the various persons involved. Among the many talents with which My Own
was endowed was that of wielding an extraordinarily witty pencil. Once
he sent to the _Fliegende Blätter_ a series of illustrations to the
examples given in the Ollendorf grammars, such as “The candelabra of thy
uncle is larger than the cat of my aunt,” “The industrious apprentice of
the baker has seen the melancholy captain,” “The French gentleman has a
long walking-stick and the poor Russian is cold,” and the like, which
were accepted and made a great hit.

In the winter, when we stayed at Zugdidi with the Dedopali, Sunday was
the day on which her children and we were regularly invited to dinner.
In the summer, however, we were left at Zugdidi quite alone, and we
enjoyed this life the most. My husband devoted a few hours in the
morning to superintending the work on the Murat estate, and the rest of
the time belonged wholly to me; and then both of us could write
diligently. At this time were produced the novels _Ein schlechter
Mensch_, _Hanna_, and the book entitled _Inventarium einer Seele_, by B.
Oulot; and _Daredjan_, _Ein Aznaour_, and _Kinder des Kaukasus_, by A.
G. von Suttner. Time also was ours for reading together, for studying
together, for long conversations about everything between heaven and
earth, and we evolved a philosophy of life, a view of the universe,
which we should never have reached under other circumstances, nor either
of us without the other; we had won for ourselves a genuine Eden of
harmony, with new, wide, bright horizons.

But one cannot revel forever on the heights of thought; one must have
one’s little corner of the earth, one’s humble everyday home; and the
reason why we felt so utterly contented in ours was that we had quite
unintentionally fulfilled that command of the Saviour which says, “Be ye
therefore as little children.”

We talked nonsense, we did absurdities, we had invented a language of
our own, we flung the most shocking insults at each other, we had the
wildest romps and the most extraordinary songs, we played, not indeed
with dolls, but with creatures of our fancy; in short, we were silly,
silly, happy children. I embodied this phase of our life in a monograph
entitled _Es Löwos_, which appeared first in the Munich monthly _Die
Gesellschaft_, and then in book form. Many reproached me for it, saying,
“One does not expose such privacies to the multitude.” As if one wrote
for the multitude! One always imagines as one’s readers those in whom a
string tuned to the same note is vibrating. There are never more than a
few such in the multitude. In _Es Löwos_ I went so far as to imagine
only one, and always apostrophized as “One” this sympathetic,
comprehending person, who perchance had experienced the like in his own
life. And lo and behold! in the course of time I received something like
a hundred letters from the reading public, in which the writers assured
me that they had had all my experiences, and signed themselves “The
One.”

Our studies had opened to us a new horizon, I said just now. That must
be enlarged upon a little. It was especially through the natural
sciences that undreamed-of lights broke upon our minds. But not as they
were usually taught in the schools, mere classifications of plants and
animals into species and orders, mere enumerations of mineralogical and
geological formations, mere dry elements of physics and chemistry with
their proper figures and symbols; no, we gained our knowledge from the
works of the latest students of nature, those who are also philosophers
of nature, and from whose investigations bursts the radiance of a new
discovery, namely, that our whole glorious world is subject to the law
of evolution. By evolution from the simplest origins it has developed
into its present complexity and is assured of incalculable
transformations yet to come. Then these other truths perceived by modern
science, the transmutability of all forces one into another, the
unbroken concatenation of all causality, the indestructibility of atoms,
the uninterrupted continuity between the inorganic and the organic
world, between physical and psychical life,—in short, the unity of the
world, and the consequent inference that the development of human
society also goes on in accordance with the same laws and that it also
is assured of incalculable future transformations.

The authors in whose works we immersed ourselves were Darwin, Haeckel,
Herbert Spencer, Whewell (“History of the Inductive Sciences”), Carus,
Sterne, etc.; and, above all, the book which was a revelation to me,
Buckle’s “History of Civilization.” I had already read this book, and
several of those just mentioned, before my marriage; and I had brought
them in my trunk. Now My Own had also to make their acquaintance. I had
the advantage over him that I had read more works on the natural
sciences than he had; he had the advantage over me of loving nature more
passionately than I did. The magnificence of a beautiful landscape, the
sublimity of the sea, and the glory of the glittering firmament inspired
in him more than enjoyment and admiration; they inspired him with
religious awe. And he had such ability to see what nature has of sweet
and mighty fascination, that from it grew that force of description
which he put into his books on the Caucasus. The landscapes which formed
the background of his novels _Daredjan_ and _Aznaour_ were painted with
glowing, brilliant colors, and won the unanimous praise of the critics.
In analysis of character, construction of plot, inventiveness, his
novels were less successful—it was for this reason that he achieved no
abiding place in literature; but in the reproduction of nature he was a
past master. The secret of this faculty was that he loved nature. Any
love multiplies any power tenfold. As I have already said, we were
mutually complementary,—we helped each other upward. He taught me to
enjoy nature, I helped him to understand her. At my desire he had to
read—read with me—all those works which I had already looked into, and
in which I now for the first time thoroughly steeped myself. This
grasping of a new truth by two together makes the possession twice as
certain, the comprehension twice as clear.

A rich life we led there in that far-off peasant cottage, around which
at night we often heard the jackals howling. Rich, although our income
was the scantest; although our housekeeping was so insignificant that it
happened when our only housemaid was ill that we ourselves got the
midday meal ready, and once—full of gayety over it—scrubbed the floors
ourselves with sand and scrubbing-brush. Rich in happenings and in
experiences, although for weeks at a time we saw not a human being and
nothing actually happened to us; the source of our happenings was in our
books and our hearts. The rarest of all earthly fates was ours:
complete, firmly-anchored happiness.

XXI
OUR LAST DAYS IN THE CAUCASUS
The Dedopali’s death · Death of my mother · Prospect of coming home ·
Translation of “The Tiger’s Skin” · Sojourn in a Mingrelian village · A
bit of Georgian history · Queen Tamara

In the summer of 1882 the Dedopali was taken ill. We were just at that
time her guests again at Gordi. The physicians whom her son summoned
from Tiflis prescribed a “cure” at Karlsbad. But she refused to leave
her fatherland.

“I hope to get well again,” she said to me, “but if this should really
be my last illness I desire to die here near the Convent of Marthvilli,
where I shall be buried. I should not like to make the long journey back
from Europe in a box.”

Her condition gradually grew worse, and when we left Gordi in the autumn
we had no hope of ever seeing her again; and, in fact, we soon received
from Prince Niko by telegraph the news that his mother had passed away
painlessly and with Christian resignation. Although I was prepared for
the news, it was a sore grief to me, and I deeply mourned for this
friend of many years. She was laid away in the crypt of the Convent of
Marthvilli, in the midst of a gigantic mourning assembly, in which the
population of all the neighboring provinces participated; thousands and
thousands had made the pilgrimage to the ancient cloister which
contained the ancestral tomb of the princes, to pay the last honors to
the “Queen of Mothers.”

At the beginning of the year 1884 I suffered a far heavier
bereavement—my mother. I had confidently hoped to see her again very
soon, for our home-coming was now in immediate prospect, and she herself
was looking forward to this reunion with yearning joy. In that moment
death snatched her away with only a brief illness. Full of sympathy and
love, My Own did his best to console and comfort me.

The period of our exile was coming to an end. The parents, who now
recognized how faithfully and happily we clung to each other, how
bravely we had made our way without ever claiming their help, had given
over their obstinate rancor and were bidding us to come to Harmannsdorf.
We had in the meantime reached a position of independence, and could
therefore return home without any sense of humiliation. To be sure,
nothing had come of the hoped-for situations at the Russian court, and
the various plans for business undertakings that were to bring us a
competency; but we had both won a place in literature which gave us the
prospect of a sufficient and increasing income and assured us an
honorable position. The critics lauded us, editors asked for articles,
publishers wanted manuscripts. My husband’s Caucasian stories and novels
were meeting with great success, and my _Inventarium einer Seele_, in
which I had set forth all my views about nature and life, about science
and politics, had made somewhat of a sensation; my belles-lettres were
equally in demand. And we both felt that we still had a good deal to
say, that the fountain of inspiration would yet pour abundant streams;
the new calling had become for us “the one important thing.”

Our return was set for the month of May; it was still three months to
that time. We proposed to use these on a work which one of my husband’s
friends, a Tiflis journalist, had urged us to undertake. This was a
French and German translation of the national epic of Georgia, “The
Tiger’s Skin,” by Shosta Rustaveli. As we did not know the Georgian
language thoroughly, the work was to be done in this way: Mr. M—— (his
name, all except the initial, has slipped from my memory) was to give us
the poetry literally in such imperfect French as he knew; we would then
translate this into correct French, and from that into German. There was
at that time a plan of bringing out a great holiday edition of “The
Tiger’s Skin,” for which the painter Zychy had drawn splendid
illustrations. In order to be able to carry out this work undisturbed,
we accepted Mr. M——’s invitation to move with him to a remote Mingrelian
village where his father was the _pope_ and owned a little house, in
which he would take us as boarders for a nominal sum. There we could
regularly devote two morning hours and two afternoon hours to “The
Tiger’s Skin,” and the rest of the time we spent in walking, reading,
and “looking forward” (a business in itself) to the coming journey home.

We enjoyed twice as much as ever the wildness, the primitive conditions,
of that Caucasian solitude, in anticipation of once more plunging into
the bustle of European civilization. The little house that we inhabited
was, so to speak, not furnished at all; we had brought with us for our
room our own _takhta_ and a few other conveniences, among them a zither.
This is, to be sure, not one of the indispensable comforts of life; but,
as we had no piano, we satisfied our craving for music with the little
Styrian instrument, on which I played accompaniments for my sentimental
songs and My Own twanged most lively heel-tapping Ländler.

The room in which the _pope_, his son, the son’s old nurse, and we took
our meals contained nothing but a table and the necessary number of
chairs. The menu alternated between two dishes, one day chicken, the
next day mutton; and the napkins were changed only once a fortnight. The
_pope_ supped his broth with a noise that reminded one of sporting
whales. Below our room was a cellar in which sauerkraut was being made,
and the odor from it came up to us through the cracks in the flooring;
but nothing, nothing disturbed our good humor, and the actively
progressing translation of the Georgian poem gave us lively
satisfaction. A whole vanished world opened before us—the world of the
thirteenth century in this remote corner of the earth. An epoch to which
the Georgians look back with pride, because it was the climax of their
country’s glory—the epoch when the great Queen Tamara was on the throne.
Shosta Rustaveli sang at her court and celebrated her fame, her power,
her charms. We learned from the mouth of our patriotic journalist even
more of the past of his country, and of the departed splendor of Queen
Tamara, than we did from the poetry of the Georgian bard. Her name stirs
the Georgians to real religious devotion; the memory of those ancient
days celebrated by Rustaveli lives as something sublime and immortal.

The Georgians look back on a history extending over twenty-three
centuries; their first king, Phamawaz by name, was elected three hundred
and two years before Christ, and the Christian religion was introduced
four hundred years after Christ by Saint Nino. Like every ancient
history, that of Georgia is a history of wars. The land was surrounded
by hostile nations and tribes; in particular, it was constantly assailed
by the Ottomans and Persians. Of course the chronicles tell of the
victorious battles which the Georgians fought against their enemies, and
their pride in this finds expression in their greeting. “Good-morning”
in Georgia is _gamardjoba_, which means victory; the reply is
_gamardjosse_, “May he (God) make you victorious.”

The reign of Queen Tamara is regarded as the golden age of the land. The
chronicles aver that under this queen prosperity prevailed, the fine
arts flourished, splendid buildings were erected,—the same as you find
it in all the ancient documents of flattery under the name of history,
where all possible achievements are always ascribed to the then reigning
monarch. If the rulers were cruel, the strictness of their rule is
praised; if they were not, then this negative virtue is extolled to the
skies. So it is to be read in the chronicle concerning Tamara, “No one
at her command was deprived of his limbs or of his eyesight”; and that
is the more noteworthy as at her time and afterwards the principle laid
down by one of her ancestors, the heroic Wakhtang Gorgaslan, was in full
force: “Whoever in war escapes death and fails to bring back the head or
the hand of an enemy shall die by our hand.”

How little it does take to kindle admiration in the biographer of a
king; among us too there are very many people who have no predilection
for tearing off limbs and putting out eyes, and no one heaps glory and
praise upon us on that account.

At the beginning of her reign Tamara’s kingdom was threatened by the
Persian caliph Nasir-ed-Din, who marched against the borders with a
“numberless” host. Then Tamara summoned her troops; in ten days she
collected battle-joyous legions from all quarters, had them march before
her in review, and addressed them with the following words: “Brothers,
let not your hearts sink when you compare the throng of your foes with
your own small numbers. Surely you have heard of Gideon’s three hundred
men and the innumerable multitude of Midianites that they overcame.
Remain fearless, and put your confidence in the bravery of each.” Then
she delivered to them the banner of her ancestor, the banner of
Gorgaslan (author of the above-mentioned edict, “Whoever in war escapes
death,” etc.). Of course the troops went and won a brilliant victory
over the foe. When they returned home the queen hastened to meet them,
and the soldiers, enraptured to see her in their midst, compelled all
the chieftains of the Persian army to bend their knees before the queen.
Probably the incident is related differently in the Persian chronicles.

A few years later Rokn-ed-Din, sultan of Asia Minor, collected eight
hundred thousand (!) men and marched against Georgia. He sent the queen,
by his ambassador, the following polite message: “I would have thee to
know, O Tamara, sultana of the Georgians, that all women are of weak
understanding. Now I come to teach thee, thee and thy people, no longer
to draw the sword, which God has given into our hands alone.” This note
was signed with the writer’s name and titles; among others, “Highest of
all Sultans on Earth, Equal to the Angels, God’s Privy Councilor,” and
the like.

Tamara read the message “without haste.” She gave her commands for the
troops to assemble, and she herself rode out at the head of her army
against the enemy. Of course the victory was complete; the streets of
Tiflis were decorated and the queen made her triumphal entry glittering
like the sun....

That the chronicles have as much to say of her piety as of her bravery
is a matter of course. The alliance of “saber and aspergillum” is as old
as these two symbols, whatever forms they have been, and are, exchanged
into. There is a national poem of Georgia, which every peasant knows by
heart, in which the following story is told of that famous queen: It was
again on a great day of victorious rejoicing. Tamara had put on all her
precious ornaments—her crown of precious stones, her gold brooches and
strings of pearls. Anew she glitters like the sun. She desires that all
her people be happy. She has given orders to her treasurer to distribute
gifts and alms to all the great and all the small. “Hast thou fulfilled
my command?” she asks. “Are all satisfied?” He answers, “Lady, I have
distributed gifts in accordance with thy will; only one beggar woman
received nothing, for she insisted on coming to thee to receive her alms
from thine own hands. We refused to admit her—she would take nothing
from us, and with angry face she went away.” The queen is in
consternation, and gives orders to make search for the beggar woman and
bring her into her presence. But she waits in vain; the couriers cannot
find the woman again. Then suddenly an inspiration comes to the queen;
she sinks on her knees before the sacred icons, crosses herself, and
cries in an ecstasy: “I know, I know now who that beggar woman was;
thou, O holy mother of God, hast sent her to me.” And she tears all the
precious ornaments from her body and carries everything, the pearls and
the diamonds, to the nunnery of Gaenathi, dedicated to the Madonna.

And in this nunnery, which is situated not far from Kutais, it is said
that Tamara was buried.

Our translation of “The Tiger’s Skin” was never published; but we did
not regret the time which we spent in this work. Through that, and
through the tales and observations which our enthusiastic Georgian
patriot connected with it, we were thoroughly initiated into the nature,
the history, and the spirit of the people and of that magical land in
which we had spent so many years; and we learned the chronicles of all
the families with which we had been associated, whose names—the
Orbelianis, the Zeretellis, the Gruzinskys, the Dadianis, the
Mukhranskys, the Tchavtchavadzes—have as proud a ring in that land as
the Montmorencys, Manchesters, Borgheses, Liechtensteins, etc. have with
us. And we were able to penetrate deeply not only into the history but
also and especially into the nature of the country, to observe the
customs of the people in this rural solitude, in the nearer or remoter
inns where our landlord took us to weddings, funerals, and baptisms.

But, interesting as all this was, we counted the days that separated us
from our return home, and the nearer this came the more we rejoiced in
the anticipation of it.

PART FIVE
1885–1890

XXII
AT HOME
Departure from the Caucasus · First destination, Görz · Return to
Harmannsdorf · Family life and neighborly visits · Literary
correspondence · Writers’ convention in Berlin

In May, 1885, nine years after our elopement, we returned home. Not
without a pang did we say farewell to the Caucasus; we had grown very
fond of the beautiful country, and our friends there also found it hard
to let us go. But the delight, after such a long separation, of coming
back “to our house” as a happy couple, who had proved their right to
such happiness and had fought their way to a self-supporting
profession,—this delight outweighed all the grief of leave-taking, and
just as jubilantly as we had originally set sail from Odessa to carry
our love and our passion for adventure to the legendary land of Colchis,
so jubilantly did we set sail from Batum to cross the Black Sea once
more: homeward—homeward!

Our first destination in Europe was Görz, the place where lay my
mother’s grave. There we desired to kneel before we returned to the
Suttners’ paternal house. Therefore we went directly through Vienna
without pausing, and it was only when that visit of pious sorrow had
been paid that we turned our faces back to the north again. Then we
spent one day in Vienna with Brother Karl, whose reception of us gave a
foretaste of the welcome that was awaiting us. We appointed the next day
for our arrival at Harmannsdorf. Artur begged that no one should come to
meet us at the station, so that he might find all his dear ones at once
in the Harmannsdorf that he so loved.

So, then, at the station of Eggenburg only the family carriage was
waiting for us. From Eggenburg to our destination is another three
miles. Ah, that splendid drive! It was a sunny, fragrant May day; the
song of larks in the air, red clover in the meadows, radiant joy in our
hearts. The landscape in the distant mountain land, where, according to
the myth, the earthly paradise was situated, was unquestionably grander
and finer than this flat Lower-Austrian region—but this was home. A
hundred sweet recollections arose in my mind, and doubtless a thousand
in his; it was the abode of his youth and childhood. When we reached the
place on the road where the tower of the castle becomes visible, he
stretched out his left arm toward the horizon with a cry of joy, and
with his right pressed me to him.

“Willkommen zu Hause, mein Weib!” he said in a tone of deep emotion. It
was the only time in his life that he called me “wife”; perhaps this is
why that moment, with all its blessed solemnity, has remained so clearly
impressed upon my mind.

And now the arrival,—the entrance through the gate, the pause before the
castle drawbridge, where the whole family was assembled,—well, we know
from the Bible how it is usual to celebrate the return of the prodigal
son.

The best rooms in the castle had been made ready for us, and thus I was
“at home” under the roof of Harmannsdorf—a roof that was to protect our
happiness for seventeen years longer.

Now began for us a new life, a family life. Harmannsdorf was occupied by
the parents and the three daughters; the eldest also, married to a Count
Sizzo at Trent, was with us making a visit. The oldest son, Karl,
secretary in the Department of Commerce, came every Saturday, and always
spent his vacation at Harmannsdorf with his beautiful wife and his
twelve-year-old daughter Mizzi, who was a pupil at the Sacré Cœur
Convent. As such she was very piously inclined, and made the most
strenuous endeavors to convert her Uncle Artur, for whom she had
conceived an ardent affection and whose ecclesiastical lukewarmness
caused her great anxiety as to the salvation of his soul. The second
oldest brother, Richard, lived with his family at the castle of
Stockern, a mile and a half distant, and of course the intercourse
between Stockern and Harmannsdorf was very lively. Of other neighbors,
whom we constantly saw, those we liked best were the owners of Mühlbach,
Baron and Baroness Josef Gudenus, and the castellan of Maissau, the
grand master of the huntsmen, Count Traun. From Vienna often came
Artur’s former schoolmates; in short, the domestic and social life left
nothing to be desired in agreeableness and liveliness of intercourse.
And yet we managed to save out many hours for laborious solitude. For we
kept up our scientific studies, were always reading the same books
together, and also writing together; not that we collaborated in
authorship,—each worked independently, and we each read the other’s
writings only after they had been printed,—but we wrote at the same
worktable.

Even while we were in the Caucasus we had entered into correspondence
with many of our contemporary authors. This correspondence was now
carried on even more assiduously. My _Inventarium_ had brought me many
unknown friends in literary circles.

Thus one day we were surprised by an enthusiastic letter from Friedrich
Bodenstedt. As the poet of _Mirza Schaffy_ had himself spent many years
in the Caucasus, he took a keen interest in Artur Gundaccar’s Caucasian
stories. M. G. Conrad of Munich, in whose newly founded monthly
magazine, _Die Gesellschaft_, had appeared _Es Löwos_ and other things,
had also engaged us in correspondence. Hermann Heiberg, Robert
Hamerling, Count von Schack, Ludwig Büchner, Konrad Ferdinand Meyer,
Karl Emil Franzos,—those are some of the names of our correspondents;
also Balduin Groller, who had long exchanged letters with B. Oulot in
the Zugdidi days without suspecting that this _nom de plume_ concealed a
woman, as he himself tells the story in one of his delicious
feuilletons.

I was fulfilling my duty as editor of a great literary periodical.
That flood of generally mediocre manuscripts, all of which demanded to
be read! Occasionally, as in a big, stupid cake, a raisin here and
there—the rare products of genius. Once there was a special editorial
feast-day; I had found a big raisin, a work of remarkable depth and
delicacy and quite incomparable grace of construction. That was a
delight, a genuine intoxication; a new talent—that is certainly
nothing trifling, is it? Above all things, what is the man’s name? B.
Oulot—a singular name, but the world will soon get used to it. But
this was not the only singularity. I take into my hand again the
letter which accompanied it. Where does the man live and what else
does he do? A Russian postage-stamp; the letter is dated from Zugdidi,
Government of Kutais.... And there is also a request for leniency, as
the work is the writer’s first. That too! I see to it at once that the
honorarium shall be sent immediately, so as to keep the new
contributor in good humor, and I write a letter of unreserved
appreciation of this first work, with an urgent request for further
articles.

These also came, and my delight and astonishment kept on increasing.
They betrayed a scientific and philosophical competence equal to that
of any university professor, but at the same time a grace, and a humor
that triumphed over everything—no, assuredly it was not a university
professor.

We got to talking together, of course through letters. We could not
get to the end of all that we had to say to each other. In this
exchange of ideas we discovered that we had in common so many opinions
about art and life that it would have been sheer nonsense to keep
bothering with society flourishes, and we began to use the “thou” like
two good comrades. It was brother heart on this side, brother heart on
that; but on one occasion I must have expressed myself so vigorously
and so unequivocally—between comrades one is not so particular about
little things—regarding some question which would have come within the
purview of the as yet unpromulgated _Lex Heinze_, that a protest might
seem proper. It followed in a very delicate, perfectly unobtrusive
manner. The next letter ended with _Deine ergebene_—the feminine form.

I was dumfounded. So B. Oulot is a woman—who would have thought that
of the man! I demanded an explanation and received one. B. Oulot
was—Baroness Bertha von Suttner, born Countess Kinsky.—Well, all right
then. I did not feel offended at it after that, and anyhow there was
no changing it now.

This was just at the time of “the revolution in literature,” and we
followed with the liveliest sympathy the phases of that revolution.
Conrad, Bleibtreu, Alberti—we read all that they wrote and were amazed
at their audacities. A _Moderne_ was beginning to show its head—which,
to be sure, has since been thrown on the rubbish heap by the very most
modern _Modernen_. And in the plastic arts too the first symptoms of the
Secession began to be distinguishable. Everywhere there was
fermentation.—After all, there is at every period a newest thing which
surprises and puzzles, is antagonized, wins, and soon becomes _vieux
jeu_. That the present phase seems to one to be so unprecedentedly
subversive of all that has been supreme, is mere illusion.

In October of this year, the first year of our return, the Congress of
the Authors’ Union held its session in Berlin. In our capacity as
members of the Union we were invited to be present, and we needed no
second invitation.

I preserved in my diary a few pictures of this congress—the first which
I had ever attended in my life—and later turned them to account in my
_Schriftstellerroman_.

On the evening before the first business meeting, a “gathering and
informal greeting of the members of the Union” took place in the
Kaiserhalle.

At the entrance of the assembly hall, from which comes the loud buzz of
hundreds of voices speaking at once, stands the host, that is to say,
the President of the Congress, to receive the guests. That is Hermann
Heiberg,—tall, fair, elegant, with nobly formed features.

The hall is packed; only with difficulty can one make one’s way from
place to place. A large number of those present have already taken their
seats at two or three long tables which run from one end of the hall to
the other. With difficulty are places secured for us.

Hermann Heiberg introduces various colleagues to us, and these fetch
still others. As often as a name celebrated in literature is mentioned,
I am stirred by the same kind of joy that one feels when at a raffle a
winning number is called. There is only one thing that is often bitterly
disappointing,—sometimes the actuality so utterly fails to correspond to
the mental picture that one has formed of the author in question. To be
sure this picture was quite misty, indefinite, lineless as it were, and
yet one regrets its annihilation. What, were these fragrant love-songs,
these rapturous fancies, written by the brutal-looking stout man? And
can it be that this awkward little bourgeois manikin is the author of
those exquisitely elegant pictures of high life? What! Did that
downy-bearded youth yonder who looks like a grocery clerk write those
essays dripping with wisdom and experience?

Various figures and faces attract my attention, and I ask who they are.
An imposing female apparition in black toilet with transparent
sleeves—an interesting face: Frau Ida Boy-Ed, the author of _Männer der
Zeit_. A small man with long white hair and benevolently beaming eyes in
a beardless face; that is Paulus Cassel, an apostle of self-sacrificing
philanthropy. There, leaning against a column,—a sharp contrast to the
Apostle Paulus,—a dark Mephistophelian phenomenon: it is Fritz Mauthner
the satirist. Near him is a pretty, animated young woman—it is the
American Sara Hutzler, whose specialty is original child-scenes; the one
who afterward married the dramatist Kainz, but died within a short time.

There at last—we recognize him by his picture—is Mirza Schaffy, our dear
correspondent-friend Bodenstedt. He hastens to us and sits down with us.
Then follow new reminiscences of the Caucasus; it was there that the
poet spent the most joyous years of his youthful activity. And he tells
of Tiflis, of the forests of Mingrelia, of the roofs of the Oriental
houses on which in the moonlight beautiful women play the lute and
dance, and to which in the silence of the night a young German poet is
summoned for a tryst; of the Platonic passion which the beautiful wife
of a Russian general inspired in the same youth, and which even to-day
gleams as the most magical recollection in the poems of the gray-haired
man.

Not only on that evening but during the whole session of the Authors’
Congress, Friedrich Bodenstedt was our constant companion; we could not
weary of telling one another of the Caucasus.

On the next day the business meetings began. It was the first session of
a Union that I had ever attended. The whole affair—the green table
standing on the lofty podium, the members of the directorate sitting
around it, each with a pile of paper in front of him, the president in
the midst—made a solemn impression on me. It aroused in my mind the
comprehension of a thing which is destined to assume ever deeper and
more widely inclusive dimensions in the humanity of the future; that is
to say, the consciousness of solidarity. This is a consciousness which
works even more efficaciously than the command “Love your neighbor as
yourself”; for in the right kind of solidarity your neighbor is
identical with yourself to begin with. That the interests of all are at
the same time the interests of each, and vice versa, gives to each
individual such a heightened feeling of existence as if he were the
whole: he can no longer separate his ego from the collectivity, since
this is—as the word Union signifies—_one_, and therefore inseparable. Of
course that is only the ideal conception of a Union; in practice the
thing often lacks its own life principle, unity.

This is not the place to tell of the matters dealt with and the course
that the business took, although I find these stated in my notebook. Let
me only sketch two or three more features of the convention.

At the Rathaus, greetings by the Bürgermeister, and addresses following.
An address by Max Nordau was on the programme, but unfortunately this
fell through. The Lord Mayor of Berlin, in gala attire, welcomed the
guests and said all the flattering things that can be said to “the
laborers of the mind,” “the bearers of civilization,” those who embody
“the progress of the idea of our time” and constitute “the pride of the
nation.” After the perfunctory speech of thanks for the “honor of such a
reception” in “the Metropolis of the Intellect,” and the like, begin the
promised addresses,—addresses in connection with which the New York
_Staats-Zeitung_ later made the remark that “the association of literary
Freelunchers, instead of discussing arrangements for furthering the
interests of their profession, talked about the relation of Old Fritz to
German literature and about the Goethe House.”

On the sixth and last day, banquet and ball in the hall of the
“Harmonie.” Again Hermann Heiberg stands at the entrance and welcomes
his colleagues and numerous guests from Berlin society. The great hall,
made as light as day, is speedily filled; the guests take their places
at table, and when the roast comes in the toasts and speeches begin. The
first speaker is Karl Emil Franzos, who in the name of the Danube states
says all sorts of friendly things to the capital of the German Empire.
Then Julius Wolff. The speakers mount a tribune so that they may be
better heard. Among them there are women. It is incomprehensible to
me ... how can one have the courage to talk so in public? A young
Russian woman with a foreign accent praises _ger’manische_ poetry. An
elderly authoress also ascends the tribune. Her voice is so weak that
only those quite close to her can hear what she says; although
conversation is resumed throughout the hall, she goes on haranguing
indefatigably in a plea—as we afterwards come to learn—for putting up a
memorial tablet on the house of Gutzkow. With all zeal—especially with
sweeping movements of her arms, the only part of the address that the
audience can make out—she explains the imperative necessity for this
memorial tablet, until some one at the foot of the tribune cries out,
“It was put up long ago.”

Now Oskar Justinus recites a poetical toast to the women that write, and
points out that even in the most ancient times there were bluestockings,
for it is well known that Leda was not averse to taking a quill in her
hand.

The last address is delivered by Hermann Heiberg, in bringing the
banquet to an end. Raising his glass, he says: “May that be fulfilled
which each one wishes in the bottom of his heart, be it right or be
it—according to the world’s ideas—wrong.... The world’s ideas are often
false, and what is warmly wished has a right to be granted.—So I drink
to the fulfillment of our warmest wishes!”

“A strange toast,” remarked some one at the end of our table; “Heiberg
seems to be talking in a fever.”

“That would be nothing to wonder at,” said my husband; “the ungrateful
task of taking charge of a festival brings with it so much annoyance and
worry that—as he himself told me a little while ago—it is only with
quinine that he keeps himself up.... And then he is one who understands
everything, forgives everything, and would be willing that everybody
should have a bit of happiness, whether what they wish is right or—in
the opinion of the world—wrong. I am one who have had fulfilled a warm
wish which other people condemned—and it was my happiness.”

“And mine, too,” I added under my breath.

XXIII
A WINTER IN PARIS
_Schriftstellerroman_ and _Das Maschinenzeitalter_ · Journey to Paris ·
Renewed acquaintance with Alfred Nobel · The Schnäbele affair · Madame
Adam’s salon · Princess Tamara of Georgia in Paris · Max Nordau · A ball
in the Palais of the _Revue des deux mondes_ · Victor Cherbuliez ·
Ludovic Halévy · Alphonse Daudet

Now once more followed a long and industrious period of work in our dear
Harmannsdorf. We all stayed in the country, even in winter; the palace
in Vienna had been sold, for the quarry and other business transactions
had turned out badly. But none of us had any yearnings for the city; the
social companionship of the numerous members of the family, the
sleighing parties on the snow-covered fields, mailtime with its manifold
messages from the wide world, the sessions of joyous labor at our common
writing-table, the reading aloud to each other of some interesting
scientific book, the many little jokes and silly tricks which we still
kept playing on each other,—for we remained like children,—all this
filled our days so satisfactorily that we assuredly did not hanker for
the pleasures of city life.

And then when spring awoke, about Easter-time, how we did enjoy finding
the first violet in the sward of the park! and there followed the series
of ever-increasing pleasures in the first umbels of the elder, the first
call of the cuckoo, the first note of the blackbird.

“After all,” My Own remarked, “that is pleasanter to hear than the
howling of the jackal. Now spring was thoroughly beautiful in the home
of Medea too; but really the charm of the things which one has been
accustomed to since childhood, the beauty of one’s own garden, the
thousand greetings which come to one from the tones, the scents, and the
colors of one’s own home, are sweeter than the most splendid impressions
of travel.”

In this time I wrote my _Schriftstellerroman_ (“Romance of an Author”)
and _Das Maschinenzeitalter_ (“The Age of Machinery”). The latter
afforded me great enjoyment, for in it I threw off from my mind all that
had accumulated within me of grief and exasperation at the conditions of
the present, and of glowing hopes for the future so full of promise. The
book was not to appear under my own name; it was signed _Jemand_—“Some
One.” The motive for this anonymity was not cowardice, but, as it was
altogether scientific and philosophical themes that were very freely
treated in the _Maschinenzeitalter_, I was afraid that if the book were
signed with a woman’s name it would not reach the readers whom I
desired; for in scientific circles there is so much prejudice against
the capacity of women as thinkers that a book signed with a woman’s name
would simply remain unread by those for whom it was expressly designed.

When the second winter after our return from the Caucasus was coming on,
we decided to see a bit of the European world. The _Maschinenzeitalter_
was finished, and I had (not without difficulty) found a publisher for
it,—Schabelitz in Switzerland. It was not to appear till spring.

We decided to spend a few weeks in Paris, which My Own had never seen.
The payment for a novel sufficed to cover the expenses of the trip, and
we set forth with that full sensation of enjoyment which is involved in
the notion of a pleasure trip. I can still remember: deep snow was lying
on the fields around Harmannsdorf, a fierce snowstorm was blowing into
our faces as the sleigh took us to the station, and we rejoiced in it
and laughed immoderately. If the road was drifted so as to be
impassable, well, then we would start some other day; our trips in the
Caucasus had accustomed us to far more serious difficulties. There we
had often ridden on the edge of abysses and crossed narrow, swaying
bridges; had reached ferries which the ferryman refused to take us over
on account of the dangerously swollen state of the water, so that we had
to seek shelter in a wooden hut, content ourselves with a meal of bread,
sardines, and Kachetin wine, sleep on a bare bench,—and yet we used
often to recall even these experiences as blithesome recollections.

The sleigh took us to the station without mishap; only the luggage-sled
arrived too late, so we had to wait for a later train, and could not
continue our journey to Paris on the same day, as we had meant to, but
were obliged to spend a day in Vienna.

Our sojourn in Paris proved to be very pleasurable. We sauntered on the
boulevards and in the Champs-Élysées; we drove in the Bois; we were
assiduous attendants at the theaters great and little; we visited the
museums; we made excursions to Versailles, Saint-Cloud, and Sèvres; and
we took in all the other similar diversions that every visitor to Paris
feels he must enjoy.

I wrote a note to Alfred Nobel, with whom I had all along kept in touch
by correspondence,—perhaps in the eleven years eleven letters had passed
between us,—to acquaint him with our presence in Paris. He came without
delay to look us up. I found him unchanged, except that he had grown
somewhat gray, but he was more deeply than ever immersed in his labors
and inventions. My Own took a keen interest in his chemical
investigations, which he explained in detail with the help of his
crucibles and other apparatus when, a few days later, having invited us
to dinner, he did the honors of his house and his laboratory. He still
lived very much aloof from the world; the only house which he frequently
visited was Madame Juliette Adam’s, and he took us there.

The author of _Païenne_ and editor of the _Nouvelle Revue_ lived in her
own house in the street named after her the Rue Juliette Lambert. As
every one knows, Madame Adam was a great _patriote_, which at that epoch
signified a representative of the idea of _revanche_. And I can remember
that in our very first call she steered the conversation into a
political channel. But just then was one of the moments when it was
generally believed that the war of revenge, predicted for sixteen years,
was coming. Herr von Bismarck was in want of a military law valid for
seven years, and in the German parliament the method of “War in Sight”
was employed as is usual on such occasions. The recipe is a sure one:
with a view to this all military demands are readily granted.
Furthermore, the Schnäbele incident on the frontier happened, and on the
horizon, slowly mounting, appeared General Boulanger’s black horse. What
an outpouring of amateur political opinion there was! Wherever one went
this question was asked, Will it break out? In the newspapers, and still
more in the air, there was the anticipation of some great event. In the
_Chat noir_, that famous artists’ Gschnas-Café (the ancestor of all the
_cabarets_ that now flood the world), Caran d’Ache was conducting his
magic lantern “L’Épopée,” Napoleonic war scenes, and _cela fait vibrer
la fibre patriotique_. Madame Adam also vibrated.

And she invited us in a most friendly way to a great evening reception
which was to take place at her house within a few days. Of that soirée I
have preserved a rather lively recollection.

The little house in the Rue Juliette Lambert was filled with guests from
the first landing of the staircase to the farthest corner of the salon.
On the threshold of the salon door stood Madame Adam, an imposing and
captivating figure. She wore a dark-red velvet gown with long train,
diamonds on the bosom, and diamonds in her white hair massed high. Her
face under this white hair looked still youthful,—somewhat in the style
of Marie Geistinger as _la belle Hélène_. Of course, as the duty of a
hostess required, she gave each person a gracious word with a gracious
smile.

“Ah, dear baron,” she said to my husband, “I am so much attracted toward
you because the country which you describe so excellently in your books,
the semibarbarous Caucasus, is so fascinating to me.”

Certainly, it was well known how much everything Russian fascinated
Madame Adam, the glorifier of Aksákof and of General Skóbelef. “How can
a woman ever busy herself so much with politics?” was my thought at that
time. “How much that is disagreeable, and sometimes ridiculous, she
brings upon herself by that! And how can one bother herself with editing
a review into the bargain?”

Many distinguished men—artists, authors, politicians—were gathered in
Madame Adam’s salons, and many pretty women. Madame Napoleon Ney was
pointed out to us as one of the most famous beauties of Parisian
society. Unfortunately, one could not make the acquaintance of all the
interesting persons present; the throng was so dense that one had to
stay in his corner and be contented with talking to a few in his own
vicinity. And for the most part one had to be still and listen, for—as
was the custom in Paris—the guests were served with all sorts of
artistic delectations: a pianist played Hungarian melodies; an author of
great promise, but as yet unknown, read a few short stories; and
Mademoiselle Brandés, at that time not yet engaged at the Théâtre
Français, declaimed a poem. But even here, amid this artistic and social
gayety, the dark word “War” was buzzing through the room; here and there
the names of Bismarck and Moltke and Schnäbele were heard, and
prophecies that next spring it surely would come to something were
boldly uttered, but without detracting from the spirit of cheerfulness
that prevailed; these vaticinations probably aroused fine hopes in the
hostess, enthusiastic for her country’s glory as she was. I was no
longer so indifferent in the presence of these things as I had been
during my youth. I already hated war fervently, and this frivolous
trifling with the possibility of it seemed to me as lacking in
conscience as in common sense.

It was a great joy to us to meet in Paris a friend from the Caucasus,
Princess Tamara of Georgia. The beautiful young widow had been
established in the French capital for a year with her two half-grown
girls; she lived in a fascinatingly furnished mansion in the Elysée
quarter. We were very frequently invited to her functions, and always
found a large company there, Russians for the most part. General Baron
Frederiks, who afterward became, and is still, chief master of
ceremonies to the Tsar, was a friend of the house.

We cultivated literary society extensively. A Dr. Löwenthal, who had
written to me on account of my _Inventarium einer Seele_ when we were
still in the Caucasus, and with whom, after an ardent exchange of ideas,
we two had become close friends, made us acquainted with Max Nordau. The
greatly celebrated author of “Conventional Lies,” although then only
thirty-eight, had very thick snow-white hair, which was very effective
with his black beard, black eyes, and interesting face. There were some
unforgettable hours which we four spent in conversation about God’s
magnificent world and the conventional, lie-ridden world of humanity.

In the Buloz house, where we attended a ball a few days after the Adam
soirée, there was not so strong a flavor of politics as in the home of
the _Nouvelle revue_; here homage was paid to only two things, the
_Revue_ _des deux mondes_ and the Académie Française. The Buloz house
had the reputation of being a center of the literary and intellectual
life of Paris. On Madame Buloz’s Tuesdays half of the Forty Immortals
were to be found there, and of course all the collaborators of the
_Revue_, from which the Academy so often draws its recruits. The solid
old _palais_ in the Faubourg Saint-Germain, with its ground floor
devoted to the offices of the monthly, and its big reception rooms on
the floor above, had a grave and dignified air. The furnishings of the
salon were of rich and substantial plainness. The tone all through the
house was rather stiff, puristic, erudite—in short, academic. The same
tone, you know, that permeates the so often uncut pages of the articles
in the old _Revue_. The married life of the husband and wife seemed to
be exemplary. M. Buloz, a man of serious and steady look, and at the
same time amiable, of about forty, with full red beard trimmed to a
point—liking best of all to talk about his _Revue_, the conduct of which
cost him much labor, for he read every line of the manuscripts that were
sent in, and sternly repelled any encroachment of frivolous realism—who
could have suspected at that time that a few years later he would be
compelled to part from his _Revue_, and that under such frivolous
circumstances as he would never have permitted one of his colleagues to
incorporate in a novel? Most surprising and startling for the whole
serious _milieu_ came the sudden discovery that M. Buloz had wasted
nearly all his property, besides incurring a million in debts,—all for a
woman. A separation resulted—whether Madame Buloz got one or whether she
pardoned him I do not know—but a separation from his _Revue_, the proud
paternal inheritance. He was forced to leave the management; and the
monthly, which ever since its foundation, for more than a half century,
had borne the name of Charles Buloz, both father and son, came out with
the name of Brunetière.

Since then the undertaking has fallen off in circulation; various new
monthlies have come into existence to enter into active rivalry with
this great-grandmother of reviews. At that time it was in full flower;
it had a circulation of 25,000 copies and brought its stockholders large
and ever-increasing dividends. At that ball M. Buloz told me that his
father had for thirty years published the magazine under a deficit; then
suddenly came the change—the _Revue_ was read all over the world and its
owners became millionaires.

“You see, gracious lady,” added M. Buloz jestingly, “if a periodical has
been kept up for a time, it can expect further duration and some profit;
only the first thirty years are rather hard sailing.”

The connections which we formed at the Buloz house brought us into
relations with various members of the Academy. I remember one evening
which we spent with Victor Cherbuliez and when we met Ernest Renan. It
was but a small circle of people that was grouped around the fireplace
there, and the result was a genuine _causerie_, such as cannot be had in
reception rooms filled with hundreds of people. There were present M.
and Mme. Cherbuliez and their daughter; M. and Mme. Renan; M. de Rothan,
a former diplomat and author of highly valued political articles and
contemporaneous reminiscences, especially regarding Alsace-Lorraine; his
wife; and lastly, Ludovic Halévy, the latest of the Academicians. The
merry blasphemer of the Grecian Olympus,—for with the aid of the equally
merry Meilhac he had exposed Jupiter, Juno, Venus, and Mars to
Offenbach’s musical mockery,—the creator of Madame Cardinal, mistress of
the household, and her daughters who “went on the boards,” was sparkling
with wit in his conversation too. As a novelist, however, he was also
successful in striking the serious strings; remember his novel _L’Abbé
Constantin_, with its tinge of sentimentality and its harmlessness for
boarding-school misses. And by no means did he fail to make the famous
patriot fiber vibrate; he became the historian of the invasion of 1871,
and celebrated the military glory and the heroic misfortunes of the
conquered.

So it came about that when the conversation that evening touched upon
the predominant question of the day—the threatening war-cloud—Halévy
welcomed, with some pathos, the possibly approaching day of requital.

Renan excitedly took the other side. He did not conceal his horror for
national massacres in general, but as a thinker he was especially pained
by the hostility between his nation and “the nation of thinkers.” He
acknowledged that he had learned much from German philosophy, and spoke
with the greatest respect of its representatives in both older and later
times.

I had expected that Renan should be ugly in his outward appearance, for
that was notorious; but this expectation fell below the reality: short,
stout, sallow, with a broad, beardless face, reminding one of Grützner’s
monks, a monstrous bald cranium,—with these qualities, the author of the
_Vie de Jésus_ gave me at first glance the impression that he was the
ugliest man I had seen in my life. Ten minutes after he had begun to
speak, this impression was effaced. Not only tolerable did he seem to
me, but possessed of a genuine charm.

Another charmer whose acquaintance we made in Paris was Alphonse Daudet.
In his case the power of the intellect, the fiery, easy discourse, were
accompanied by an externally beautiful appearance. With his flashing
black eyes, his thick curling hair, his mobile, aristocratic features,
Alphonse Daudet could not have helped pleasing every one even if he had
not been Alphonse Daudet. His wife—who was more of a collaborator to him
than the world suspects, though his grateful testimony to the fact was
public and plain-spoken—was likewise a very attractive personality. I
often called there on her day at home. The man of the house was not
present on these occasions, but stayed shut up in his workroom. It was
in this that he used to receive us and fascinate us with his gift of
fiery conversation.

XXIV
THERE IS A PEACE MOVEMENT
Return from Paris · International Peace Association · _Das
Maschinenzeitalter_ by “Jemand” · Anonymity attains its end ·
Bartholomäus von Carneri · At the Carneri table · In the Hotel Meissl

In the spring of 1887 we returned home from Paris enriched with many
experiences and impressions. One thing especially I had learned there,
which had a decisive influence on my after life and work. In a
conversation about war and peace—a theme which was already mightily
filling my soul—our friend Dr. Wilhelm Löwenthal informed us that there
existed in London an “International Peace and Arbitration Association,”
the aim of which was to bring about, by creating and organizing public
opinion, the establishment of an international court of appeal which
should take the place of armed force in settling disputes between
nations.

“What! Madrid had such a girl, and I learn it for the first time
to-day!” cries Don Carlos, when, in the scene with the Princess Eboli,
she discloses her soul to him. Just so I felt. What? such a league
existed,—the idea of justice between nations, the struggle to do away
with war, had assumed form and life? The news electrified me. Dr.
Löwenthal had to give me on the spot all the details about the formation
of the Association, its aim, its methods, and the persons who were
associated with it. What I learned was as follows:

The name of the founder and president of the Association was Hodgson
Pratt. The Duke of Westminster, the Earl of Ripon, the Bishop of Durham,
and others were among its directors. Its headquarters were in London.

Hodgson Pratt, a man of lofty ethical and philanthropical principles,
had, within a few years, journeyed over the Continent for the purpose of
calling into existence branches of his society. Since then there were in
Stuttgart a “Württembergischer Verein,” Fr. von Hellwald, president; in
Berlin a provisional committee, Professor Virchow, president; in Milan a
“Unione lombarda per la pace,” Professor Vigano, president (after him,
Teodoro Moneta); in Rome an “Associazione per l’arbitrio e la pace,”
Ruggero Bonghi, Minister of Instruction, president. Others in Sweden,
Norway, and Denmark.

The appeal which the London society had adopted as the basis of its
propaganda, a copy of which Dr. Löwenthal handed me, contained the
following introduction:

Lately a member of the English ministry declared that England’s
greatest interest is peace. Could not the same thing be said of every
civilized country?

The international political conditions in the civilized world when
contemplated arouse no less astonishment than reflection.

On the one hand men of every rank and of all shades of opinion desire
progress, the common advantage and happiness of mankind; and the
object of all the endeavors of the men of science, the enlightened
writers and thinkers, culminates in the accomplishment of this
progress and well-being.

On the other hand, in opposition to these endeavors, the fruits of
industry and diligence are constantly sacrificed in behalf of military
objects, and this sacrifice serves to delay and hinder all progress.

Has the time not arrived, at the close of the Nineteenth Century, for
all men to consult together and get into agreement to put an end to
this folly, this terrible plague which can be avoided only through a
common understanding and endeavor?

But how arrive at this result? Through the irresistible power of
widely directed and energetically organized public opinion.

The means for attaining this propaganda and this organization is to be
found in the formation of a great league, with branches in all
European cities.

The appeal goes on to explain what the league was to aim at and what
were to be its methods.

On my return I found awaiting me the proof sheets of my book _Das
Maschinenzeitalter_ (“The Age of Machinery”). I added in the chapter
entitled “Zukunftsausblicke” (“Glimpses into the Future”) an account of
the London League. Just as I had previously known nothing about it, I
took it for granted that my readers also were unacquainted with this
phenomenon of the times. For in that thing called “Publicity,” the
endeavors of a few hundred men—even of a few thousand—disappear like so
many drops of carmine in an arm of the sea.

When the book came out, shortly afterward, I had the satisfaction that
not a single one of the very numerous critics who devoted whole columns
to their reviews of it ever suspected that “Jemand”—Some One—could
possibly belong to “the weak-minded sex.” Doctor Moritz Necker, the
well-known literary editor of the Vienna _Tagblatt_, in writing to me
about another matter, mentioned that he had recently been reading an
anonymous book called _Das Maschinenzeitalter_; in his mind there was no
doubt that the author was Max Nordau. Cherbuliez was of the same
opinion, and in a sixteen-page article in the _Revue des deux mondes_
designated Max Nordau as the author of the work he was reviewing. Max
Nordau met this with a published declaration that he did not know the
book, and that he was in the habit of signing what he wrote.

For some time I had been in correspondence with the philosopher
Bartholomäus von Carneri, to whom, after reading his _Sittlichkeit
und Darwinismus_ (“Morality and Darwinism”), I had written a letter
expressing my admiration; he had replied that he knew and prized my
_Inventarium_, and a regular correspondence had ensued. I had not
revealed to him anything about my anonymous book; I was all the more
pleasingly surprised when in the newspaper report of the
parliamentary proceedings I found a speech of Carneri’s, delivered
in the Austrian Reichsrat the day before, in which he mentioned _Das
Maschinenzeitalter_. Thereupon I asked him what kind of a book it
was, and who was the author. To this he replied that the author was
not named, but he had guessed who it was—Karl Vogt; he had instantly
recognized him by his style. Many, however, believed that he
himself, Carneri, had written the book. Then I confessed to him that
I was the guilty one, but begged him to keep the secret, and this he
agreed to do.

At the beginning of the next autumn we had gone to Vienna for a
fortnight, as we often did. At the hotel at which we put up we learned
that the member of the Reichsrat from Styria, B. von Carneri, was in the
same house. The prospect of becoming personally acquainted with my
famous correspondent was extremely tempting to me, and we sent in our
names to him. The savant received us with alacrity. An old man, a sick
man,—almost a cripple,—and yet what gayety and freshness! Carneri had
never been well in his life. His head was all the time bent over to his
right shoulder, he could walk only with difficulty, and since his early
youth he had not spent a day without agonizing pain. And he called
himself a happy man; he not only called himself so, he was. His
intellectual labors, his political activities, the possession of a
beloved daughter and a beloved son-in-law, the high regard which he had
won in the learned world and among his parliamentary associates, may
well have been the basis of his enjoyment of life; but the real secret
was doubtless that he not only dealt in philosophy but actually was a
philosopher, that is to say, a man who can pass beyond the miseries of
life and thankfully enjoy its beauty.

We spent some exhilarating hours in Carneri’s company; all the themes
which we had broached in our correspondence were discussed, and the
friendship which had begun through our letters was only confirmed by
this personal association. That same evening we met again. When the
member from Marburg-an-der-Drau stayed in Vienna during the sessions of
the parliament, he was accustomed to take his supper at a certain long
table in the hotel dining-room, and at that table a number of his
colleagues and other prominent personages from the political, literary,
and learned circles of Vienna used to gather. The “Carneri table” at the
Hotel Meissl was a sort of salon of wit and talent. That evening we also
took our places at this table, and listened with interest to the lively
conversation, the center of which was our friend Carneri, at whose right
hand I sat. I can remember one episode. My neighbor on the right
suddenly spoke past me to my neighbor on the left, and said to him:

“Say, I have bought the book you quoted in your speech lately. Do you
still not know who ‘Jemand’ is?”

“No, I have not a suspicion,” replied Carneri, and exchanged a smiling
glance with me. “And what do you say to it?”

My right-hand neighbor began a long dissertation on _Das
Maschinenzeitalter_, and another man who had also read it joined in the
conversation. What was said I no longer recall; I only know that it was
not disagreeable to me, but amused me immensely, especially when I threw
in the remark, “I shall have to get that myself,” and some one cried,
“Oh, that is not a book for ladies!”

XXV
_DIE WAFFEN NIEDER_
How the plan for the book originated · Study of sources · The model of
my hero · Satisfaction in writing the word “End” · Unanimously rejected
by the editors · The publisher’s scruples · Publication · How the book
was received · Favorable and hostile criticisms · Personal contact with
the peace movement resulting from the novel · The peace congress of 1889
in Paris · Founding of Interparliamentary Union

But I no longer had “The Age of Machinery” and its fate so much at
heart. I had on the stocks another work, which had taken possession of
me; to this all my thoughts and purposes were turned. I wanted to be of
service to the Peace League, and how could I better do so than by trying
to write a book which should propagate its ideas? And I could do it most
effectively, I thought, in the form of a story. I should certainly find
a larger public for that than for a treatise. In treatises one can only
lay down abstract appeals to the reason, can philosophize, argue, and
dissertate; but I wanted something else: I wanted to be able to put into
my book not only what I thought but what I felt, felt passionately; I
wanted to give expression to the pain which the image of war burned into
my soul; I wanted to present life, palpitating life, reality, historical
reality; and all this could be done only in a novel, and best in a novel
written in the form of an autobiography. And so I went ahead and wrote
_Die Waffen nieder_, “Away with Weapons.”[20]

It was to be the history of a young woman whose fate was closely
involved with the wars fought in our own day. But in order that the
historical events introduced should correspond to the reality, that the
descriptions of the battle scenes should be truthful, it was requisite
for me to make preliminary studies and collect material and documents.

This I did conscientiously, as well as I could. I read up in big-volumed
histories, I rummaged in old newspapers and archives, to find reports of
war correspondents and military surgeons; I got such acquaintances of
mine as had been in the field to relate episodes of battles; and during
this period of study my horror of war waxed to the most agonizing
intensity. I can certify that the sufferings through which I led my
heroine were actually experienced by me while I was working on it. What
a woman must suffer when she knows that a beloved husband is engaged in
war I could now more easily imagine, for the depth of my own conjugal
love sufficed to put me mentally in such a situation. And the portrayal
of a noble personality, as I attempted it in drawing the figure of my
hero, was rendered the easier by the fact that my own husband sat as
model for this character.

What a feeling of relief and satisfaction when I wrote the word “End” at
the bottom of the second volume!

Now for placing it. I had no fears about this; many periodicals had
begged me to send them a manuscript, and that great weekly which had
printed my earlier works, and which had never refused anything I sent,
would doubtless publish this manuscript too. I sent it in without
misgivings. My astonishment was not little when the reply came:

Gracious Lady:

It is with regret that we find ourselves compelled to return to you
the ... [some compliments] manuscript. Large classes of our readers
would take offense at what it contains.

So I tried it on another editor: the same result. And then on
others—unanimously rejected. In one of the answers (which were all more
or less sugar-coated with courteous phrases) it said: “In spite of all
these merits, however, it is quite out of the question to publish the
novel in a military country.”

So perhaps it was better to forego the thought of serial publication and
let _Die Waffen nieder_ make its first appearance in book form; and so I
sent the much-traveled package to my publisher Pierson. He hesitated a
long time. The book seemed to him dangerous. At that time there had just
been decided in Germany a case under the press laws, of which the
consequence was to be an increase in the strictness of the censorship
and a rigorous suppression of all writings that contained any sort of
mutinousness against existing institutions. Pierson advised that I
should give the manuscript to some experienced statesman to look over,
and ask him to strike out everything that could give offense. I cried
out in indignation at such a demand. A work in which I had written off
from my soul all the rage and all the pain that the hallowed “existing
institution” of war had begotten in me (and assuredly in thousands of
others beside me, only that they dared not express it)—to get somebody
to lop and trim in diplomatic-opportunist fashion such a work, which,
whatever its worth or worthlessness, had at least the one merit of being
hotly felt and _unreservedly sincere_,—to remodel it by the rules of
that most contemptible of all arts, the art of suiting everybody,—no,
sooner into the stove with it. Then I should alter the title at least,
was the publisher’s next suggestion. No! The title embraces in three
words the whole aim of the book. Of the title, too, not a syllable is to
be changed. After this ultimatum Pierson gave way, and _Die Waffen
nieder_ made its appearance.

The publisher had no cause to regret his audacity: to-day the novel is
circulated by hundreds of thousands and has been translated into a dozen
languages. From this quite unexpected success I draw only one
conclusion: the idea which permeates the book was to the taste of the
public. In spite of the editors’ fears that the warlike German public
would take no interest in the idea of peace, it was shown that this idea
is cherished in wide circles—even in military circles; for from these
too there came to me many tokens of appreciation. When a musical note
sounds strongly in a room, this does not demonstrate so much the
fullness of the tone as the favorable acoustic properties of the room.
The spirit that usually obtains in newspaper offices, in theatrical
directorates (as a generality, in managements of all sorts), is usually
behind the times with regard to the wants of those masses who are in
each case concerned: judgments are formed there according to the state
of public opinion as it made itself felt ten or twenty years ago; but
meanwhile public opinion itself, in its uninterrupted transformation,
has progressed to another stage.

So I am ready to believe that a book against war, appearing at the
beginning of the seventies, when the intoxication of victory still
effervesced in Germany and the wrathful clamor for revenge still raged
in France, would have had no success whatever. The cult of arms, too,
had to attain those huge dimensions whereby it has since then harnessed
the peoples under its heavy yoke, it had to have brought the world to
the brink of ruin, in order that the watchword “Away with Weapons” might
find so powerful an echo.

Every day brought me reviews from far and near,—feuilletons and
editorials. Bartholomäus Carneri published a ten-column article in the
_Neue Freie Presse_, J. V. Widmann a series of five feuilletons in the
_Bund_. I received criticisms from Russia, where the book appeared in
five different translations,—one of them authorized by me,—criticisms
from America, from England, from the Scandinavian countries, where even
in its first year translations were made.

I was now brought into living touch with all those who were connected
with the peace movement, or who, having had their attention drawn to the
existence of such a movement by my book, were now joining it.

The following letter afforded me especial pleasure, The inventor of
dynamite wrote me:

Dear Baroness and Friend:

I have just finished reading your admirable masterpiece. We are told
that there are two thousand languages—1999 too many—but certainly
there is not one in which your delightful work should not be
translated, read, and studied.

How long did it take you to write this marvel? You shall tell me when
next I have the honor and happiness of pressing your hand—that
amazonian hand which so valiantly makes war on war.

Nevertheless you make a mistake to cry “Away with Weapons,” because
you yourself make use of them, and because yours—the charm of your
style and the grandeur of your ideas—carry and will carry much farther
than the Lébels, the Nordenfelts, the De Banges, and all the other
implements of hell.[21]

A. Nobel

In a Reichsrat debate on the military budget (April 18, 1891) Minister
Dunajewski, of the Department of Finance, spoke the following words:

“There has recently appeared a book called _Die Waffen nieder_. I can
only advise the gentlemen to devote a few hours to the reading of this
novel; any one who then still has a predilection for war I can only
pity.”

Of course opponents were not lacking. Anonymous letters of ridicule and
of abuse; withering criticisms—“What the good old lady tells about her
misfortunes is indeed very sad; but the conclusions drawn from them can
elicit from the serious politician only a smile”; “emotional silliness”;
“obtrusive, inartistic didacticism”; “Brummagem that totally fails of
its purpose”; “the authoress ought to return to her short stories, in
which she has shown a quite clever talent”; etc. Even one of the great
in the realm of literature, Felix Dahn, sent out an epigram which went
the rounds of the press, but which—the poet himself will concede
this—cannot boast of much poetic beauty:

_An die weiblichen und männlichen Waffenscheuen_

Die Waffen hoch! Das Schwert ist Mannes eigen,
Wo Männer fechten, hat das Weib zu schweigen,
Doch freilich, Männer gibt’s in diesen Tagen,
Die sollten lieber Unterröcke tragen.[22]

Everything in this world is in reciprocity. What comes as a result is in
turn the cause of new results. So here. I had written the book with the
design of rendering, in my own way, a service to the peace movement, of
whose incipient organization I had learned; and the relationships and
experiences that grew out of the book have swept me more and more into
the movement, so that at last I was compelled to go into it not only, as
I had at first intended, with my pen, but with my whole being.

Meanwhile, during the time of the World’s Exposition of 1889 in Paris, a
Peace Congress had been held there, presided over by Jules Simon. This
was taken as an opportunity for creating also the institution of
Interparliamentary Conferences. The year before, two men—Randal Cremer,
member of the English Parliament, and the French deputy Frédéric
Passy—had set to work to form an Interparliamentary Union. They enlisted
the support of a number of their colleagues, and in the year of the
Exposition these assembled in a first conference (of the English
Parliament three hundred members were present), and it was agreed that
adherents should be secured from the popular assemblies of all the
European countries, and that every year an Interparliamentary Conference
should be held. For the next conference, the second, London was named as
the place of meeting.

To all this the contemporary world paid but little attention, one might
say paid none at all. But I followed these events with the eagerest and
most hopeful interest. Through the monthly periodical Concord, the organ
of the London Peace Association, I was kept informed of what was going
on, and I read attentively the reports of all the speeches delivered in
the assemblies, and of the resolutions passed. But as yet the idea of
taking part in the movement myself, otherwise than with my pen, never
entered my mind.

XXVI
INTERCOURSE WITH FRIENDS
In port · Trip to Vienna · Literary circles · Balduin Groller · Theodor
Herzl · Letter from Count Hoyos · Letter from Friedrich Bodenstedt

After our return from Paris we remained quiet and secluded at
Harmannsdorf. An uneventful life, but no empty life. There is no way in
which a life can be better filled than with labor and love. Of course
there is not much to tell about it. The reminiscences of my youth, with
all its betrothals and art-plans and varying adventures, have certainly
made more amusing reading.

The period of storms was past; we were now in port. The midday sun of
youth no longer blazed, and now there lay on our horizon something like
the tints of evening. But not yet time to lay aside work; there was yet
much to be done. And we had to bear a great grief, to fight a hard
battle. It was not sorrow of our own that weighed upon us, but the
sorrow of the world; we took the field not against personal enemies, but
against the enemies of mankind—cruelty and falsehood!

It is a common belief that only people who are themselves unfortunate
can understand the misfortunes of others, and they call that the hard
school of suffering. With us it was different: whatever we experienced
of deep pity, of warm wishes to help and to better, had its root in the
_joy_ which we had in life and life’s beauties. It was in the college of
happiness that we had learned that here on earth life may be—in other
words, ought to be—glorious and joyous and rich in love. The unfortunate
are likelier to get embittered: “other folks may as well have their
troubles too,” they think, and they comfort themselves by saying “there
is no such thing as happiness anyhow.” We knew better: there is. It is
only that not all find it, that very few indeed can find it because so
much stupidity blocks the way to it,—these things will not let the happy
be at peace.

For a little change from our workaday existence in the country we had
brief trips to Vienna. There we attended the theater and associated with
a few friends, mostly in literary circles. When Carneri was in town we
joined the “deputy table” at the Hotel Meissl. We had a very pleasant
intercourse with Balduin Groller, then editor of the _Oesterreichische
Illustrierte Zeitung_. While still in the Caucasus we had formed an
epistolary friendship with him, a friendship which has remained
steadfast to this day. Humor and heart are the two qualities which
characterize Balduin Groller as a feuilletonist and as a man. This is
why in his company one is excellently amused and at the same time is in
such a comfortable frame of mind; you laugh at his dry wit and bask in
his warm geniality. That he was a handsome, dark-eyed, elegant man, an
adept in sports, did not detract from the effect. Moreover, he liked us
as well as we liked him, and those evenings when we four—Groller has the
dearest little wife—chatted together over our food and wine were most
delightful. Often Theodor Herzl joined us. He also sparkled with wit.
And that head of his—like an Assyrian king’s! He ought to have been
really king of the new Zion, whose awakener he was, and which might
perhaps already exist if he had not died so prematurely.

We had in Vienna a dear and interesting friend, Count Rudolf Hoyos, a
handsome old gentleman, every inch an aristocrat, but a democrat in his
views. I perceive that this is the third time I have laid stress on
external beauty in describing the persons of notable men. I cannot help
it—in the first place they really were handsome, these three, and in the
second place, I like handsome people better than homely people. One must
forgive homeliness; but one ought not to neglect beauty.—Count Hoyos was
a free and brilliant intellect. He had published a volume of poems in
which a few pearls were to be found. His residence—a whole floor in the
palace of the “Adliges Kasino” on the Ringstrasse—was a museum:
paintings, art furniture, bric-a-brac, antiquities, vases, fabrics,
carved cabinets, armorial trophies, bronzes, costly books,—it took hours
and hours to admire all the rare objects. The host, however, preferred
to spend his time in a little oriel where there was room only for one
table with various mementos on it, besides his easy chair with a
reading-desk, a little divan and a rocking-chair for at most three
callers, and an easel with the portrait of a woman—a woman whom Rudolf
Hoyos had loved; a great lady who had once been the center of a
distinguished and witty circle, but who was no longer living. Count
Hoyos remained unmarried. I have a large number of letters from him, and
one of them I will introduce here; his character will thus most clearly
be shown:

Toblach, August 13, ’90

Many years ago, at a _Thé d’esprit_, I was introduced to a daughter of
Bettina Arnim. Her first words after the introduction, as she handed
me my cup, were, “What do you think about the immortality of the
soul?” “I believe in immortality, but not in the soul,” was my reply.

This story is suggested by the article “Carus,” excellently translated
by you in the last magazine. It interested me very much, but did not
at all satisfy me.

Do you know a children’s game _Frau Gevatterin, leih mir d’
Scher’_,[23] in which those who take part keep changing their seats,
while there is always one who finds all the chairs taken, because
there are more players than there are seats? Carus lets his ideas play
this game, or rather the designations for the ideas. Ego, personality,
soul, its activity, spirit, idea, consciousness, and so on, keep
changing their places with great agility—but there is always one of
them that gets nothing.

It does no good to give all ideas new names or to foist new meanings
upon old words—there is always one left in the air; that is, he no
more finds the ultimate cause than do the rest of us, only he does not
acknowledge it as we do.

What answer does C. give to the question with which the article
starts? Is that which used to be called Soul a cause or an effect
(that is, a phenomenon)? Does he believe that every cause begets
effects, the children of which again become causes? Does he close the
circle and regard the last effect as the first cause and vice versa?

He constantly provokes me to contradiction even in details. For
instance, he brings Luther forward as a “progressive spirit,” because
he substituted the Bible for the Church—belief in authority for belief
in authority—! Whither this progress has led, we can see by the
sanctimonious frauds with the halo! these Bismarcks with the tiara—!

Pardon, if C. is a favorite with you, but frankness is the first
condition of a wholesome correspondence. Even with Villers I used to
have frequent controversies.

Your many-sided activity and creative enthusiasm fill me with
admiration, like a great drama of nature. Now pray allow yourself the
enjoyment of the latter, as I did yesterday in my world’s-end
thunderstorm.

Gratefully yours
R. H.

Best regards to your worthy husband.

Here also I introduce a letter which I received from Mirza Schaffy,
after I had sent him a review of my novel by Carneri in the feuilleton
of the _Neue Freie Presse_. The Peace Congress which Bodenstedt tells of
is the one that took place in Paris in the year 1849, under the
presidency of Victor Hugo, when Cobden was present.

Wiesbaden, April 8, ’90

Best thanks for the article you kindly sent me regarding your
admirable work; I am returning it herewith, as soon as I have read it.
Carneri has wielded his pen like a master and written just after my
heart. The other printed sheets which I also inclose are the last
pages of the second volume, which is soon to be out, of my
Recollections. On the last page of all you will find how it was I came
to be sent from Berlin to Paris as a peace man and a free-trader. The
thing was so suddenly arranged that I had no time left to prepare a
speech. And besides, I could not have said anything that was not
already included in the Berlin letter of adhesion which I was to
deliver. Moreover, I had never yet spoken in public, and had no desire
to make my first experiment in a foreign language. So everything would
have been sure to go off without a ripple had not Richard Cobden
insisted on making me make a speech, and that in the very first
session. I had taken my place in one of the front rows of the hall,
which held between five and six thousand people, and I had been calmly
listening to a half-dozen addresses—among them a very good one by
Bastiat—when Cobden perceived me and immediately came down from the
platform, seized me by the hand, and made me go with him and take a
place in a chair next him on the platform. As vice president he sat at
Victor Hugo’s left, and, when Victor Hugo opened the congress with
solemn grandiloquence, had immediately followed with an address in
fearful French but immensely effective.

I obstinately refused his insistence that I also should be heard, and
I believed that I had safely got out of it, when suddenly my ear
caught a whispered conversation between him and Victor Hugo:

“Il faut le faire parler de quelque façon que ce soit.”

“Mais il m’a prévenu, déjà hier, qu’il n’a pas préparé un discours.”

“Donnez-lui toujours la parole; il faut donc bien qu’il dise quelque
chose!”[24]

The next moment the bell tinkled and the voice of the president was
heard,

“Je donne la parole à Mr. Fr. Bodenstedt de Berlin.”[25]

I got to my feet in some trepidation, and said, in as good French and
in as loud a voice as I could just then command, that the president
had been aware ever since my arrival that I had not come to make a
speech; “mais même si j’avais préparé un discours, je ne le
prononcerais pas aujourd’hui ici....”

“Pourquoi pas? Pourquoi pas?”

“Je vous en dirai la raison tout franchement. Je viens de promener mes
regards à travers cette vaste salle, où l’on voit représentées par
leurs drapeaux toutes les nations civilisées du globe, mais le drapeau
de la nation la plus civilisée, le drapeau allemand y manque!”—[26]

After all eyes had looked in vain for the German flag, which was
nowhere to be found, M. E. de Girardin arose to his full height and
cried in a solemn nasal tone, “Monsieur, vous êtes le drapeau vivant
de l’Allemagne ici!”[27]

During the storm of applause that followed these words, I remembered
that at breakfast I had seen in the _Charivari_ a cartoon of Girardin,
with these words for a legend: “Mr. de Girardin commence à flotter
avec le vent.”[28] So I got up, as soon as the hall was quiet again,
and said, “Merci du compliment, bien que je ne puisse pas l’accepter
dans toute la force du terme, attendu que je ne flotte pas avec le
vent, moi!”[29]

Indescribable effect. Hundreds of Americans and Englishmen cried, “The
translation! The translation!”

M. de Coquerel, curé de Ste. Madelaine, _translateur officiel_, gets
up and begins:

“The learned gentleman has said—”

I interrupt him, politely begging permission to translate my words
into English myself; in doing so I make an allusion to our Anglo-Saxon
relationship, and arouse great enthusiasm.

Now arose M. de Cormenin (Timon) to protest against Germany’s being
_la nation la plus civilisée du globe_: only France, said he, could be
so designated.

“Let us put it to the test,” I cried.... “How is the greatness of a
nation known? By its great men. Name me six of your great living men
and I will wager that every German schoolboy knows their names; then I
will mention six Germans who are their peers, and I will acknowledge
myself beaten if you yourself can give me any tolerably satisfactory
account of their importance.”

So the matter was thrashed back and forth without its being possible
to speak of it as a speech; I myself was farthest of all from having
the idea that I had made one. But Fate often plays strange tricks with
us. Szarvady, Wilhelmine Claus’s husband, was my guide through Paris,
and we had agreed to dine at the Hotel Rougemont at six o’clock with
some of his acquaintances. He had not been at the meeting, but had
taken me to Victor Hugo’s the day before and had there learned that I
was not going to make a speech. Great was his astonishment at reading
in all the evening papers the most contradictory reports of the speech
I did not make. John Lemoine in the _Journal des Débats_ was praising
my fine English, and _Galignani’s Messenger_ remarked as follows about
my French:

“The learned gentleman delivered himself in a most exquisite French.”

That is the only sentence which my memory retains as an attestation of
my oratorical triumph. In Paris I was called _le drapeau vivant de
l’Allemagne_ for a few days, and from there the phrase went over into
all the German papers, where it kept its vogue for a few years. Now it
is to be read only on a “triumph cup” which a fascinating young lady
presented me; on it she had painted me as I then was, in my thirtieth
year, with a full head of curly hair, slender, and vivacious. This
young enthusiast afterwards married the famous Orientalist, Professor
Matzstein, and is still living in Berlin.

But, to turn from this swift success of a witticism to a soberer tone,
I must tell you briefly of a soirée which I attended at Alexis de
Tocqueville’s. He was at that time Minister of Foreign Affairs and was
the most intelligent Frenchman whom I ever knew. With him, Cobden, and
Bastiat I had a long conversation in which the peace question was
treated more exhaustively than was possible in the Congress. We agreed
that the fruit of peace could be ripened only on Germanic soil, while
France and Russia would remain disturbing elements as long as they
should have the power to be such.

As far as I personally am concerned, I have always found myself in a
difficult position as an apostle of peace. My father-in-law was a
colonel. One of my sons-in-law is likewise a colonel. Two of my wife’s
brothers went to fight against France as young captains in 1870. One
of them did not come back at all; the other lost a leg at the storming
of the heights of Spichern, and now hobbles round as a major. All my
wife’s tears could not keep my only son from going as a volunteer
against France, where he won the Iron Cross and the Order for Valor,
with swords. He is now living in St. Paul on the Mississippi....

Yesterday I was interrupted while writing the first sheet of this, and
now the second is drawing to an end. I will only call your attention
to a poem entitled Die kriegerische Nazarener (“The Warlike
Nazarenes”), which went through all the papers in 1854, before the
breaking out of the Crimean War, and which you will find on page 120
of the ninth volume of my collected works (Berlin, Decker, 1867). It
might be very appropriate for reprinting in the new edition, as is
shown by the utterances of three ecclesiastical potentates, which it
illustrates:

The issue is the battle of the Cross against the heathen.

The Metropolitan of Moscow

It is for the glory of God that you are fighting.

The Archbishop of Paris

Jesus Christ, our Saviour, for whose sake you fight, will bless your
arms.[30]

With best greetings to the husband also,

Friedrich Bodenstedt

XXVII
MENTONE AND VENICE
The news of the Crown Prince’s death · Sojourn in Mentone · Octave
Mirbeau · A winter in Venice · Old acquaintances · Princess Tamara and
Marietta Saibante · Visit of Felix Moscheles to the widow “Tillings” ·
Moscheles as a peace propagandist · Formation of a section in Venice
through Marquis Pandolfi · Grelix · The Princess of Montenegro ·
Princess Hatzfeld, born Von Buch · A memory of Cosima Wagner

In the beginning of the year 1889 (my novel was then still a manuscript
in Pierson’s hesitating hands) we once more gave ourselves the treat of
a little pleasure trip. And this time our course took us to the
Riviera—our destination Mentone. We were caught on the way by the news
of Crown Prince Rudolf’s death. The first report spoke of it as a
hunting accident; only a little at a time did we learn the terrible
contradictory details. The tragedy affected us deeply.

From Mentone, our headquarters, we made excursions to Monte Carlo, Nice,
Cannes. Naturally My Own was fascinated with the beauties of the
Riviera. To one who loves nature so passionately as he did the sight of
this blooming, paradisal corner of the world must afford an intense
enjoyment; and the combination there of the charm of artificial luxury
with the charm of nature was a double attraction to him, with his
receptivity for every kind of elegance. But we did not participate in
this social life; our vacation budget would not have permitted it, nor
had we any inclination to do so.

We made a very interesting acquaintance a few days after our arrival at
Mentone,—that of Octave Mirbeau. The young writer had even then become
famous through his novel _Le Calvaire_. I knew the novel, and a chapter
in it that describes a marvelous scene from the Franco-German
War—describes it in a way that expresses a hearty condemnation of war.
The chapter had captivated me, and it was a pleasure to me to be able to
shake hands with the author.

Octave Mirbeau with his pretty young wife lived in a tiny villa which he
had bought in Garavent, and there they invited us to dinner. The young
writer looked more like an Englishman than like a Frenchman. He reminded
me a little of Achille Murat. Very tall, broad-shouldered, with a fine
blond mustache. But, if his exterior had an English air, his manner and
conversation were genuinely French, that is to say, full of piquant wit.
Yet he talked also of very serious things. Social problems seemed to be
what he had most at heart. There need be no misery in the world, was his
fixed belief; that there nevertheless was, was the occasion of his
wrath.

On our way home from the Riviera we spent a week in Venice. The
beautiful dead city of the doges was like a revelation to My Own. He
fell in love with it. It filled him with jubilant admiration. And so we
made up our minds that sometime we would spend a whole winter in Venice.

This plan we carried out in the year 1890–1891. We took rooms in a small
palazzo on the Grand Canal. A delectable little palace, on the outside
gilded and gayly colored—the Palazzo Dario; we rejoiced in the view of
it every time we saw it from the gondola. The interior also pleased us
immensely, for the rooms were wholly in old Venetian style. We had taken
a gondola by the month. One of the two gondoliers was likewise our
valet. The landlady furnished us with good Italian cooking, and I had
engaged a pretty girl as my waiting maid. You are not to suppose that we
had discontinued our work. The forenoon hours were regularly
appropriated to writing. We were happy as happy could be. _Die Waffen
nieder_ had been out now for a year, and I was still receiving critical
articles from the periodicals and letters from the public regarding it.

How round the world really is, and how small! Wherever one goes one
always meets friends and acquaintances from the remotest regions. So it
was here. We were introduced into society by our consul general, Baron
Kraus, and quite unexpectedly we met dear old friends.

Princess Tamara of Georgia, in whose house in Tiflis, and again four
years before in Paris, we had spent so much time, was now settled in
Venice and was there introducing her two daughters into society. I even
found a friend of my girlhood days—Marietta Saibante—in the Marchesa
Pandolfi, whose salons in the Palazzo Bianca Capello were a
meeting-place for Venetian society. We had not seen each other in nearly
twenty-five years, and had quite lost track of each other; so it was a
delightful surprise to both of us to meet again so unexpectedly. Her
husband, a member of the Italian parliament for Sicily, had just come
from Rome. He is the same Marchese Benjamino Pandolfi who afterwards
took a prominent part in the peace movement.

One forenoon my husband and I were sitting and chatting together after
breakfast, when a card was brought in. On it was written the inquiry
whether Mr. Felix Moscheles of London, who had chanced the day before to
learn through Sir Austen Henry Layard that the author of _Die Waffen
nieder_ was in Venice, might be permitted to present his respects.

I sent down word that it would be a pleasure to me.

My husband went to meet the visitor in the anteroom.

“My wife will be much pleased ...” he began politely.

“What! How is this?” cried the other. “Can you be Baron Suttner? So you
are not dead? Why, you were shot in Paris!”

“Excuse me, no....”

Thereupon the two gentlemen came in where I was, and the stranger
explained why he had been so surprised to find me in the possession of a
living spouse, when he knew from the story of my life, which he had
lately read, that I had lost my two husbands, and he had not supposed
(somewhat reproachfully) that I was married for the third time.

We laughingly explained to him that the two deceased military men were
mere creations of fancy, and all that was taken from reality was the
loving and happy wedded intercourse which the book depicts—and this,
thank God, had not been sundered by any cruel fate.

Mr. Felix Moscheles, a son of the famous musician, and editor of the
correspondence between his father and Mendelssohn, now explained to us
that he, together with Hodgson Pratt, Cardinal Manning, Lord Ripon, the
Bishop of London, the Duke of Westminster, and others, belonged to the
directorate of the London Peace Association. Being a permanent resident
of London and a naturalized Englishman, he had set himself the task of
carrying on propaganda for his peace association whenever he was
traveling. His chief specialty was table-d’hôte conversion; but this, he
laughingly acknowledged, was generally a wretched failure, or else
brought upon him the counter attempts of old women tract distributers to
convert him.

The preceding winter he had spent with his wife in Cairo, where he had
made quite a number of Egyptian studies,—Mr. Moscheles is a painter by
profession,—and there he had succeeded in winning over sundry beys to
his peace theories. A friend from Berlin had sent him my book, and that
had awakened in him an eager desire to make the acquaintance of the
unfortunate woman who had suffered so much by war and who had expressed
in this book so much that he himself had at heart. Now the day before he
had learned quite by accident, in a soirée at the house of Sir Austen
Henry Layard, the well-known ex-diplomat, that the author was in Venice,
and he could not but pay his respects to her: first as a friend of
peace, to thank her for the book, and secondly as a man, to express his
sympathy for the poor broken-hearted widow ... and—what disillusions
life brings—he is received by the husband of a jocund woman!

In the course of the conversation Mr. Moscheles told us that it would
have been very agreeable to him if in Venice he could have met with
people who would be disposed to form a local section of the Peace
Association; but that there was no prospect of it—no one took any
interest in the question. He was therefore planning to return to England
in two days.

“Who knows?” said I. “Perhaps it might be possible to do something in
the matter after all. This evening there is a reception in Casa
Pandolfi; I will speak about your wish to the marquis, who, to the best
of my knowledge and belief, belongs to the Parliament at Rome and to the
Peace Association there.”

So that same evening, in what had been the Palazzo Bianca Capello, while
the young people were dancing in the next room, I asked the host for a
word with him. With but little hope of any results I told him about the
visit of the English friend of peace, and about his desire. The Marquis
Pandolfi seemed very much surprised to hear me speak of such things; and
even more joyfully surprised was I when I now learned that he was one of
the most enthusiastic and active adherents of the cause, that the group
of sympathizers in the Italian Chamber already comprised a large
proportion of the popular representatives, and that he, Pandolfi, was at
work on the organization of this group and the preparations for the next
conference. He most willingly took up the idea of having a section
formed in Venice, and commissioned me to request Mr. Moscheles to be
good enough to call on him for further conference the next forenoon.

A few days later a provisional committee had been formed, a notice sent
out, and a meeting called. About a hundred persons attended at the hall,
among them many journalists and lawyers. Only two women were
present,—Mr. Felix Moscheles’s wife Grete and I.

The two given names Grete and Felix had among their friends grown into
the collective name Grelix. For Grelix is altogether of one mind; Grelix
is enthusiastic for every kind of social progress and works for it;
Grelix paints in partnership, visits every picturesque corner of the
earth with sketchbook and pencil; Grelix’s self is a pretty sight too,
he with his thick snow-white hair crowning still fresh features and an
elastic figure, she looking as if she might be his daughter, nice and
delicate as a little doll, with goldblond hair tumbling about a rococo
face; and the house in London, containing the two studios and all the
art treasures collected in traveling, is called “The Grelix,” after its
owner.

Pandolfi gave those who were present a kindling address—it is well known
how fierily Italians speak if they are orators—in which he urged the
formation of a Venetian section of the universal European league of
peace and explained the aims of the interparliamentary group to which he
belonged. Then several others took part and expressed their views.

It was the first time in my life that I had been present on such an
occasion, for I had never belonged to any kind of a Union, or looked on
at a meeting of one or at its formation. The result was that a committee
was at once appointed, with Pandolfi as chairman; dispatches were sent
to the Peace Association in London and to the peace and arbitration
group in Rome; and so the group so ardently desired by our English guest
was founded.

The next day all the Italian papers had notices of this event, and for a
while it was the talk of the day in our circles. In such fashion, to be
sure, as parlor talk in the presence of a new movement, striving to
accomplish a great revolution in any field, ordinarily is,—expression of
sapient doubts and probable objections, hinted mockery, condescending
recognition of the noble aim,—and all against a background of stolid,
obstinate indifference.

And especially—is it credible?—especially women are the ones that manage
to find beautiful aspects of war, that neither can nor will conceive of
a condition when their sons will not any longer have to die for their
country, but simply to live for it.

Among the ladies of Venetian society with whom I associated at that
time, and who showed some interest in the newly founded Pandolfi Union,
these two were foremost: first the widowed Princess Darinka of
Montenegro—who died a year later. “We shall yet live to see the world
shaking off war,” she said to me. “The Emperor of Russia, you may
believe me, cherishes a deep horror of it.” Well, she did not live to
see that day; but what difference does the presence of us ephemera make
when it is a question of the history of humanity, which goes on
living—and we in it—?

The second of the women who took an interest in the question was the
Princess Hatzfeld, born Von Buch. A splendid old lady—she had just
celebrated her seventieth birthday. She had a receptive mind and warm
enthusiasm for everything that took place in the world in politics and
art. When Richard Wagner was living in Venice she was on terms of
intimate friendship with him and Frau Cosima. She was the first who
learned of his fatal illness and hastened to his deathbed. A note from
the stricken wife, “Come!” had summoned her. When she entered the room
where Wagner lay, he had just drawn his last breath, and Frau Cosima
with a wild cry threw herself on his dead body. After a while she rose
to her feet, and, pale, tearless, stepped to a little table on which lay
a pair of scissors; these she seized, and, cutting off her long thick
tresses, placed this blond silken cushion under the dead man’s head.

PART SIX
1890–1891

XXVIII
THE AUSTRIAN INTERPARLIAMENTARY GROUP IS FORMED
Return · Skeptical reception of my reports · Resumption of our literary
labors · Pandolfi suggests enlisting recruits in the Austrian parliament
for the conference at Rome · Correspondence with members: Baron Kübeck,
Pernerstorfer, Dr. Jaques, Dr. Exner · The group is formed, Baron
Pirquet turning the scale

On our return from Venice to Harmannsdorf we stopped for a few days in
Vienna.

On the very first evening we met at the Hotel Meissl a few members of
the Reichsrat who were friends of ours, and, still under the influence
of our exciting experiences, I told them the whole story of the founding
of the Venetian Peace Society through a member of the Italian chamber. I
also told them about the Interparliamentary League which had been formed
in Paris in the year 1888, had met in London the year before, and was to
have its rendezvous in Rome this year.

The gentlemen listened with interest but with very skeptical faces. As
to joining, none of them had any idea of it.

At Harmannsdorf we industriously resumed our work. My husband wrote his
Caucasian story “Shamyl,” and I also sketched the plan of a new novel,
_Vor dem Gewitter_ (“Before the Storm”). What was meant was the
political and social storm whose clouds are rolling up in all quarters.
Literary work did not keep me from busying myself with the peace cause
so dear to me, for I kept up a steady correspondence with Hodgson Pratt,
Moscheles, Frédéric Passy, and others.

I received word from Pandolfi that he, encouraged by his success in
Venice, was now zealously at work in the Roman chamber, enlisting as
large a committee as possible for the Interparliamentary Conference. He
was having brilliant success; three hundred senators and deputies
enrolled themselves. Now he was especially concerned to have
parliamentary committees formed in Germany and Austria also, in order to
send representatives to the conference in Rome, the date of which was
set for November. He urged me, in case I had any connections with
Austrian parliamentarians, to assist in the matter. That was at the
beginning of June. What difficulties and what delays preceded the
formation of an Austrian group, will be apparent from a bunch of letters
which I have preserved from that time. The writers were people with whom
I had communicated in the matter first personally (we went to Vienna for
that purpose) and then by correspondence.

From Baron Kübeck, whose name I found in the London Peace Association
and who therefore seemed to me most fitted to further the cause, I
received a very explicit answer, which is interesting especially by its
excursions into the domain of foreign politics as they were understood
in the year 1891 in our political circles.

Vienna, June 11, 1891

Highly honored, most gracious Baroness:

First of all I beg your kind indulgence for my long delay in answering
your friendly communication. The highly interesting inclosure I return
with thanks, having taken a copy from the address circular (which
should perhaps be sent also to Smolka and Trautmannsdorf?).

My now somewhat overcrowded affairs, and especially my attempts to
sound some of my more prominent colleagues, are responsible for this
delay.

Taking all together, I believe that I find among the great men of our
party very little agreement with our—_your_—great ideas; that is to
say, in theory they may assent, but hardly as regards working to bring
them over into practical life.

Hofrat Beer regards it as inopportune and impossible to go to Rome as
a representative of the parliamentarians; Professor Suess is a kind of
war man himself in spite of his peace-breathing utterances;[31]
Bärnreither considers public talk about the matter as premature, and
so it goes. The proposition receives most assent, and, as it seems to
me, practical appreciation, among a few cultured Poles—why? because
they, having a tinge of cosmopolitanism, do not take that parochial
standpoint which unfortunately plays the principal part among our
German deputies.

I think I have also a strong inclination to sail in the cosmopolitan
channel; which has stamped me with a certain foreignness in the
circles with which I am in closest political harmony, and yet—wrongly.
But never mind—to business!

The opinion of the Poles with whom I have talked agrees with mine that
the present condition of chauvinistic hatred of Germany in France, and
likewise the danger threatening us on the side of Russia, cause the
Triple—or rather Double—Alliance, with its foundation of exorbitant
military preparation, to be a defensive necessity, a guaranty of
peace, even in the eyes of the populaces concerned. There is much
truth in this too, since the French _of to-day_ are not to be
capacitated, and Russia is only looking for a chance to conquer the
rest of Europe and British India by a sudden attack at an unexpected
moment—which, considering her supply of half-savage, battle-tried, and
pugnacious men, may easily be realized some day when Russia’s
shortcomings shall be exceeded by those of Europe; so probably nothing
remains but to wait for the ultimate undoing of this perpetual Gordian
knot, whether through the arduous work of a peaceful partition or
through the horrors of war.

But still there can and must be endeavor after that which can
_prepare_ for the final victory of arbitration, and under this head
come economic questions: customs unions, the facilitation of rail and
water transportation by unified tariffs, reciprocity of the credit
system and of the circulating medium, and so on. This will at least be
now attempted between Germany and Austro-Hungary, and will probably be
extended to Switzerland, Belgium, Italy, and some of the Balkan
states. The aim of these agreements is doubtless, among other things,
to make the burden of military preparations more endurable, and that
is _something_.

Furthermore, an effort should be made to diminish the horrors of war,
especially to put some limitation on the use of explosives[32] so as
to bring the destruction of property—to say nothing of human life—not
utterly out of proportion to the military purpose to be attained
(_vide_ the bombardment of Alexandria by Admiral Seymour, etc.).

This is the aim of the Polish gentlemen, one of whom, Koslowski, is my
fellow member in the Cobden Club of London and was also present at the
last Peace Congress. The second Pole would be Sopowski, who has
studied the Oriental question as very few have, and has written very
interestingly on it; finally, Szepanowski, whose long residence in
England has made him a genuine thorough-going cosmopolitan.

As regards arbitration, you will admit, most gracious Baroness, that
in a great political question arising, for example, between France and
Germany or between Russia and Austria, and affecting their very
existence, it will doubtless be impossible to find a power which could
undertake the office of arbitration, or to which it would be
intrusted. Perhaps the Pope? Yes, the idea would be quite worthy of
the Supreme Head of the Church, but will Protestant Germany or
schismatic Russia ever acquiesce in such an award? I doubt it. Yes, in
minor territorial questions (Luxemburg, Samoa, the Carolines, etc.)
submissiveness to an arbitrator who occupies a suitable neutral
position is possible and probable; but in such world-affecting
questions as those I have mentioned, probably not so soon, probably
not in the first thousand years.

This I desired to lay before you, most gracious Baroness. You know how
much I admire and appreciate you and your noble activities, and would
so gladly share in them as your faithful follower; but our
contemporaries will not heartily coöperate, and this must be taken
into consideration. But the modus to be provisionally adopted, as I
have permitted myself above to indicate it, bids fair to be successful
in securing many present advantages; and to this I should like to draw
your attention.

Accept, etc.

Max Kübeck

P.S. In Berlin, so far as my knowledge goes, Dr. Barth would be our
man; I will write him.

Permit me to lay at your feet my discourse on British India.

The Socialist deputy Pernerstorfer:

House of Deputies, Vienna,
June 16, 1891

Highly honored Lady:

I would willingly, at least for myself personally, obey your friendly
summons to go to Rome for the Peace Conference. But this is quite out
of the question for me, since such a journey, especially at the
present moment, exceeds my pecuniary ability; all the more as I should
have to take it not alone but accompanied by my wife. So what remains
possible toward meeting your desires is that I should help along the
propaganda for the Conference among the members of the Austrian House
of Deputies. Now you do mention some names, and I have not the least
doubt that the men you name are warm friends of the efforts toward
peace. Yet this friendship is certainly nothing but a highly Platonic
one, which does not go further than pathetic assurances and
sentimental phrases. You clearly have a far too favorable opinion of
the Austrian Parliament; the thoughts that govern this house are of a
purely practical, and often a very selfish, nature. Ideal endeavors
are here regarded as ideological, and moral indignation is not taken
seriously. It would be a tempting theme for a writer of creative power
to hold up a mirror to the world in a political novel. The detestable
picture would be seen of a class brutality such as had never before
come to light in such a degree.

So I cannot do anything in this second direction either. It is
possible, no doubt, to induce a few members of the Austrian Parliament
to take a trip to Rome, on which occasion they would have also to take
part in the Peace Conference; but do you really regard that as any
gain and as especially desirable?

I would not let this opportunity pass, highly honored lady, without
thanking you from the bottom of my heart for the great gratification
which you have given to me, as well as to so many, many others, by
your splendid book _Die Waffen nieder_. For those who, like myself,
are in public life, such a book is more than an enjoyment; it is a
great consolation and means an uplift and a new stimulus.

With the deepest respect,
Your sincerely devoted
Pernerstorfer

Here follow two more letters from deputies:

House of Deputies, Vienna,
June 21, 1891

Much-honored Baroness:

First of all allow me to thank you most heartily for your exceedingly
delightful favor. Baron Kübeck had already spoken to me of your noble
endeavors, with which I too am in the most cordial sympathy.

As I have long been in touch with the English Committee—and also have
the pleasure of personal intimacy with Rugg. Bonghi—I am fairly well
_au courant_ with the condition of things. Besides, it has always
intensely interested me to follow the course of cases in which the
principle of arbitration has come to be applied in international
controversies.

Certainly it cannot be denied that progress in this matter takes place
with infinite slowness; hence, to begin with, it is peculiarly
difficult, at least in our circles, to enlist adherents for a cause
which to-day seems still Utopian. The counter argument, in the words
“Russia, France,” is not to be got rid of.

We must, therefore, begin by realizing that to-day there can be
attained at best nothing more than perhaps to have a small number of
deputies show an inclination toward an expression of sympathy, and, in
addition, toward inducing one of their number to go to Rome.

Baron Kübeck and I will not fail to try for this. You will understand
that of course I shall not fail to confer with Baron Pirquet and
Pernerstorfer, and likewise with Count Coronini.

In case I have any favorable news to send, I shall take pleasure in
reporting it, since personal contact with you, Frau Baronin, even if
it be only by letter, can only be very delightful to me.

With respect,
Dr. Jaques

Dr. Wilhelm Exner, president of the Technological Trade Museum and
section chief, wrote:

Vöslau, June 29, 1891

Highly honored Baroness:

Your friendly lines of the twenty-sixth instant cause me some
embarrassment, as does any disproportionately great reward which one
yet neither can nor would decline. I am much surprised to find any
value attached to the fact when a politician who _as such_ plays so
unimportant a part joins himself to those who declare for an idea the
justification of which cannot be gainsaid by any one. I made my avowal
to the last Peace Congress held in London; what does that signify in
comparison with your brilliant literary propaganda?!!!

I am going to send your letter to an autograph collector, who is a
friend of mine, the Princess Pauline Metternich, if you will allow me.

It is my intention to go to Rome, if my parliamentary duties permit of
it, and I look forward to obtaining one great personal advantage
thereby—your acquaintance. If my genial colleagues Pirquet and Kübeck
also go to Rome, the days there are likely to be splendid. This
prospect is almost too fine to hope for realization.

For the present, allow me, honored Baroness, to express to you my
sincerest and warmest thanks for your letter, and to put myself with
the greatest pleasure at the service of that endeavor for which your
pen is proving to be such a valuable factor.

With especial esteem, respect, and devotion, most gracious Baroness,

Yours,
Exner

To this correspondence belong also the two following letters from the
Marquis Pandolfi in Rome.

Rome, June 13, 1891

Dear Baroness,

I have to inform you that the deputies of Germany have replied,
accepting all our propositions and promising to visit us. Only they
wish the Conference to be postponed till the beginning of November.

So then all countries have heeded the appeal with the exception of the
parliaments of Vienna and Budapest. These must be labored with, and
you can do that better than I, with the assistance of a friend in the
Reichsrat.

I am sending you the copy of a letter which I have addressed to the
Germans; it may serve you as a pattern of what you will want to write
to your friends, of course with such changes as are requisite.

Finally, I beg you to give me the names of the presiding officers of
both houses in Vienna and Budapest. I am sending you under separate
cover the constitution of our Committee, and later, as soon as it is
printed, you will receive the full list of our Parliamentary
Committee,—more than three hundred members.

Best regards to your husband, etc.

B. Pandolfi

(Without date)

Dear Baroness:

I have come to Stra for some days. As soon as I return to town you
will get:

The first circular, which we have sent to all our deputies and
senators;

The second circular, which we dispatched a few days ago.

Baron Kübeck will have to do just as I did if he wants to make a
success of it:

1. In order to form the first nucleus of deputies he must personally
tackle the most active and best-known members, one at a time, and
request their signatures to a declaration by which they concur in the
formation of a Parliamentary Committee.

2. When this first nucleus is formed (thirty or forty are enough) hold
a first meeting and appoint a provisory board.

3. Then the board will send out invitations to all the deputies,
explaining the purposes of the organization, and, above all, the first
purpose—to designate a number of such deputies as are willing to come
to Rome.

4. After that, for all further steps, to communicate with me.

5. As soon as the committee is formed and the board appointed you must
let me know their names, and thereupon a letter will be sent to the
gentlemen in the name of the whole Italian Committee, asking them to
come to Rome. They will receive the formal invitations and programmes
later.

In the meantime I will inform you that at the last conference in
London thirty-six members of foreign parliaments were appointed to
make preparations for the third conference. Among these thirty-six
members Austria is represented by Count Wilczek and Cavaliere Bolesta
von Koslowski, and Hungary by Count Apponyi and Dr. Viktor Hagara. I
have sent to each of these four gentlemen a circular, of which you
shall receive a copy as soon as I get to Rome; but thus far not one of
the gentlemen has replied, so far as I am aware, and this is not
encouraging.

Altogether this committee of thirty-six has turned out badly, and I
think the matter must be otherwise arranged in future.

The best way is for Parliamentary Committees to be formed in each
country in the manner that I have explained above.

With heartiest greetings, etc.,
Pandolfi

The Interparliamentary Group in Austria was formed—formed through the
zeal, born of real conviction, of one of the deputies to whom at my
suggestion Baron Kübeck (himself not wholly convinced, as his letter
shows) had addressed himself: Peter, Baron Pirquet. He remained for
years at the head of the group, represented it with talent and tact at
all the subsequent conferences, and his crowning act was the
organization of the Interparliamentary Conference at Vienna in the year
1903. After the group was formed, delegates for Rome were appointed,
among them Dr. Russ and Baron Pirquet, and thus the participation of
Austria in the third Interparliamentary Conference was assured.

XXIX
FOUNDING OF THE AUSTRIAN PEACE SOCIETY
Appeal in the _Neue Freie Presse_ · Response from the public · Adhesions
and contributions of money · Prosper von Piette sends a thousand
florins · Dr. Kunwald · Preliminary meeting · Joining the International
League · Circular for the formation of a national union · Letter from
the Duke of Oldenburg · Permanent organization · Voices from members of
the world’s intellectual aristocracy

But how was it with the Peace Congress,—that is, the congress of the
private peace society, which was to meet in Rome at the same time,—would
Austria be unrepresented in that? Of course, since no peace association
existed in Austria. This thought gave me no rest. It must surely be
possible to gather adherents for the idea. The result of my
excogitations was an appeal which I sent to the _Neue Freie Presse_ on
the first of September, 1891, without much hope that the paper would
publish it. Great were my joy and amazement when on the third of
September, on opening the sheet, I discovered my article in a prominent
place, with a footnote by the editor saying that “no one can have a
better right to speak on the question proposed than the author of _Die
Waffen nieder_.”

By way of introduction the article told of the approaching congress in
Rome, the assured participation of the Austrian parliamentarians, and
the need of forming also a private association whose delegates should
take part in the congress at Rome. Then it went on:

This is the way affairs stand: Armies millions strong—divided into two
camps clashing their arms—are awaiting only a signal to spring at each
other; but in the mutual trembling dread at the immeasurable horror of
the threatening outbreak may be found some security for its delay.

But postponement is not suppression. The so-called “blessings” of
peace which the system of armed dread endeavors to maintain are
guaranteed to us only from year to year, are always represented only
as lasting, “it is to be hoped,” for a while yet. Of the abolition of
war, of a total suppression of the principle of force, the powers that
are leagued in an armed fraternity for “the maintenance of peace” will
not hear a word. To them war is sacred, ineradicable, and men must not
dream of doing away with it; but it is also, in view of the dimensions
which a coming conflagration will develop into, dreadful to them,
inexcusable before their own consciences, so it must not be begun.

But what an unnatural thing that is which must not stop nor begin, not
be denied nor affirmed! An eternal preparation for that which is to be
avoided by the preparation, at the same time an avoidance of that
which by the avoidance is prepared! This monstrous contradiction is
thus explained: that creation of historical antiquity which they are
still trying to preserve—“merry” war that shifts jurisdictions,
bestows power, and claims only a fraction of the population—has in the
course of time, through the development of civilization, become a
moral and physical impossibility.

Morally impossible because men have lost something of their savagery
and disregard of life; physically impossible because the accessions to
our technology of destruction during the past twenty years would make
of the next campaign a thing that would be something quite new and
different, no longer to be designated by the name of war. _If one
should prepare a bath for long hours, heat the water, heat it until it
boiled and ran over, then could what happened to any one who should at
last get into the tub, or rather fall in, still be called a “bath”?_ A
few years more of such “maintenance” of peace, of such inventions of
machines for murder,—electric mines, ekrasit-loaded aërial
torpedoes,—and on the day when war is declared all the Dual, Triple,
and Quadruple alliances will be blown to shivers.

Those who have the slow-match in their hands luckily take notice of
this. They know that with such a supply of powder the consequences
would be terrible if they should carelessly or even wantonly set it
afire. So in order to increase this beneficent carefulness the supply
of powder is constantly increased. Would it not be simpler,
voluntarily and unanimously to take away the slow-matches? in other
words, disarm? Establish an international reign of law—fuse into one
group the separate groups which constantly swear to each other that if
attacked by some other group they will fight shoulder to
shoulder—_found the alliance of the civilized states of Europe_?

The various alliances now stand face to face as equals in power and
dignity. What is to hinder their making what they now set as their
aim—peace—the foundation of their existence? What hinders it? the law
of inertia on the one hand, and on the other hand the fomented
national hatred, the flurry constantly kept up by the noisiest
party—the war party—in every land.

The noisiest to be sure—but yet at the same time the smallest. A
little body of chauvinists here and there. In Russia a group of
Panslavists—the Tsar desires peace; in France a group of
revenge-seekers—the government desires peace; among us and in Germany
a few militarists—both the emperors desire peace. To say nothing of
the people; they yearn for peace and have a right to it. The shouts of
martial comradeship which are uttered here and there on the occasion
of various welcomes to fleets, and which may so easily be interpreted
as the expression of a desire for war on the part of the peoples,
ought no longer to be so misunderstood: have we really not yet learned
that there is nothing more epidemic than hurrahs and vivas? that these
shouts must always, on behalf of every cause, rend the air as soon as
the first signal is given—by a natural necessity, like the rolling of
thunder after the flash of lightning?

Small then, that is certain, is the number of those that still desire
a state of war. Still smaller the number of those that acknowledge
this desire aloud and proclaim it in their own name. On the other
hand, infinitely great are the masses who yearn for peace, not peace
prolonged in fear and trembling but peace securely guaranteed. Among
these, however, the number is again very small who believe in the
possibility of fulfillment for their wish, and who have combined to
proclaim aloud their purpose and to make for this goal with united
effort. He who waves the white flag has millions behind him, but these
millions are still dumb.

The article then went on to tell of the beginnings that had already been
made in other countries, and ended with a request that people would send
in letters of adhesion, with the purpose of having the supporters unite
in a league which might send its representatives to the congress in
Rome.

It had surprised me that the _Presse_ so willingly printed my appeal; I
was still more surprised at the response which it awakened in the
public. Hundreds of letters (they will be found among my possessions
when I die) poured in on me from Vienna and from the provinces and from
all classes of society. Enthusiastic concurrence, joyous offers of
coöperation, also promises of pecuniary assistance. A rich manufacturer
of Bohemia, Prosper Piette was his name, inclosed in his simply
registered letter a thousand-florin note to be expended at will in the
service of the cause; I sent the offering to Rome by the next mail, to
the committee for the organization of the congress.

Out of the letters I selected a few which were especially adapted to
inspire confidence, and entered into personal communication with the
writers of them so as to form, with them and with their help, a
provisory committee that should call a first meeting. Doctor Kunwald the
lawyer, one of the first who had sent in their names in response to my
article, and whose letter was among the most enthusiastic, gave me
efficient help in this matter. An invitation was extended to all authors
of letters of adhesion living in Vienna to meet together on a certain
day at a certain place for the purpose of holding a constituent
assembly. Accompanied by Doctor Kunwald I repaired to the designated
hall. My husband had been ill with bronchial catarrh for several days,
and could not come from Harmannsdorf to Vienna. The meeting was pretty
well attended. The chairmanship was conferred upon me as having sent out
the original summons; but, since I was too inexperienced to perform the
duties of the office in parliamentary manner, I authorized Dr. Kunwald
to preside in my name. Those present listened to the reading of that
article of the constitution of the English Peace Association which says:

Each of these national sections, however great the number of their
members may be, is constituted through the simple fact that all are
agreed to work for the common end.

Even an assembly held in a private house, without any appeal to the
public, may be regarded as the nucleus of such a section. It is
sufficient to nominate a secretary and to vote to meet at least once a
month, in order to keep in touch with the progress of the union and to
devise means for propaganda.

As soon as a section is recognized by the Central Committee in London,
it belongs to the Association.

I was now commissioned to draw up a new circular inviting to the
definitive formation of an association, and to induce influential
personages to join in signing this circular as preliminary committee. I
undertook this labor, and on the eighteenth of October all the journals
printed the following appeal, with full headings:

The International Peace and Arbitration Association (headquarters in
London; president, Hodgson Pratt; vice presidents, the Duke of
Westminster, Cardinal Manning, the Marquis of Ripon, the Bishop of
London, etc.), whose various branches, established in almost every
country in Europe, are to be represented at the next Congress (Rome,
November 9, 1891), has now among the rest, by action taken at a
preliminary meeting of sympathizers held on the twenty-ninth of
September, an _Austrian section_.

But in order that this section may be able effectively to perform the
duties devolving on it in this country, in order that it may be in a
condition to spread and grow strong, it has determined to organize
itself as a regular and legal society, whose constitution is then to
be submitted to the proper authorities for acceptance.

The Association is _not to be political_, for its object—“the
furtherance of the principle of a durable peace among the nations”—is
purely _humanitarian_. If, in the last analysis, it is incumbent upon
this tendency to exert some influence on the course of politics in
general, this is only what is common to all humanitarian and
civilizing efforts; for all such are characterized by aiming at the
amelioration and progress of human society, and thus influence the
development of social conditions in all directions. We are concerning
ourselves only with one thing,—the recognition and promulgation of the
simple principle that

_human society—whether as individuals or as groups of individuals,
called nations—has to seek the foundation of its true welfare in
unity, not in separation; in mutual cöoperation, not in mutual
enmity_.

Moreover, connection with the society presupposes the conviction that
war is a fearful evil, but by no means an _unavoidable evil_; that in
the intercourse of civilized nations the status of force should, and
may, be replaced by the status of law.

So one who joins the general Peace Association, or any of its
branches, does not have to start with any political programme; on the
contrary, _the advocacy of any such programme is excluded from the
debates of the meetings by the constitution_. In the community of
_purpose_ is to be found the reason why the hosts of the friends of
peace may be drawn from all ranks and all parties; hence it is, too,
that in the lists of members of the various peace societies the names
of Whigs and Tories, of socialists and aristocrats, of freethinkers
and church dignitaries, stand together.

If service in the army were not _in limine_ a bar to all participation
in public associations, even active soldiers might become members; for
they are not there to defend _war_, but to defend their country in
case war breaks out. They have just as much human right to desire the
disappearance of this calamity as the physician has to desire the
disappearance of epidemics. A universally known and honored person has
given to this view the following noble and courageous expression, in a
letter in which he offers his name for membership:

“... Although upon the breaking out of any war in which Germany was
involved (I am a colonel _à la suite_ in the Prussian army; I was
retired in 1875 as a semi-invalid) I should immediately present myself
for reinstatement in the army, yet I am in no sense fond of war; on
the contrary, I regard war as a terrible calamity, even for the
_victor_. I have taken part in two campaigns, not as one of a large
staff but with the troops, and have thus had enough—more than
enough—of opportunity to know from my own observation and experience
the whole unnamable wretchedness which every war brings in its train.
Joyfully, therefore, do I accept your invitation, and will most gladly
strive to further, to the extent of my powers, the large-hearted,
noble, and—may God grant it—also beneficent undertaking which you have
started.

“Elimar Herzog von Oldenburg.”

The first, the only purpose which we have in view is the intimation of
our own desire for peace and the creation of a sufficiently educated
public opinion.

The practical methods to be used in our activities for this purpose
consist in the dissemination of printed matter, circulars, and
declarations; the insertion of articles in the daily press, the
delivery of public addresses, the familiarization of people with the
literature of the subject, and, upon sufficient occasion, the
publication of pamphlets or books; the sending of delegates to
meetings and congresses; constant communication with the allied
societies, and unremitting care to keep up to date the knowledge of
the condition and progress of the general movement.

To the constituent assembly—to which all who have sent in their
adhesion, or shall send it in, will receive invitations; it will be
called together in the second half of this month—is reserved the
acceptance of the proposed constitution, the election of the permanent
board of management, and the appointment of the delegates which the
Austrian Peace Society now in process of formation wishes to send to
Rome.

Vienna, October 18, 1891

The preliminary committee:

B. Ritter von Carneri
Geh. Rat Graf Carl Coronini
Graf Rudolf Hoyos
Prof. Freiherr von Krafft-Ebing
Reichsratsabgeordneter Freiherr von Pirquet
P. K. Rosegger
Dr. Carl Ritter von Scherzer
A. G. Freiherr von Suttner
Bertha Baronin von Suttner-Kinsky
Fürst Alfred Wrede

A few days after the publication of this circular the definitive
formation of the governmentally authorized _Österreichische
Friedensgesellschaft_—Austrian Peace Society—took place in the Old
Rathaus, with a membership of two thousand.

Enthusiastic addresses were made, and the delegates were appointed—six
in number—who should represent the youngest peace union at the congress.
The treasury of the society had already sufficient funds to enable it to
pay traveling expenses.

Now we made our preparations for going to Rome. I also wrote to sundry
distinguished personages at home and abroad, requesting letters of
greeting and approval which I might lay before the congress.

Some of these, as well as of those that had already been sent
spontaneously, I insert here; they belong to the history of the
beginnings of the Austrian Peace Society:

Madame:

I was just reading your novel _Die Waffen nieder_, which Mr. Bulgakof
had sent me, when I received your letter. I greatly appreciate your
work, and the idea comes to me that the publication of your novel is a
happy augury.

The abolition of slavery was preceded by the famous book of a woman,
Mrs. Beecher Stowe; God grant that the abolition of war may follow
upon yours. I do not believe that arbitration is an efficient means of
abolishing war. I am just about finishing a treatise on this subject,
in which I discuss the only means which in my opinion can render wars
impossible. Nevertheless, all efforts dictated by a sincere love for
humanity will bear fruit; and the congress at Rome, I am certain, will
contribute much, just as that at London last year did, to popularize
the idea of the flagrant contradiction in which Europe finds itself
between the military status of the nations and the Christian and
humanitarian principles which they profess.

Receive, Madame, the assurance of my sentiments of genuine esteem and
sympathy.

(Signed) Léon Tolstoy[33]

October 10/22, 1891

Berlin, October 20, 1891

Highly honored Lady:

Receive my sincere thanks for giving me too an occasion for announcing
my whole-hearted indorsement of the lofty and magnificent work in
which you are taking such a prominent part both in word and deed. I
joyfully and unreservedly declare myself in accord with the objects of
the International Peace and Arbitration Association. That these
objects are attainable, that some day they will be attained, is my
firm and heartfelt faith, just as I believe in the progress of
humanity. And I could think of nothing that could occupy a human life
more greatly and worthily than to cöoperate in bringing about this
realization,—than to fight for assured peace. If in this battle you
can make use of my assistance, highly honored lady, then command me
utterly; your call will always find me willing and prepared. I shall
never cease to exert myself in public and in private to have war
recognized more and more widely as what it is,—as the saddest and most
shameful relapse into barbarism, the most terrible crime against the
genius of humanity.

Accept the expression of the hearty respect with which I shall always
be

Your wholly devoted
Ludwig Fulda

Paris, October 30, 1891

... You will not doubt that I am with you at heart, and that I have
the warmest sympathy and approval for your efforts to disseminate
ideas of peace, of reconciliation, of civilized forms of law, even in
the relations of nation to nation.

Of course I know, as well as the doubter and scoffer who seems to
himself so wise, that the Peace and Arbitration League can scarcely
count on practical results at this moment or in the immediate future.
But as a writer I believe in the might of the word, and its function
in changing traditional views and spreading new and better ones. If I
did not believe in this, I should long ago have broken my pen. So let
us write and speak unweariedly against the horror of war. _Semper
aliquid haeret_, and gradually we shall convert the governments and
nations from barbarians to men!

Dr. Max Nordau

Munich, October 29, 1891

... My most respectful greeting to all friends of peace! Only the
brute in man can desire war. So let all the inciters and promoters of
war be treated as brutes and put out of the decent society of
civilized men. And, moreover, let any one who in the press eggs on war
and speaks in favor of wholesale murder be brought before the courts
as a common bravo and assassin.

... The last word in this fearful question of blood, to which the
flower of the country is sacrificed, does not rest with the men at
all, but with the mothers.

Dr. M. G. Conrad

Neuilly-Paris, October 12, 1891

... I rejoice in that happy event, the newly formed Peace Society.
This is a fresh encouragement to our endeavors, a new reason to hope
for good results. To be sure there are still many prejudices to meet,
and perhaps also enmities to overcome; but that is only one more
reason for recognizing the necessity of having our efforts supported
by an imposing number of representatives of all nations. It is time,
it is high time, that genuinely universal demonstrations should—by
encouraging the timid—call forth an uprising of the conscience of
mankind, and that society should stand on its guard against the ruin,
the misery, the crime, by which it is threatened.

Frédéric Passy
Député de la Seine, membre de l’Institut et président de la
Société française de la paix et de l’arbitrage

Paris, October 30, 1891

I trust my telegram of greeting to the Austrian Peace Union reached
the meeting in time.

Our League, founded at Geneva in the year 1867 under the chairmanship
of Garibaldi and Victor Hugo, was the first peace society, I think,
that elected a woman to its committee. This will show you, gracious
lady, how deeply we wish you well in your noble initiative. With all
our hearts we extend to the newly founded society our sympathy and
devotion.

Charles Lemonnier
Président de la Ligue de la paix et de la liberté à Genève

Berlin, November 12, 1891

Your name is mentioned among the promoters of a movement which is to
lead humanity “upward,” Christianity toward its fulfillment.

I regard it as my duty to approach you respectfully and to beg you to
regard me as one of those who join in the loftiest efforts with all
their might. Every fiber of my being belongs to the “upbuilding of a
kingdom of God on earth,” to the “coming of Christianity.” This
comprehends all the efforts of good men. I am all on fire with
idealism, and yet I am no fancymonger. You have to do with “a man
among men.” Undismayed, but also unbefooled, I shall go on in the
paths that are marked out for me. The more comprehensive our action
is, the more effective; the more resolute, the more beneficent; the
more simultaneous along the whole line, the more thorough the success.

“Now, then, something must come.” I live in the firm conviction (to me
the word “belief” would not be enough for this) that we stand before
the gate that at once parts us from and admits us to the age of
completion. To grasp the latch with a vigorous hand seems to me the
duty of all those to whom God has granted the ability to do so.

M. v. Egidy, Oberstleutnant a. D.

Kilchberg near Zürich

... From the inmost conviction I declare myself in accord with the
aims of every peace union, in obedient veneration of our sublime
Master from Nazareth. Here his disciple, our dear Leo Tolstoi, is
incontrovertibly in the right.

Only I believe that we of our profession can accomplish even more for
the good and great cause through our slowly but certainly infiltrating
books than through associated activities—of this you yourself have
given a shining example—though of course the latter also have their
value.

Conrad Ferdinand Meyer

(Without date)

I do not believe there can be a thinking and feeling man who does not
inwardly belong to the League of Peace; and if our states were
“Christian” not merely on paper but in the deep meaning of the word,
there would be no need of a League of Peace.

Friedrich Spielhagen

Jena, October 31, 1891

Gracious and honored Lady:

I hope that these lines, with the assurance that I thoroughly approve
the aims of the International Peace and Arbitration Association and am
ready and willing to become a member, will reach you while you are
still in Vienna.

Although I believe with Heraclitus that battle is the father of all
things, yet I hope and wish with all my heart that the better stock of
competition for the higher blessings of civilization may displace the
savage and cruel conflict of races and the bloody warfare between
nations, which at present still, as in the Middle Ages, brings the
greatest wretchedness to the “highly civilized” nations of the present
day.

May the Peace Congress in Rome on the ninth of November be attended by
the best results!

With especially high respect, your devoted
Ernst Haeckel

XXX
UNION FOR RESISTANCE TO ANTI-SEMITISM
A. G. von Suttner, Count Hoyos, Baron Leitenberger, and Professor
Nothnagel found the Union · Article in the _Neue Freie Presse_

Before I write of the congress in Rome I want to go back a bit. In
the spring of 1891—consequently before the founding of the
Interparliamentary Group and the Peace Association in Vienna—my
husband had also brought into existence an association of which I
wish to tell.

We were still in the Caucasus when, at the beginning of the eighties, we
were informed of the Anti-Semitic movement started in Prussia, and
propagated by Court Chaplain Stöcker. This phenomenon, I need hardly
say, aroused lively disgust in us. We set forth the arguments against
this reversion to the Middle Ages in various articles written for the
Vienna papers on which we were regular collaborators, but the articles
were returned to us on the ground that in Austria there was no
Anti-Semitism, and if any of it should spread from Prussia to us the
only proper attitude toward it would be contemptuous silence. Later
events showed that this attitude was not the proper one. Wrong must be
withstood if it is recognized as such; there is no other way. In such
cases silence, though professing to express contempt, is itself
contemptible. Not only must the victims react against it, it is also for
those who are not personally concerned to antagonize a wrong wherever
they see it. Their silence is complicity, and generally springs from the
same motives as the silence of the victims,—that is, from timidity. Only
not to come into any collision, only not to subject one’s self to
annoyances,—that is the motive at bottom, even if it does outwardly bear
itself as genteel reserve.

After we came home the Anti-Semitic movement in Vienna had taken on
especially brutal forms. In the year 1891 it had even gone as far as
violence. The indignation which my husband felt boiled over.

“Something must be done!” was his decision.

And he sat down and wrote a constitution and a plan of action and an
appeal. And now what he had to do was to find some prominent men who
would go hand in hand with him. That same evening—we were just then in
Vienna—he went to look up Count Hoyos in his residence on the
Kolowratring. “The gentleman is not in,” said the servant; “he is
downstairs in the club.” My husband immediately betook himself to the
lower floor, where the clubrooms were situated, and sent for the count,
who was sitting at a whist table.

“What is it, dear Suttner, anything very urgent?”

“Yes, justice for the persecuted—”

“Out with it!”

Count Hoyos took hold of the matter enthusiastically, and proposed to
invite his whist partner, Baron Leitenberger, the well-known Liberal
manufacturer, to join the provisory committee. So he also was called
out, and a few moments later the formation of the league was a settled
thing among these three. The next day Professor Nothnagel, so highly
regarded both as a man and as a savant, came in with them; and a short
time afterwards the constituting assembly met, with these four men at
the speakers’ table. After the appeal had been printed in the papers,
several hundred, including personages prominent in Viennese society and
politics, had joined. On the day after the first meeting the _Neue Freie
Presse_ published the following article, which will give the best
explanation of the author’s ideas and purposes:

THE UNION FOR RESISTANCE TO ANTI-SEMITISM

BY A. GUNDACCAR VON SUTTNER

Vienna, July 21

Yesterday our Union came into existence as a legally recognized
society, to begin action against that hostile movement which is aimed
directly against a portion of our fellow-citizens. This is the object
stated in section 2 of the constitution: in plain terms, to combat the
Anti-Semitic movement, and to do this by public lectures, the
dissemination of informatory literature, discussions, and, if
necessary, the founding of an organ to represent the Union.

Politics is excluded: primarily because our Union is not political,
and in the next place because the matter in question is social in the
strict sense of the word and has nothing to do with the conduct of
state business. The proof of this lies in the fact that we reckon
among our members persons of every shade of belief, that we welcome
without exception every one who is in full enjoyment of his civic
rights.

A certain order of opponents who are never at a loss for false and
mendacious allegations have already made the attempt to represent our
Union as one that purposes to take the field against Christianity in
favor of the Jews. Hostile attacks of this kind carry their own
condemnation. As a proof of the falsity of their assertions stands the
fact that we already number among our members priests of the two chief
Christian denominations, and that we announce the distinct expectation
of gradually enlisting all those who are first and foremost called to
preach the word of peace, of love to our neighbors, of humanity.

In a time when men are founding societies to protect dumb animals from
cruelty—and that with absolute justification—it is, I think, only
logical that we should at last take a stand also against cruelty to
our fellow-men, all the more as the attacks have not been confined to
assaults upon honor, but have taken the form of acts of violence which
have given our Jewish fellow-citizens every reason to fear for the
safety of their existence. I will mention only those suburban heroes
who smashed the windows of Jewish women and shouted threats of murder
at them; those soldiers who struck down an old man on the street; that
schoolboy who thrust a knife into the eye of one of his Semitic
comrades. These are individual cases out of many; a single one would
have been enough to stir all right-thinking men to a great cry of
indignation.

The party against which we are arraying ourselves seems to have
contemplated nothing less than to decree for Austria a sort of moral
state of siege, and thereby to bring a pressure to bear on the
timorous souls of whom there are more than enough, whereby many of
these will allow themselves to be enrolled in order not to call down
upon their heads the wrath of that association, which is always ready
with the appellative _Judenknecht_. Special laws directed against the
Jews, like those that have reached such a magnificent development in
Russia, would naturally not have been long in making their appearance,
and ultimately, as a logical consequence, special laws against all who
do not think as do those gentlemen of the persecuting party.

Well, to-day, by good fortune, it appears that there are still
Austrians who will not submit to such a reign of terror, and who
answer such demands with the cry, “Browbeating won’t work.”

In the bosom of the opposing party, on the other hand, the reign of
terror has broken out; every one who there believes himself called to
be a leader takes the proverb “Bend or break” to heart; every one
collects his troops around him and forms a detachment which snarls at
every other. Skirmishes also have already been fought, with fists and
words, and the lawsuits growing out of them show us clearly and
distinctly what is going on behind the scenes of that stage. This
ought to open the eyes of many an objective observer who has supposed
that he was falling in with the demands of the times if he joined that
troop.

Originally, when Herr Stöcker was still having his day, Anti-Semitism
attempted to put itself on the ground of Christianity, and of
threatened Christianity at that, and to conjure up a religious
question. This plan was a lamentable failure, for there were enough
honorable religious teachers who opposed it. Then the attempt was made
to lay emphasis on race differences and to make these the basis of
up-to-date persecution. Here also the results were meager, and so they
ultimately hit upon the method of rousing human passion, of heating up
the hatred and envy of all those, bringing all those to the
burning-point, who had little or nothing to lose but hoped to gain
much. Of course the matter could not be allowed to pass as mere
commercial or competitive jealousy; a scientific whitewash had to be
applied to the whole thing, and so they got footing on the social
question: accumulated capital is the destroyer of the little man; the
Jew has accumulated capital in his hands, therefore the Jew is the
destroyer of the little man. That there are among the Jews themselves
whole masses of little men who have scarcely a crust to nibble was
entirely lost from sight—such a thing simply does not count with
logicians of that stamp; they have in sight only the Christian little
man and the Jewish big man.

It is a recognized fact that you can fool the heedless masses with
certain catchwords as much as you please. It is the children’s game,
_Schneider, leih’ mir die Scher_ (“Puss in the Corner”), arranged for
the use of grown-up people: the one who tries to find a place knows
perfectly well that the place to which the other directs him is not
empty, but he runs toward it obediently, and meanwhile the wily fox
swaps his place for a better and snaps his finger laughingly at the
one dispossessed. This is the game played by those men who sin at the
phrase “social question”: “The Jew has an empty place”—and the dupe
makes for the Jew. Since he knows incidentally that his “friends” are
not well disposed toward the Jew, he means at least to get this much
advantage from the game, that he will vent his temper on the man; he
can do this without any expenditure of great courage and without
peril, for he has behind him a superior power which springs to his
aid—if the aid costs nothing more than a few fisticuffs.

As far as this dragging in of the social question is concerned, these
florid speakers only commit the trifling error of adopting for their
science absolutely faulty premises, so that their whole edifice is
shaky at its foundation. No social reformer, no economist of the
present time will look for the evil in accumulated capital as such.
The man who should keep his millions locked up in his strong box in
the form of packages of bank notes—for so the common throng imagines
it—would ultimately perish of starvation, for it is a law of nature
that what is not renewed is at last used up. Accumulated capital,
then, is not in itself the cause but only the result. The evil has its
roots elsewhere; and if once these roots are radically extirpated,
then capital will of necessity circulate in such a way as to pass
through all hands.

A few representatives of the people have already indicated the
solution of the social enigma—if I am not mistaken, Dr. Menger
recently. It is not our affair, however, to go into this in detail
here, for our aim is simply to bring out the fact that the
Anti-Semitic movement on the basis of social science stands on feet of
clay, and that the men who to bolster their cause trespass on this
ground have only an utterly superficial acquaintance with the
question, most of them none at all. But the average man allows himself
to be persuaded easily, for he has learned a deal at school—but not
logical thinking. Now if he sees that another is (or rather seems to
be) doing this business for him, then so much the better; then he
gladly lets the other take the trouble and believes that he has done
his part when he joins in the hue and cry.

A few days ago an Anti-Semitic member of the Reichsrat took the floor
with an interpellation; it related to our Union and to the accession
of a man whose name is spoken with reverence and gratitude throughout
all Austria. The speech may receive a suitable rejoinder in a proper
place; I wish only to mention here that the said deputy used words to
this effect: that it appeared by our appeal that the Union intended to
wage battle in a “hostile,” extremely “acrimonious,” and
“unscrupulous” manner against the Anti-Semitic party as such and also
against all those citizens who cherish an Anti-Semitic spirit.

Hostile? Acrimonious? Unscrupulous? I should hope not! Those who think
that they have to see in Anti-Semitism a movement serviceable to the
general good we pity because they are on the wrong track, and we hope
that we shall be able by convincing proofs to bring them back to the
right path. Those that have found in Anti-Semitism personal means for
personal ends we _despise_, as every honorably-thinking man despises
him who uses unfair means to promote his own interests. Hostility and
acrimony, therefore, are not the right words. And as for
unscrupulousness, it depends on what the word is taken to mean. If our
opponents expect that we are going to take the tone that they are
pleased to use,—in which, for instance, they give their readers in the
_Unverfälschte Deutsche Worte_ the news about the formation of our
Union,—they, are mistaken. Such co-workers we would never accept into
our membership, for decency is above all things to be preserved in our
camp. We are of the opinion that no cause can ever be helped toward
good repute by abusive words. Some hundreds of years ago they would
indeed have had their effect, for then behind such strong expressions
came knock-down arguments with the fist, and the stronger fist
prevailed. But really to-day the great majority is better bred, and
rowdy attack with word and deed is not to the taste of the cultured
inhabitants of Austria.

Among our objects is also that of stirring our fellow-citizens to
independent thinking. We do not wish to dictate, we wish to lead and
to point out the way which it would be wise to take. Our two weapons
are to be reason and the sense of justice; with these, we are fit to
meet all attacks. We cannot be put down with pseudo-science, with
juggled statistics, with distortion of truth and justice, and other
such approved weapons; for we have in our ranks men who are
preeminently qualified to annihilate such arguments with strictly
scientific and expert methods, and to floor their antagonists _coram
publico_. In a word, we feel that we are strong, we feel that we are
equal to the work which we have undertaken.

Their opponents proved to be stronger. I shall have occasion hereafter
to tell something of the course that matters subsequently took. But now
I will return to the point where I broke off—to the Peace Congress at
Rome.

XXXI
THE CONGRESS IN ROME
Frame of mind · Life together in the Hotel Quirinal · General Türr and
his career · Little revolution against Bonghi · Alsace-Lorraine · The
Grelix couple · Baron Pirquet · Opening festival on the Capitol ·
Ruggero Bonghi as chairman · Weighty words · Founding of the Bern
Central Bureau · Echoes · The monthly _Die Waffen nieder_ is launched ·
A. H. Fried · “The Important Thing”

To Rome! No one can undertake the journey to the Eternal City without
being overcome by a certain feeling of awe. There vibrates in the soul a
diapason of historic and æsthetic tones, of memories of antiquity and
the Renaissance; pictures rise of Forum and Vatican, of gladiators and
cardinals, of palaces and churches, of entrancing gardens and dazzling
treasures of art. We also, both of us, quivered with this peculiar
_frisson_ of joyous expectation when we found ourselves in the train
that bore us Romewards. My Own naturally felt it with especial force,
for he was to see the Eternal City for the first time. And this frame of
mind was still more intensified by the object of our journey,—a
congress, a Peace Congress. That was history too, only not ancient
history, but the most modern; strictly speaking, the history of a future
at whose gates one could as yet only knock; but what a new and beautiful
world lay behind these gates!—And was I actually on my way thither as
the delegate of a society which I myself had called into existence, and
should I there—in the Capitol—meet and take counsel with statesmen from
all climes? Was it not an unheard-of temerity, or, in simpler terms, a
piece of impudence? It had all come about so quickly; I had acted under
such an irresistible impulse, under the compulsion of an eager will, but
also under the protection of that naïveté which consists in ignorance of
difficulties and hindrances, and which helps forward every hazardous
undertaking better than deliberation and experience.

When we arrived at our destination the Interparliamentary Conference was
still in session; our Congress was not to begin till two days later.
Almost all the participants in the two events had taken up their
quarters in the Hotel Quirinal; and so this whole international society
of pacifists—at that time, to be sure, the expression “pacifism” had not
been coined—was brought together in constant intercourse,—in the large
dining-room at meals, in the halls at all hours of the day in conferring
groups, in the drawing-rooms in social intercourse. Here I found all the
old friends and colleagues with whom I had so long been in
correspondence, and many new friends besides. I remember that at my
first arrival there was standing in the vestibule a tall, martial
figure, with a white mustache a quarter of a yard long, and an
acquaintance who was present introduced “General Türr.” Happy omen, that
the first antagonist of war whom we met at the place of the Congress was
a general, “a grizzled warrior”! His life’s history comprises a whole
chronicle of wars: in 1848 as lieutenant under Radetzky in Italy; in
1849 with Kossuth in the Hungarian Revolution. Banished from Hungary, he
was one of the English army in the Crimean War; in 1855 arrested in
traveling through Hungary, condemned to death—pardoned through the
efforts of the Queen of England. In 1859, on Garibaldi’s general staff,
he takes part with the thousand, in the expedition to Marsala; fights at
the Volturno with his division; in 1860 is military governor of Naples;
in 1861, general-adjutant to King Victor Emmanuel. And how he, the
battle-tried veteran, was here, to take part in the peace campaign. Not
as a new convert; even when serving with Garibaldi he had been taught
the misfortune of war and the hope that a European peace organization
might be possible, for he was the inspirer of the famous manifesto sent
out by Garibaldi to the princes of Europe inviting them to union; and
ever since 1867 he had been a member of the French Peace Society founded
by Frédéric Passy.

As the Interparliamentary Conference was still in session when we
reached Rome, we had the opportunity of making the acquaintance of the
representatives of the fourteen different parliaments who were here
assembled under the presidency of Minister Biancheri. It was originally
intended that Ruggero Bonghi should preside, but he had withdrawn, for a
whole little revolution had broken out, and the German and Austrian
parliamentarians would not have gone to Rome if Bonghi had not waived
the chairmanship. What had occurred? The famous savant and former
Minister of Public Instruction had published in some review an article
which contained language expressing sympathy with the French conception
of the Alsace-Lorraine question. I find among my letters an echo of the
feeling that was aroused at that time in both the parliaments of Central
Europe. Superintendent Haase, member of the Austrian Reichsrat, wrote
me:

Noble and highly honored Baroness:

After a three weeks’ absence I came to Vienna yesterday by way of
Teschen, where I gave hasty attention to only the most important
official papers and packed into my trunk the private letters that had
arrived for me. I am sincerely distressed to find now that your letter
of the twenty-third of last month has remained unanswered, and that
you must be having a very curious idea of my politeness. So, in the
first place, I crave your pardon.

As regards the business, I must make a distinction between the
general and the specific. Whatever service I can perform in the
cause of human charity will always be gladly done; and if you should
ever be in want of my commonplace services, call upon me. It will be
a double pleasure to me to help forward a good work if at the same
time I can be of service to an ideal woman, so worthy of deference
for her high-mindedness. Do not, I beg of you, take this as banal
flattery. But the special case with which we are concerned to-day
has become different since you wrote to me. To take part in the
Interparliamentary Conference this year, and in the Peace Congress
at Rome, as I had intended, is no longer possible for me.

For, even though Signor Bonghi does at a later time give out that
Alsace-Lorraine will not be spoken of at the Congress, yet in
consideration of what he has already said he is not the man under
whose leadership the friends of peace can meet in conference.

War is not merely a misfortune, it is a crime, committed by the person
who calls it forth. But in the statement that a demand which can be
made effective only through the force of arms is justifiable there is
surely involved a sort of “summons to the dance,” and whoever issues
it, even indirectly, becomes an accessory and responsible for the
bloody consequences. Signor Bonghi’s utterances about the position of
France toward Alsace-Lorraine would, in case France declared war upon
Germany, compel him to approve of this war at least. This involves a
logical impossibility of his condemning war altogether; and if he
nevertheless does so, he comes into contradiction with himself: Bonghi
versus Bonghi.

This contradiction would be bad enough in all conscience if it related
to a war of Peru against Chile; but, since the point of Bonghi’s
well-known utterance is directed against Germany, those among the
friends of peace who are friends of Germany can least of all
participate in an assembly over which Bonghi presides and to which he
in a sense gives character. I do not know how you feel about this
matter. But I should wish that all of us who unite with our hereditary
love and fidelity to our Austrian imperial dynasty and fatherland the
warmest sympathies for our ally, the German Empire, should not part
company in our feelings about this situation.

And now, highly honored Baroness, accept the expression of my most
distinguished consideration, with which I sign myself

Your wholly devoted
Dr. Haase

Vienna, October 9, 1891

The days before the opening of our Congress were devoted to
preparatory labors and to confidential communications. The French,
English, and Italians wanted to bring before the Congress a discussion
of the Alsace-Lorraine affair, which had been tabooed by the
Interparliamentarians; but we Austrians succeeded in persuading our
foreign colleagues not to touch upon this ticklish theme. It would
make the Germans too shy to be handled; they would be afraid of being
regarded at home as guilty of high treason should they permit the
result of the Frankfurt treaty to be treated as a “question” in their
presence. The peace movement was as yet a very tender plant; it must
be kept away from any over-chilly draft. In the confidential session
there was utterance of various views, but not the slightest discord.
All alike felt themselves comrades, fellow-combatants for a great
object which promised a blessing equally to all nations. The two great
peace veterans Frédéric Passy and Hodgson Pratt had the gift of
spreading around them an atmosphere of confidence and devotion; it was
felt that the fundamental trait in their nature was greatness of soul.
And Ruggero Bonghi made a third. The chairmanship of the Congress was
put into his hands.

We also met the Grelix couple—that is, Grete and Felix Moscheles. Grete
looked as if she were Felix’s daughter, a dainty little Sèvres figure;
blond hair, done up with the touch of genius and framing her face as
with a mist of gold; a delicately cut and amusing visage—amusing because
it was animated by mischievous dimples and sparkling eyes, and because
the mouth, opening a trifle awry in speaking, disclosed among her white
teeth an especially comical, conical eye-tooth. At the same time this
little woman with the scintillating wit always wore, in opulent variety,
toilets in the height of style and yet arranged to suit her own artistic
taste—Grete is a painter. Always costly ornaments suited to her gown;
but an enthusiastic socialist—the two things are quite compatible, it
seems.

Baron Pirquet, who had taken part in the Conference as a member of the
Reichsrat, now came into the Congress in his quality as a director of
the Austrian Peace Society. This man of peace had, like General Türr,
begun his career in the military service. The son of an Austrian general
of Belgian extraction, he had been in the campaign of 1859 against
Sardinia as a lieutenant of dragoons; and then for many long years was
connected with the diplomatic service. Very distinguished in his
appearance, with a classically handsome head and most delightful
manners—such was the man outwardly. The inner man I learned to value in
after years as a true friend and as a zealous worker in the cause of
peace. He remained at the head of the Austrian group of the
Interparliamentary Union until he was taken ill; and he prepared the way
for, and brilliantly organized, the Conference of 1903, which was held
in Vienna.

Great and deep were the impressions which I brought away from those
meetings in Rome. In later times I have been present at many other Peace
Congresses which were not less magnificent; but that one was the first I
had attended, and we know how everything which is experienced for the
first time is felt as a tenfold intensified experience.

First the opening session on the Capitol. The very approach of the
delegates was spectacular. When they got out of their carriages on the
square before the Capitol, a military band played the march from
_Lohengrin_, and a double lane of guards in gala uniform stood on the
terrace, on the steps, and before the entrance of the great hall where
the meeting was to be held. In the hall itself, the walls of which were
decorated with the flags of all the nations represented, stood the
president’s table, in the background on a platform; on the right and
left, in seats arranged like those in an amphitheater, a numerous
public; and in front of these seats, on each side, a row of curule
chairs reserved for the leaders of the various delegations (just imagine
with what pride I took my place there: _sella curulis_—once the seat of
honor for the kings, and later for the magistrates); at the directors’
table Minister-President Biancheri, who delivered the address of
welcome. After he had finished, the delegates of the peace societies
were to speak, one for each country. They were called up in alphabetical
order: “Angleterre” was the first. Hodgson Pratt left his curule chair
and mounted the platform. When he had ended his words, “Autriche” was
called, and, as I was the presiding officer of the Austrian group, I as
their spokesman had now to repair to the chairman’s table.

Stage fright ... that was a condition from which I had suffered
distressfully all my life. When I was to sing at the Duprez recitals, or
later at concerts, or even before two or three expert critics, the demon
_trac_ would always, even after long familiarity with the experience,
clutch me by the throat and deprive me of half my powers amid
unspeakable moral anguish. And here, for the first time in my life, at a
world’s congress, in the presence of statesmen, in such a solemn
assembly, in such a place—the Capitol!—I was to deliver a public
address, the words of which would be taken down stenographically and
sent off by telegraph by the newspaper correspondents of all countries.
One would have supposed that the aforesaid demon must now pounce upon me
and throttle me lamentably. Nothing of the sort. Quite calmly,
unconcernedly, in glad exaltation, I said what I had to say, and a storm
of applause followed my words. This is the way I explain the matter:
stage fright is an accompaniment of vanity, a trembling question
addressed to Fate: How shall _I_ please? with the whole accent on the
word “I.” Here at the Capitol, among the servants and interpreters of a
world cause, _I_ was an incidental! I had something to say which seemed
to me important, and which I knew would be a welcome and joyous message
to the like-minded persons who surrounded me. Who was going to say it,
and what personal impression my insignificant person would produce, was
a thought that did not come to my consciousness at all; and so I spoke
without any uneasiness, with the assurance of an ambassador who has
definite and good tidings to communicate. I could tell them that in a
country of Central Europe where no Peace Society existed till six weeks
ago, to-day, at the first summons of a powerless woman who had no other
claim than having written an honest book, two thousand people had
already banded together that they might be represented in Rome; and if
in a few days two thousand fellow-combatants had offered themselves,
then at the next Congress there would be twenty thousand members of the
Austrian group to be represented. In conclusion I laid on the chairman’s
table some of the most enthusiastic letters of approval, signed by
illustrious names—Tolstoi, Haeckel, the Duke of Oldenburg, and others.

I was mistaken in my prophecy that during the following year the
membership of the Union would be increased tenfold. The New does not
march forward so rapidly. When it first makes its appearance it
powerfully attracts all who were already quietly cherishing similar
ideas. The rest of the world now gives ear in surprise, but means to
wait and see if the New is successful; and if that does not come to pass
immediately, then they turn away again and decide that the matter has no
vitality. Meantime it germinates and sprouts and ramifies quietly until
it reveals itself once more to the contemporary world with a new
impulse.

So my début as a Peace-Congresswoman came off with great success, and I
confess I was rather proud that I had spoken—think of it! on the
Capitol; the only woman in history to whom such a thing had happened.
But this pride was somewhat taken down when there came to my notice a
newspaper item which told of the occurrence and added that “it was not
the first time that one of the sisterhood had quacked on this spot, and
this time it was not even a matter of saving the Capitol—”

On the next day the deliberations began. Ruggero Bonghi presided. The
vivacious little man acquitted himself of that duty with humor and
rigor, to the delight of all. He was easily enraged, and then he pounded
heavily on the table with his fist; and universal applause followed this
gesture, for it always emphasized an energetic preservation of order.
Famous savant and philanthropist that he was, he enjoyed Queen
Margherita’s especial confidence. She intrusted him with the management
of her charities, and frequently enjoyed his gift of conversation.

I jotted down at that time some weighty passages of his introductory
discourse:

The question is often raised whether these unions are working toward a
goal that can be attained; but this question comes from men who have
incorrectly understood the teachings of history and do not see that
the progressive development which lies behind us is a guaranty for
what is going to be.

The system of arbitration has already been repeatedly put in operation
for the settlement of controversies; and what we demand is nothing
further than that this principle should unfurl its banner and call to
humanity, “Here I am. Change your course and I will give you peace.”

It is said that the armies and fleets, that this monstrous expenditure
of men and money, is for the purpose of preserving peace. It would
follow that our opponents pursue the same object as we do—with the
difference that we pursue that end with means corresponding to the
cause, while they proceed in a manner diametrically contrary to it.

It is certain that we have before us a lofty ideal; and those that
ridicule the ideal and its adherents are like men who should maintain
that it were idle to take a torch when one had to go through a dark
passageway.

Every nation should contribute its quota to the general good of
humanity. In this way the human race would move toward an increasing
perfection, which, sustained by intelligence and philanthropy, will
awaken the energy for greater and greater performances.

At this Congress it was determined to found a central bureau at Bern.
The plan for this was suggested by Frédéric Bajer, and he and Hodgson
Pratt made the proposal. Although attacked in certain quarters—is not
every positive new thing always attacked?—the motion was carried, and
Élie Ducommun, the Swiss delegate, was commissioned to take charge of
the preliminary arrangements. The privilege of starting the first fund
in the treasury of the Bern bureau was mine by virtue of the
circumstance that the proprietor of the Roman daily _Fanfulla_, the
Marquis Alfieri, asked my authorization to publish an Italian
translation of my novel _Die Waffen nieder_ in the feuilleton of his
paper, to which I agreed on condition that the honorarium—fifteen
hundred francs—should be paid over to the treasury of the Bern bureau
when it should be founded.

In order to give a picture of those days and of the impression that they
made on my mind at that time, I insert here what I wrote about them in
the first number of my monthly, _Die Waffen nieder_, in January, 1892:

_Echoes of the Peace Congress_

So, then, the beautiful days at Rome and Naples have now rushed past
us like the rest!...

But this does not mean that all that filled those days has
vanished—that is to say, that the words are stilled, the thoughts
dispelled, the pictures obliterated.... We know that every slight
motion of the hand, by disturbing the surrounding air, operates to
immeasurable distances, and in the same way we know also how through
unreckonable time the movement of spirits sets the surrounding and
succeeding world of spirit in vibration.

“Never-to-be-forgotten” is the word ordinarily employed for days so
richly filled. But it is not the correct word, for ultimately
everything is forgotten; even should all those who shared the
experience preserve to the end of life their recollections of what
they experienced, yet there comes the time in which they themselves
are forgotten, in which their ashes are scattered to the winds, their
archives buried in ruins. So we will not call the contents of these
days of the Congress never-to-be-forgotten, but rather ineradicable.

And be it said that this event cannot be compared with a slight
motion. The echo which the Congress and Conference this time awakened
in the public could hardly have been wished louder. When it is
realized how the Peace Congresses of 1889 and 1890 passed almost
unnoticed, and what general attention was attracted to the one this
year, it is fair to hope that in like progression one of the next will
become an event that stirs the world. And to bring this to pass would
take nothing more than either an avalanche-like spread of the
announced will of the nations for peace, or the resolve of the
governments themselves to come together in a High Council of Peace to
plan the bases of arbitration treaties.

Such confidence in the simple and probable realization (most likely
within our lifetime) of the ideal set before us should fill the hearts
of those that are fighting for this. Let the skepticism that wisely
balances difficulties be left to those that stand aside. “Let us keep
ever before our eyes the sacred purpose which we have set before us,”
said Bonghi in his concluding address; “let us work with such fiery
zeal as if the attainment of this depended wholly on us and as if we
could attain it even to-morrow. If others hinder us, then it is not
our fault. Let us scorn those that jeer at us and pity those that do
not understand us. What we desire is the noble, the just, the
beneficent; and if there be any one who believes that these things are
forever denied to men, then for God’s sake and for man’s let him hold
his tongue, for life would be altogether too sad if we all had to
think as he does.”

“Words, words!” say our opponents in derisive tones. This objection
also Bonghi meets with that genial humor which frequently flashes
through his style. “You reproach us for putting forth nothing but
words; did we ever claim to be cannon?” And in saying this he gave
that short chuckle of his which stimulated his hearers to irresistible
laughter.

Truly it would be nothing to deplore if the purpose of these
congresses and conferences—the international reign of law—received
valid realization by their pronouncements; rather, it is to be
deplored that doubters and scoffers exert themselves to retard such
realizations, and that those who have the power of decision are not
already coming together for united work, but are contenting
themselves—each in isolation—with avowing their own peace purposes in
words—words—meanwhile augmenting the preparation for war by their
uninterrupted action.

It is only mutual mistrust that keeps up this inner contradiction. But
fair dealing will put this mistrust to rout; the lust for war
perpetually attributed to “the others” will prove itself to be a
phantom; the suspicion that the governments are not willing to
renounce war, that the peoples are not willing, will disappear, and
thereby the renunciation will have become a reality, the word an act.

What accelerative effect the congresses are producing in this respect,
cannot be determined by any measurement. The opponents of the
movement, indeed,—the indifferent or the so-called “practical,”—stick
at the lack of immediate validity in the resolutions, at the
difficulties, misunderstandings, and blunders which must inevitably
come up in the deliberations of a multitudinous (and also polyglot)
body of men.

“That such an unwonted instrument of will must work imperfectly for a
time is obvious,” remarked a member of the German Reichstag, Dr.
Barth, in speaking of the Conference, “and it takes just about the
intellectual superiority of Frau Wilhelmine Buchholz and her (very
widely scattered) kin to see nothing more behind this natural
imperfection. On the other hand, whoever has any understanding for the
imponderable things in the life of nations, and can separate the
appearance from the actuality, will recognize in this as yet clumsily
working Conference a very notable stir of the humanitarian sense of
solidarity.”

It is to be desired that Congress and Conference may in future be held
simultaneously, that is to say in alternate sessions, so that the
participants of the one may be able to attend the other; for the
representatives who meet in the Interparliamentary Conference are for
the most part also members of the peace societies of their respective
countries; their voices should therefore not be wanting in the
deliberations of the Congress. And especially should all share
unitedly in the festivities, the receptions, the gala performances and
excursions which the city where the Congress is held offers to its
peace guests. Too much is demanded of the people when they are
expected to divide their enthusiasm between two successive occasions
dedicated to the same object. Two opening ceremonies on the Capitol,
two gala representations of _Amico Fritz_, two special trains to
Naples and Pompeii, two illuminations of the Forum and the Colosseum
in the course of a fortnight; it was a serious tax. And yet the Roman
Committee, the authorities, and the generous-hearted southern populace
managed to entertain in equally brilliant fashion first the
Parliamentarians and immediately afterwards the delegates of the Peace
Unions.

The two bodies are really at bottom only two different forms of the
same movement, closely connected, the one an outgrowth of the other;
the upper and lower house of the same parliament, so to speak. The
unconstrained intercourse in an exalted frame of mind, plus the
joyous acclamations of the populace, the waving of banners, the
bands of music,—all this brings on fraternization and mutual
understanding more, almost, than the deliberative work that precedes
it. Besides, what can be produced by the congresses does not consist
in effective paragraphs of law; it is only a fundamental thought
that is to be championed—a great, shining, heart-warming fundamental
thought—the principle of the solidarity of nations, the
fellowship[34] of all the civilized peoples. Of such a fellowship
void of enmity we surely have a joyous foretaste when we—the
representatives of seventeen different nations—banquet around a
flower-decorated table (the word PAX in white camellias on a green
background) or take a jolly excursion in a special train furnished
by the government, are greeted on our arrival by a crowd shouting
evviva and received with official manifestations of respect, and
take our places in the waiting landaus or banner-hung boats—and all
this under the gracious ensign of harmony; they were intoxicating
moments full of blessed inspiration. We forgot that what we had come
to battle for there is not yet attained, that the world outside is
still in the sign of Hate; at all events the world that we were just
then in the midst of was unanimously inspired by the same faith, the
same ideal. Yes, they were—I had almost said—“never-to-be-forgotten”
hours!

There such images and impressions were imprinted on our minds as could
be received only in such circumstances. It is one thing for a solitary
tourist to wander through the streets of Pompeii, another thing for a
happy pair on their wedding journey; still another for the assembled
participants in a Peace Congress. All thoughts converge to the same
paramount center. The view of Vesuvius, for example, whose summit was
enveloped in clouds of smoke, could only on this occasion have
suggested to a traveling politician the following observation which I
heard from the lips of our Austrian delegate, Baron von Pirquet:

“How the old volcano hides his face in a veil of fog—apparently he is
ashamed, in presence of us friends of peace, of the destruction which
he has poured out upon the poor city and its wretched inhabitants. And
yet what is the petty mischief that he has on his conscience compared
to the devastation and scenes of horror that were spread over this
very same region by the martial legions!... How infinitesimal are the
crimes of such a mountain against mankind in comparison with the
crimes against mankind which men perpetrate; it is for us to be
ashamed.”

And when we all stood in the great arena listening to the explanations
of the professor who was detailed by the government to guide us, that
the gladiatorial contests were counted “the indispensable” for the
Romans, we could not but say to each other, “And yet people have
learned to dispense with them and to abhor them.” So if to-day many
still count war indispensable, what does that prove? Or, again, many
of us might make this observation: at bottom it was an innocent
gratification to look on and see how a few dozen wrestlers—criminals
at that, condemned to death—stretch each other on the sand or are
killed by wild beasts, compared to that other custom of drilling
millions of innocent men for the giant arena in which they are to be
mangled and dashed to pieces not by lions and tigers but by artificial
murdermachines....

In one of the little Pompeian houses an ancient inscription was still
perceptible on the wall; our professor of archæology read it off:

A WOE TO HIM WHO CANNOT LOVE
A DOUBLE WOE TO HIM WHO WOULD PROHIBIT LOVE.

Then the thought thrilled through me:

O ye who would hinder us from working at the weaving of the band that
is to gird all nations together in concord, ye who scoff at us because
we would choke out hereditary hate, because we would fan the flame of
the love of humanity—“a double woe to you!”

The monthly from which the above extract is taken was published for
eight years until the end of the century, when it was replaced by the
_Friedenswarte_. The idea of issuing a periodical did not come from me.
After the newspapers had spread the tidings of the founding of a Peace
Society in Vienna and the part which it was to take in the approaching
Congress, a young publisher in Berlin wrote me an enthusiastic letter in
which he suggested the establishment of an organ for the new movement;
he would publish it, I was asked to be editor in chief and to put my
name on it as such. An eager devotee of the idea of peace since his
earliest years, since he had for the first time seen the Vereshchágin
pictures, he now desired to dedicate all his powers as a publicist to
the cause of peace. His letter was burningly written, and I consented.
From that day to this A. H. Fried has been my most zealous
fellow-combatant.

So then I stood in the midst of the young movement; I had a new Union to
preside over, a review to edit, a regular correspondence to carry on
with the colleagues whom I had gained in Rome, and once more my life and
activities were filled with something which I recognized as “the one
important thing.”

PART SEVEN
1892–1898

XXXII
HOME AND FRIENDS
We two · Business troubles · Deaths · Family life at Castle Stockern ·
Home theater · The twelfth of June · Visit of Prince André Dadiani

These pages have of late been very full of Union reports and “movement”
news, and it looks as if we both had been immersed in political life and
sadly taken up with league-breeding. But when I look back to those days,
there rise in my memory a multitude of other recollections connected
with our private life, with the family and social life that we led, and
especially with our cloudlessly happy married union. The outside world
with its mediæval darkness and its pitiable conditions caused us much
annoyance, and we took the field against these as well as we could; we
found much satisfaction, too, in the battle itself; but our chief joy,
our wealth, our fullest gratification, was each other. We had lost
nothing of our gayety, of our frivolous childishness, nothing of our
deep, fully confiding love. We swam in it as fishes in the sea; and,
whatever made us gasp and suffocate when we ventured out on the beach
sands, we could always dive back again into the vivifying currents of
our happiness.

A filigrain happiness, a miniature happiness. It did not consist of
soaring emotions and boisterous enjoyments. The everyday was its
territory; the everyday with the petty sweetnesses of comfort and humor.
We were not lost in astonishment, in admiration, in worship of each
other; better than anything of that kind, we loved each other,—loved
with all our weaknesses and faults. To lay one’s self out to be of
assistance, to procure a better existence for our fellow-men now and in
the future, is all very fine. Yet the best and first of duties is to
give as much joy as possible to one’s partner in life, and at the same
time to be joyful one’s self. To what end do we want to free mankind
from persecution, from disease, from oppression, from violent killing,
if not to provide mankind with the possibility of enjoying life? So that
is the chief end. But we ourselves, and those who stand nearest to us,
have the same claim; why should this claim be left unrecognized, when it
is the easiest of all to satisfy? If in a circle of ten each sacrifices
himself for the welfare of the other nine, who of the circle gets the
intended welfare? Well, we two _did_ fare “cannibalistically well,” if
not _wie fünfmalhunderttausend Säuen_, “like half a million swine,” as
the well-known student song has it, yet like two jolly little pigs.

And it was not all a bed of roses at Harmannsdorf either. The business
of the estate would not go right, the quarry least of all. They changed
superintendents, changed managers, negotiated with agents for contracts,
but there was no improvement. On the contrary, the enterprises planned,
ever arousing new hopes, led to risks, and when they ended in smoke we
were a bit worse off than before, but ready to come up to the next hope
all the more trustfully. And, since a modicum of volatility was
characteristic of the whole house of Suttner, we shook off the worry and
took from the day whatever of good the day brought.

All these long days had also brought something of sorrow. My Own’s
oldest brother Karl was suddenly attacked by pneumonia, which carried
him off in a week. My sister-in-law Lotti, the Countess Sizzo by
marriage, lost her husband. The bereavement was not very severe. It had
not been a wretched marriage, but not a happy one either; the two were
incompatible and lived for the most part separated,—he in his home in
Southern Tirol, she at Harmannsdorf. Karl’s daughter Mizzi, who was then
sixteen, after his death came to live in her grandparents’ house and was
always with us thenceforth. Her uncle Artur, whom she genuinely
worshiped, had to take her father’s place.

The liveliest intercourse was kept up with the neighboring castle of
Stockern. There lived (and still live) my husband’s older brother
Richard, nicknamed _Igel_, “hedgehog”; his wife Pauline, called _Das
Weib_, née Ponz von Engelshofen, châtelaine of Stockern and mother of
five children,—one daughter and four sons, the eldest of the sons born
in 1871, the youngest in 1886, so that there was much fresh, gay youth;
and, in addition, governesses, tutors, aunts, cousins, and other guests.
Lively times were always going on there. Very often the whole train
would come to Harmannsdorf, especially on occasion of birthdays, patron
saints’ days, hunts, vintages, and harvest-homes; still more frequently
we drove over to Stockern, or both families would join in excursions to
near-by Rosenburg or some other place of resort.

“Das Weib” was the last survivor of several brothers and sisters who in
the war year of 1866 had fallen victims to the epidemic of cholera which
had broken out in the country. The stories of that time when nine
persons in the family and service of Stockern were carried off by the
destroying angel in six days served as the basis for the episode “The
Cholera Week” in my novel _Die Waffen nieder_.

Now grass had grown over all that tragedy. Man’s memory is so terribly
short. Stockern was now full of happy people, and we two contributed our
mite to the gayeties. Uncle Artur was his young nephews’ favorite
comrade, and “Tante Boulotte” was no spoil-feast either.

I recall among other things a tragi-comedy entitled “Cleopatra,” which
was performed on the domestic stage. My Own had written the text, in
gory doggerel, and composed the music for it as well. The rôle of the
Egyptian queen was intrusted to my hands. The eldest son of the house,
at that time already a lieutenant of dragoons, appeared as a helmeted
officer of the Roman Guards; a neighboring proprietor played Antony; the
young girls of the family had to enact the part of slaves, and the
author of the masterpiece mimicked an old wandering prophet who knew all
things in advance, from the Queen’s death of snake-bite up to the latest
events in the Vienna city council. The governess at Stockern, a
wonderfully pretty young English lady, had to play the part of
Cleopatra’s maid, whose most important function it was to groom her
mistress’s pet snake. Miss Pratt’s English accent had a monstrously
comical effect. As she knew no German, her part had been hammered into
her only with the greatest difficulty. In a soliloquy she had to
apostrophize the snake intrusted to her care with the words _o du
elendes Mistvieh_—“O you wretched dung-brute” (from that specimen of the
text may be got some idea of the loftiness of the poem), but she
declaimed it _o du ellen Mittwoch_! From that day, when people at
Stockern wanted to be rude they called each other _Mittwoch_,
“Wednesday.”

To us two the greatest festival of the year was always the twelfth of
June, the anniversary of our marriage. But we never cared to celebrate
it with more company than ourselves, and so it came to pass that if we
were at Harmannsdorf at that date we left for parts unknown early in the
morning and were gone at least twenty-four hours. Having run away on our
real wedding day, we did so on the anniversaries too. Of all things, no
congratulations and toasts on that day; we wanted to be alone—in
devotion. We would drive down to the railway, take tickets to any
station; arriving there, we would hunt up the local hotel to order a
dinner, and then go out into the fields and woods. June, you know, is
the happy month when everything is in full bloom, when roses grow rank
and the cuckoo calls, when all nature is a wedding celebration. We would
wander about for a few hours and then come to our dinner with a glorious
appetite; we would have it served under an arbor in the hotel garden.
And then out to the woods again. There we would seek out a shady or
perchance a sunny place—we were not afraid of the sun, but had a
lizard-like predilection for its caressing glow—and there other hours of
hallowed dialogue would pass: hours which were prolonged till the
setting of the sun, till the rising of the moon, till the blowing of the
evening breezes. Then back to the inn, where supper was awaiting us in a
neat room. And our material for conversation was still not
exhausted—from year to year it grew richer; for what we said to each
other on those days was the manifold variation of the now cheerful, now
melancholy, but always sweet, theme, “Do you remember?” All that we had
experienced together, seen together, learned together, we passed in
review, and when we took out and rearranged our memories and conceptions
it was as if we were counting treasures,—the joy of wealth obsessed us.
Rich we were in remarkable memories that were common to both, rich in
accordant ideas, and superlatively rich in intertwining feelings of
never-cooling affection, of never-failing confidence.

And on the next day we would go back among men again—as if nothing had
happened.

We had kept up a correspondence with our friends in the Caucasus. The
Murats were still in Zugdidi; Prince Niko was living for the most part
in St. Petersburg. One day there came from Prince André Dadiani a letter
postmarked at Vienna, to say that he was passing through the city and
ask if he might call. We, too, had to be in Vienna—for a festival
meeting of the Peace Union, at which, among other things, Peter Rosegger
and the court actor Lewinsky made addresses. Accordingly I wrote the
prince to come to the meeting, and he did so. After the addresses the
company stayed to supper, and our Caucasian friend stayed with us. All
this may possibly have been Greek to the Russian officer who had fought
at Kars, but he expressed himself as quite in sympathy with my aims and
endeavors; whether from politeness or conviction, I will not undertake
to say. On the following day we took him with us to Harmannsdorf, where
he remained for some time as our guest.

XXXIII
LETTERS FROM ALFRED NOBEL

I kept up a regular correspondence with Alfred Nobel. I will quote here
some of his letters[35]:

Dear Baroness:

If I have not replied sooner to your kind and courteous letter, it is
because I was in hopes of bringing you my answer _de vive-voix_, my
respects _de vif-cœur_.

Here I am in Vienna, but you are not, and I am told that you do not
often come. On the other hand, if I should go to Harmannsdorf I should
be greatly afraid of causing you trouble, and in this respect I am as
timid as the most sensitive woman.

How happy I am to know that you are happy and contented, back at last
in a land which you love, and rested from struggles of which my
sympathy can measure the extent.

What shall I tell you of myself—a shipwreck of youth, of joy, of hope?
An empty heart, whose inventory is a white—or gray—page.

Pray remember me cordially to your husband, and accept, dear Madame,
the assurance of my best sentiments founded on profound respect and
genuine devotion.

A. Nobel

Vienna, Hôtel Imperial, August 17, 1885.

The visit at Harmannsdorf was nevertheless paid. In the year 1887 we had
seen Nobel again in Paris, and the following letter shows that we were
urging him to visit us in our own home:

Dear Baroness:

The proof that there is no justice in this world is that you take me,
I am sure, for an ill-bred man and an ingrate. And yet there is no
truth in it, for ever since I had the pleasure of seeing you at my
house I have been anxiously watching for the moment of leisure that
should permit me to go and shake hands with two friends. But if you
could see, only for a day or two, the life I am leading, you would
realize how impossible it is to make the two ends meet. For a week
past, with my trunk packed, I have not been able to get away; and yet
my visit to Manchester is urgent. But at this moment all the
_dynamiteurs_ in the world—the _dynamiteurs_ are the directors and
managers of the dynamite companies—have conspired to come here and
bother me with their affairs,—conventions, plans, deceptions, etc.,
and I am ardently wishing that a new Mephisto would come to enrich
hell with these evil-doers.

A thousand friendly things—never friendly enough for you—and the
assurance of my good will.

A. Nobel

Paris, January 22, 1888

The following letter is the answer to mine in which I wrote that I had
been told at a florist’s that he was married and that the presence of a
Madame Nobel had been announced in Nice. I asked whether I might
congratulate him. He wrote back:

Dear Baroness and Friend:

What an ingrate this old Nobel is, but in appearance only, for the
friendship which he feels for you only increases, and the nearer he
approaches the final nothingness the more he values the few
persons—men or women—who show him a little genuine interest.

Could you have really believed that I was married, and married without
informing you? That would have been a double crime against friendship
and against courtesy. The bear has not as yet got so far as that.

In making me married, the florist was using flowery language. As for
Madame Nobel of Nice, it was in all probability my sister-in-law. That
is how the secret and mysterious marriage is explained. Everything
does in the end get explained in this world below, except the
magnetism of the heart, to which this same world is indebted for its
existing and living. Now this magnetism is just what I must be lacking
in, since there is no Madame Nobel and since in my case the dust that
is thrown in the eyes is inadequately replaced by gunpowder.

You see there is no _jeune femme adorée_—I am quoting word for
word—and I shall not find in that direction a remedy against my
_nervosité anormale_—once more a literal quotation—or against my
gloomy ideas. A few delicious days at Harmannsdorf might perhaps cure
me, and if I have not as yet replied to your arch-amiable and friendly
call of hospitality, that comes from a multitude of reasons which I
will explain to you by word of mouth.

Whatever happens, it is absolutely necessary that I should come soon
to see you, for if not, who knows if I ever have this pleasure and
consolation. Fate, alas! is unwilling to be converted into an
insurance company; and yet we would offer her very tempting premiums.

I beg of you, assure your husband of my best sentiments; as for
yourself, it is idle to reaffirm to you my affectionate and fraternal
devotion.

A. Nobel

Paris, November 6, 1888.

On December, 10, 1889, my husband’s oldest brother Karl died. As Nobel,
during his last stay at Vienna, had become acquainted with Karl and his
wife, I informed him of the bereavement. Nobel wrote:

Copenhagen, December 19, 1889

Dear Baroness and Friend:

On receipt of your brief note of the 10/12 I addressed to the Baronne
Charles de Suttner the expression of my condolence. Will you be the
intermediary of my lively sympathy for your husband and your
relatives?

I also have sad news to announce. I am just here from Stockholm, where
I have been to conduct to her last home my poor dear mother, who loved
me as people do not love nowadays, when feverish life serves as a
check on sentiment.

I press your two hands—the little hands of a dear, kind sister who
wishes me well just as I wish her and hers well.

A. Nobel

My appeal in the _Neue Freie Presse_ of September 9, 1891, was partially
reproduced in the Paris newspapers, and editorially commented on. Nobel
wrote to me regarding this:

My dear Friend:

Delighted I am to see that your eloquent pleading against that horror
of horrors—war—has found its way into the French Press. But I fear
that out of French readers ninety-nine in a hundred are
chauvinistically mad. The government here are almost in their senses;
the people, on the contrary, are getting success- and vanity-drunken.
A pleasant kind of intoxication, much less deleterious unless it leads
to war, than spirits of wine or morphium.

And your pen—whither is it wandering now? After writing with the blood
of martyrs of war, will it show us the prospect of a future fairy-land
or the less utopian picture of the thinkers’ common-wealth? My
sympathies are in that direction, but my thoughts are mostly wandering
towards another common-wealth, where silenced souls are misery-proof.

With kindest regards ever yours
A. Nobel

Paris, September 14, 1891

After the Austrian Peace Society had been founded and the Roman Congress
was in prospect, I informed my friend about it and asked him for a
contribution to the treasury of the Union; here is his reply

53 Avenue Malakoff, October 31, 1891

Dear Baroness and Friend:

I do not see very clearly what great expenses either the Peace League
or the Peace Congress can have to bear. Nevertheless I am quite ready
to make a pecuniary contribution to its work, and I hasten to send you
for this object a check, inclosed herewith, for £80 sterling.

What you need to get, I think, is not the money but the programme.
Wishes alone do not assure peace. The like may be said of big dinners
with big speeches. One ought to be able to present well-minded
governments with an acceptable plan. To demand disarmament is almost
to make one’s self ridiculous without profiting any one. To demand the
immediate establishment of a court of arbitration is to come into
collision with a thousand prejudices and to make every ambitious man
an obstructer. To succeed, one ought to be content with more modest
beginnings, and do as they do in England with legislative projects
whose success is dubious. In such cases they content themselves with
passing a temporary law, limited in duration to two years or even to
one year. I do not think there would be found many governments that
would refuse to take into consideration such a modest proposition,
provided it were supported by statesmen of note.

Would it be too much to ask, for example, that for one year the
European governments should engage to refer to a tribunal formed for
this purpose any difference arising between them; or if they should
refuse to take this step, to defer every act of hostility until the
expiration of the period stipulated?

This would be apparently little, but it is just by being content with
little that one arrives at great results. A year is such a small
period of time in the lives of nations, and the most blustering
minister will tell himself that it is not worth while to break by
force a convention of such short duration. And at the expiration of
that period all the states will make haste to renew their peace
compact for another year. Thus, without a shock and almost without
realizing the fact, they will come to a period of prolonged peace.

Then only will it be of any use to think of proceeding little by
little to that disarmament which all good men and almost all
governments desire.

And suppose that in spite of everything a quarrel should break out
between two governments, do you not think that nine times out of ten
they would calm down during the obligatory armistice which they would
have to respect?

Believe, dear Baroness, in my affectionate sentiments,
A. Nobel

XXXIV
IN BERLIN AND HAMBURG
My review · Invitation to Berlin · A. H. Fried and his plans · The
reading · The Berlin Tageblatt on a letter from Frédéric Passy · A
banquet · Voices from the Press · Evening at Spielhagen’s · Dinner at
Mosse’s · The Empress Frederick · Professor W. Meyer does us the honors
of “Urania” · Excursion to Hamburg · An evening tea with Hans Land, Dr.
Löwenberg, Otto Ernst, and Detlev von Liliencron · A letter of
Liliencron’s

As aforesaid: on January 1, 1892, began the publication of my review
_Die Waffen nieder_, through the house of A. H. Fried, Berlin. The
publisher helped me very zealously in the editing. Distinguished
collaborators were represented in the very first numbers: Carneri,
Friedrich Jodl, Ludwig Fulda, Björnson, Bonghi, Karl Henckell, Rosegger,
Widman, Moritz Adler, and others sent me articles. I published the
review for eight years, until the end of 1899. From that time forth its
place was taken by the _Friedenswarte_, edited by A. H. Fried, which is
still—in 1908—being published, and to which I regularly contribute a
running chronicle entitled _Randglossen zur Zeitgeschichte_, “Comments
on the History of the Time.”

But let us return to 1892. Through my participation in the Congress at
Rome, through my editorial labors on the peace review, through
correspondence with sympathizers in all parts of the world, through the
duties connected with the Vienna Union, I was now wholly absorbed in the
movement. The next object of my desire—and in this also I was incited
and supported by A. H. Fried—was to see a peace society, established in
Berlin likewise.

I received from the Berlin Press Society an invitation to give, on one
of their literary nights in the following March, a public reading of
some chapters from my novel _Die Waffen nieder_ in behalf of the
endowment fund of the Society. I accepted the invitation, and my husband
and I started for Berlin full of anticipation. For I had learned by
previous letters from A. H. Fried that a very special honor was in store
for me, namely a banquet, whose committee of organization presented the
following signatures: Dr. Baumbach, vice president of the Reichstag; Dr.
Barth, member of the Reichstag and editor of the _Nation_; Wilhelm
Bölsche, author; Oskar Blumenthal, dramatic writer; Gustav Dahms, editor
of the _Bazar_; Paul Dobert, editor of _Zur guten Stunde_; Karl Frenzel,
writer; Dr. Max Hirsch, member of the Reichstag; Hans Land, author; A.
H. Fried, publisher; L’Arronge, theatrical manager; Fritz Mauthner,
author; Dr. Arthur Levysohn, editor in chief of the _Berliner
Tageblatt_; O. Neumann-Hofer, editor of the _Magazin_; Paul Schlenther;
Prinz Schönaich-Carolath, member of the Reichstag; Zobeltitz; Albert
Traeger, member of the Reichstag; Julius Wolff; Baron von Wolzogen; and
Friedrich; Spielhagen.

It was A. H. Fried who had been the original promoter of this affair,
and who had also succeeded in obtaining such brilliant names on the
dinner committee. He was waiting for us at the railway station on our
arrival, and this afforded me my first opportunity of becoming
acquainted with the publisher and co-creator of my review. A young man
of twenty-eight, all fire and flame for the cause of peace, full of zeal
for organization. He began at once to unfold plans for using my presence
toward realizing the establishment of a proposed union. There was
already in existence a small Interparliamentary Group, and this must now
be followed by a private peace society which might send its
representatives to that year’s Peace Congress at Bern.

The hall where my reading had been announced as to be given had been
long sold out, so that many demands for seats had to be refused. The
Empress Frederick had engaged a row of places, but the death and funeral
obsequies of her brother-in-law the Grand Duke of Hesse called her away
from Berlin at that time.

The evening of the reading was successful—that is to say, I was received
with applause and was applauded at the end; but I read altogether too
softly, as I afterward heard. That the public and the critics gave me
such a favorable reception in spite of that, I attributed to their
sympathy with the cause which I represented.

Frédéric Passy sent a letter to me at Berlin, in which he pleaded for
our cause with his usual eloquence. I handed the letter over to the
editors of the _Berliner Tageblatt_, and it was published on the day
after my reading with the following editorial comment:

Mr. Frédéric Passy, the president of the French Peace Society, a
political economist whose high reputation is not confined to France,
is a member of the Académie des Sciences and enjoys universal respect.
If there were never any but such voices sounding over the Vosges from
France, the cause of peace, of humanity, of the higher civilization,
would soon have the victory. Let us hope that Mr. Passy’s eloquent
words will waken in his own country also the universal response which
they so thoroughly deserve.

A glittering picture of the dinner has remained in my memory. In the
richly flower-decked banqueting-hall stood a table laid for two hundred
and fifty guests. There was a preliminary gathering in side parlors, and
there I made the acquaintance of a great number of literary colleagues
of both sexes, and also found again many whom we had met seven years
earlier at the Authors’ Convention; there were also parliamentarians,
publicists, and other notabilities of Berlin. About ten o’clock
Friedrich Spielhagen escorted me to the table, at which he presided. He
it was, too, who pronounced the oration of the evening. After he had
ended, my right-hand neighbor, Dr. Barth of the Reichstag, spoke. And
now I had to express my thanks. A stenographer took down my maiden
after-dinner speech, and I found it the next morning in the newspapers:

It is in joyful exhilaration that I express to you, Meister
Spielhagen, and to you, Herr Dr. Barth, and to all the company who
have done me the honor of gathering here, my deep-felt thanks. To be
so acclaimed and by such persons—for those who entertain me are
certainly among the foremost in the literary and political world
here—must indeed fill any one’s heart with pride.

Indeed, if one feels, as I do, that this lavish homage so far exceeds
the desert of her to whom it is offered, then must the wish be aroused
to protest against it and to cry out: It is too much—take back the
praise, take back the expression of such kindly sympathy! You fill me
with happiness, but you fill me also with mortification.

Yet I can gather from your addresses that the reason why the honor
conferred upon me so far exceeds the value of my performances and my
person is that it does not really concern them, but the principles
which I endeavor to serve. They are the same principles to which you,
highly honored artists, representatives of the people, and publicists,
devote your work and your works—the enfranchisement, ennoblement, and
fraternization of civilized mankind. Those minstrels and legislators
and journalists who pay homage to war and stir up national differences
have assuredly remained absent from this banquet.

I trust that an echo from this festival so indescribably beautiful to
me will make its way to all our fellow-citizens. By this I mean all,
whatever nation they belong to, who strive for righteousness. All on
this side or that side of the Rhine, this side or that side of the
ocean, this side or that side of every other boundary of country or
class—I could wish that these fellow-citizens of ours might learn how
in the circle of the most intellectual men of the capital of the
German Empire a simple woman, hitherto unknown to them, has been so
brilliantly honored, merely on account of the will which she has
manifested in the cause of peace. In giving me your approval for a
book bearing the title “Away with Weapons,” in sanctioning my endeavor
which took me to the Peace Congress at the Capitol, you coin that
title into a watchword and recognize that endeavor as a legitimate
ideal of civilization.

Thus understood, ladies and gentlemen, I joyfully accept all that you
have said to me; thus understood, no enthusiasm is too impetuous for
me, no love too warm, none of those who entertain me too high in rank
and repute. With joy I take from your hands the roses and the wreaths,
and—merely as an intermediary—lay them at the feet of the genius in
whose name you have summoned me here. In this sense I am ready to
drain my glass in the heartiest thanks to you who are present, and in
brotherly greeting to the absent friends of peace in all nations, in
the name of the whole table!

Albert Traeger spoke after me, and then, as a special surprise, the
great tragedian Emanuel Reicher was called upon and read to us a
translation of Maupassant’s short story _La Mère Sauvage_.

In the account given in the _Berliner Tageblatt_, from the pen of the
editor in chief, it said:

It cannot be sufficiently reiterated that this festival has powerfully
contributed to strengthen all who have at heart the blessings of
international peace in their endeavor diligently to cultivate the
humanitarian and civilizing might of the peace idea, without reference
to the unfavorableness of the times and the tendencies of the day.
Thus, then, the festival that was planned in honor of a single person
may be considered as a link in the chain of phenomena by means of
which the enlightened spirits of the century are seeking to build up
the higher (_kulturellen_) interests of humanity.

Nevertheless, I must note that several Berlin newspapers spoke
disparagingly of my appearance there in particular and of my aims in
general, for the most part making reference to the so-often-cited saying
of Moltke, “Perpetual peace is a dream and not even a beautiful one!”
But even the antagonistic voices refrained from abuse and ridicule. That
would not have been the case twenty or perhaps even ten years before.
Then the whole matter would have been half laughed to death, half
scolded to death,—or wholly smothered to death by silence.

We stayed in Berlin for a number of days, and these days were crowded
with participation in conferences, talks, and plans for the
establishment of a German Peace Society in Berlin. Yet nothing
definitive resulted. Dr. M. Hirsch and Baumbach were in favor; Rickert
disapproved.

Friedrich Spielhagen gave us a delightful reception at his house one
evening before my reading took place. About forty persons were present.
At the table I sat between the host and Albert Traeger. There I became
acquainted with Ossip Schubin, Wolzogen, Stettenheim, Dahms, Wolff. A
Prinz Reuss, an officer, asks for an introduction, and says in a modest
way,—of course it was meant ironically,—

“I ought to be ashamed of being in uniform in your presence.”

I could not think of anything to say; later, on the stairs, some very
appropriate answers occurred to me.

I also remember a Lucullus dinner which the proprietor of the _Berliner
Tageblatt_, Rudolf Mosse, and his wife gave us in their splendid new
_palais_. Frau Mosse, who was engaged in all sorts of philanthropic
undertakings, often had the opportunity of talking with the Empress
Frederick. She knew that the Empress would have been glad to hear me.
The Empress had now returned from the funeral of the Grand Duke of
Hesse, and on the next day Frau Mosse was to meet her at some kind of a
function. She intended to ask her if she wished me to be presented to
her. This would have been a great pleasure for me, because I cherished a
deep respect for the widow of Frederick “the Noble.” But the following
day I received a note from Frau Mosse stating that her plan had fallen
through; her Majesty thought best to forego the pleasure—“from motives
of prudence.”

Professor Wilhelm Meyer also invited us to inspect his “Urania,” and he
did us the honors of all the sections, explaining the whole series of
wonders in his poetically clear manner. “Those are the churches of the
future,” I wrote in my diary at that time.

From Berlin we made an excursion to Hamburg. Hans Land accompanied us.
My diary mentions drives among marvelously beautiful country
establishments; a trip on the Elbe to Blankenese; meals in the famous
Restaurant Pfordte; a performance of _Der Vogelhändler_ in St. Paul’s
Theater; and an evening tea at our rooms in the hotel. This made a vivid
impression in my memory, for we had a very interesting little circle and
the conversation was highly stimulating. Our guests, besides Hans Land
and his sister and brother-in-law, were Dr. Löwenberg, Otto Ernst, and
Detlev von Liliencron. Otto Ernst was not as yet the celebrated
dramatist, but a simple school-teacher; yet he had with his _Offenes
Visier_ written himself on our hearts. Detlev von Liliencron was already
at the height of his celebrity—the king of German lyric poets at that
time. Certainly no pacifist; on the contrary, a strenuous, mettlesome
advocate of war—but none the less admired by me. I welcomed the chance
of making his acquaintance. His conversational talent was brilliant. I
had corresponded with him some years before, expressing my admiration
and sending him some of my husband’s writings. I insert his reply here:

Kellinghusen (Holstein), April 27, 1889

Gracious Baroness:

How gracious and kind of you—hearty thanks! Twice already I have been
eager to write to you; first after reading _Es Löwos_, which I find so
incomparable, and then after reading the _Inventarium einer Seele_. I
did not do so especially because I thought you would not care to pile
up still more correspondence. Now I have the privilege of offering you
my sincerest thanks for both,—and how touching, heart-quickening and
lovely is _Es Löwos_!

You, most gracious Baroness, and your husband are fighting together
with us, the little band that there is of us, against the absolute
bogging, the absolute collapse, of our literature. We who are living
shall have no laurels,—scorn and ridicule are too strong,—but we have
smoothed the way for our successors.

I have already heard so much about you from my friend Hermann
Friedrichs, whom I honor so highly—if only he were not so gloomy. In
political matters—I am very conservative, and am growing more so every
day if possible—Friedrichs and I are antipodes. But in other respects
we have many views in common.

You must be in the midst of springtime in your beautiful Lower
Austria; in my cloudy and ever-damp home and in the loneliness in
which I am compelled to live like a deaf-mute, scarcely a leaf is on
its way.

I beg you most humbly to remember me most cordially to your husband.
_Daredjan_[36]—wonderful.

I am the most gracious Baroness’s most obedient

Baron Detlev Liliencron
Captain retired

Well, between the date of that letter and our meeting in Hamburg three
years had passed, during which the most gracious Baroness had chosen
“Away with weapons” as a watchword, which probably went against the
grain of the most obedient and conservative Captain retired. None the
less we got along together all right.

From Hamburg we went home by way of Berlin again, but stopped there only
from one train to another. During this delay we conferred once more with
Dr. M. Hirsch, who promised that he would do his best to establish a
Berlin Peace Union.

I have not yet told of one encounter which took place in those Berlin
days. Because it was the one that made the deepest and most lasting
impression on me, because it remained interwoven with my further thought
and activity, I have reserved speaking of it to the end.

On the forenoon of the eighteenth of March—it was the day after my
reading—we made the acquaintance of a man with whom we had already had
intellectual relations for a long time,—Moritz von Egidy. I would remind
the reader of his letter of November, 1891, which I quoted among the
other documents addressed to me on the occasion of the Congress at Rome.
Now I was to see face to face the man who had offered to join with me in
“putting his hand to the latch of the gate that admits us to the age of
completion.”

One forenoon during our stay in Berlin—I had just written to Egidy to
ask when we might see him—his card was handed to us. He came in, and—but
of this man, this creature of light who was snatched away all too soon
from the world of his day, I will not speak incidentally, but devote a
special chapter to him.

XXXV
MORITZ VON EGIDY
His confession of faith · Further development · Candidacy for the
Reichstag · From his address to the electors · On the fear of
revolution · Idealists in act · My first meeting with Egidy · Visit at
his home · Consistency of preaching and practice · A letter from Egidy

Von Halbheit halte den Pfad rein,
Der ganze Mann setzt ganze Tat ein,
Und wahre Ehre muss ohne Naht sein.
Emst Ziel
Keep thy path from halfness free;
Whoso is whole, whole deeds plies he;
Genuine honor must seamless be.

When the report went through the papers that a lieutenant colonel of the
Prussian army had written a pamphlet entitled “Serious Thoughts,” in
which he renounced the teachings of the Church, and that as a result of
this he had been obliged to send in his resignation, it was regarded as
a spicy bit of news. People sent for the pamphlet expecting to find in
it the views of an enemy of religion; and behold, they were the
thoughts, the serious and quickened thoughts, of one of the most
religious and Christian men that could be found; but one who, like
unnumbered multitudes of his contemporaries, did not regard the dogmas
and formulas of official orthodoxy as true and binding—who, however, in
contradistinction to the contemporaries that pass over this discord,
considered it incompatible with his human dignity and his religious
nature to pretend to a belief which he did not cherish.

His demand was that the Church should cease to impose articles of faith
that are in contradiction with the conscience of the time, and that
instead of the narrow sects a broad, great, united Christianity should
embrace all those who feel the need of a consecrated life, and who carry
in their hearts faith in God, and the Christian ideal.

Honest, solid, frank, glowing with inward warmth, was every word of the
booklet; and even one who occupied a quite different standpoint—that is
to say, one who had not reached the author’s degree of doubt or who had
got far beyond it—could not but feel the one desire to shake that man’s
hand.

That it is not compatible with the position of an active officer to
utter thoughts that are not merely “serious” but revolutionary, since
they assail an established institution sanctioned by the State, was
doubtless clear to the penalized lieutenant-colonel himself; and he
accepted his discharge without resentment, as a matter of course. And
where he had posted himself he kept his stand, with head erect.

To be of use to the men of his time, to make a way out of untenable
contradictions for them, to free the sacredness of genuine inward
religion from external fetters of falsehood, was what had constrained
him to write. And he felt himself doubly bound to continue the work that
he had begun after a multitude had flocked to him waiting for his
further leading.

The sentence above, “Where he had posted himself he kept his stand,” is
in reality inaccurate, for Egidy went on from this place step by step in
the same direction—that is, along the upward path of knowledge—with the
same resolute gait, and where he stood a few years later he had
immeasurably widened his field of view, and consequently his field of
influence also. Although he remained true to himself, or rather by
remaining true to himself, he had become almost another man since his
first appearance with his “Serious Thoughts”; he had gone on thinking
with the same seriousness, gone on willing with increasing power, and
the domain which he surveyed at the end of his career, the ideal toward
which he was then striving, went as far beyond his first announcement as
that went beyond the narrow dogmatic track which he had originally
renounced. And yet he did not for a moment need to disavow the basis of
his endeavor; the watchword that he followed was from first to last
“Religion no longer beside our life, our life itself religion!” Only his
religion was then no longer “Mere Christianity,” but the push toward
goodness, inner consecration; the striving for knowledge, for
development. “Love is power” was another of Egidy’s maxims. He had begun
with the demand for a change in the religious sphere, because there
first he felt the discrepancy between old canons and new needs of the
spirit; but gradually his demands had extended to the bettering of
all—especially social and political—conditions.

He had put himself at the service of his convictions with a strength of
character that was matched only by his strength for work. He went on
lecture tours, published a weekly entitled _Die Versöhnung_
(“Reconciliation”), gave an answer to every one who in person or by
letter came to meet him either as a seeker for advice or as an opponent;
he took a stand publicly with regard to all problems and events of the
day, and when election time came he announced himself a candidate for
the Reichstag.

But the election went against him. One who subscribes to no party
programme does not get the voters, for they too have been drilled into
partisan politics.

Here are a few passages which I have extracted from his appeal to the
electors, premising only that this man was never an opportunist, that he
forever scorned to say A and insinuate B, or to show gray in order to
attain white. Certainly this method is unpolitical according to
prevalent customs, and apparently Egidy’s attempt to enter political
life was wrecked on that reef. The worship of party and special
interests in which our life is swamped comports but ill with a series of
declarations in which the first sentence ran, “I belong to no party and
to no group of interests,” and where a little further on it says:

The question does not concern the advantage of a group or class, or
the principles of a party; the question is to serve the
community—without any limitation of the concept. He who cannot take
into his heart and brain the concept community (_Gemeinsamkeif_) in
all its completeness and elevation, is no such representative of the
people as the times require.

The goal which Egidy saw before him was,

for every individual an intellectual independence limited by nothing,
and an existence secured against all material oppression, for these
are the conditions of inner freedom. There is no such thing as a
welfare outside of freedom, at least for any one who feels himself a
man. Until all are free, none is free. The ruling portion of the
people is just as little free as the ruled. The continual fear of
losing the rule paralyzes the sense of welfare—makes unfree.

We need conditions which shall make it possible for every one of the
people to lead a life worthy of humanity. We are a people no longer
under guardians, and we shall get ourselves these conditions. The way
to this end: a peaceable transformation of our circumstances, from the
present as starting-point, with the unselfish coöperation of all. No
_tabula rasa_, not a “future society” to begin day after to-morrow;
but a resolution of the people, clearly expressed in some form or
other, that from now on other fundamental conceptions sway our
institutions and consequently our existence. The change of conditions
takes place in proportion to the progressive development in ourselves.

We all, without exception, are in a process of development. The
transition to a new view of the world, which has long been on the way,
is to take place during the next few years in the soul of the people.
Whoever hampers this development commits a crime against the
ordinances of God. Only when rationality and natural sensibility rule
the thought of the majority, can we dare think of actual upbuilding.
All enterprises undertaken in the meantime are only barracks which
will be crushed by the spirit of the new time as it will soon appear
with elemental power.

Again, as to his attitude toward the military bills that were pending at
the time of his candidacy, Egidy expresses himself in such fashion as no
legislator in our country has yet ventured on. He binds himself neither
to Yes nor to No. He reserves the right to examine each situation as it
comes:

Should the duty of the representative of the people be understood as
many would have it, he would not need to enter the hall, but might
send in on paper the written Yes or No with which his electors have
stamped him for each individual question. Just because I believe so
fearlessly in the victory of good in the world as a whole, just
because I believe rock-firmly in peace, I must also conscientiously
hear the others. If the representative comes to-day to a decision that
binds him, then he relinquishes the right to approach the champions of
the measure with questions, desires, proposals, and discussions. What
more intelligence does any one need who is tagged beforehand?

On the other hand, a candidate for election must carry with him
serious reflections regarding this as well as every question. My
reflections are as follows: I am persuaded that we are not on the
immediate verge of a war; nor is a war between civilized nations any
longer thinkable. We are on the verge of peace. A war of battles is a
phenomenon which the consciousness of civilized nations has got
beyond. “Peace” does not mean “no more struggle”; “peace” means only
“no more war.” That we ourselves do not desire war and have no use for
it, we affirm on every occasion; our neighbors assert the same. Either
we have confidence in these assertions, and then nothing hinders us
from accordingly realizing peace,—to-day we are only living in an
armistice,—or we do not have confidence in these assertions, and then
we must forthwith get a certainty of how we stand with our neighbors.
The present status is unworthy of a dignified nation. “The quietest
man cannot live in peace if it does not suit his malignant
neighbor”—but the proof that the neighbor is malignant is lacking; the
proof that it does not suit the neighbor is lacking; and, above all,
the proof is lacking that from the moment when we should pave the way
for peace it would not suit the neighbor; quite apart from the fact
that we have no right to designate ourselves as quietest men. As yet
nothing has been done to convince our neighbors by our actions that we
love peace. Only after attempts directed toward this end have shown a
negative result will it be permissible to say that our neighbor is
thinking of war. But in that case the sooner we strike the better. So
I shall first ask for the proof of the factors of danger which the
champions of these measures may allege, and shall, as occasion may
demand, suggest and support measures which shall practically
demonstrate to our neighbors that love for peace which we have always
professed. _Si vis pacem, para pacem._ One party must begin; he is
free to begin who is most sensibly conscious of his strength; he is
bound to begin who can say with the best conscience: “Not from fear of
war do I put aside my weapons, but from love for peace.” The manliness
of the nation should assuredly not be lost; but for its exercise the
handiwork of war is no longer necessary, nor for its preservation the
battlefield.

It was a time when in the German Empire the combating of the so-called
revolutionary parties was part of the order of the day. Egidy took a
stand with regard to this question also, and gave his discussion of it a
particularly interesting turn; for his conception of “religion, order,
propriety,”—three ideas which he assuredly held in the highest
esteem,—differed fundamentally from the popular conception which demands
a clinging fast to all the established. He who fights under the banner
of Evolution does not want to “revolutionize” the established, but to
“transform” it. I let Egidy speak for himself:

I do not see any revolution (_Umsturz_, “upset”) threatening, anyhow:
at least I do not feel threatened so long as I still have the
confidence, which hitherto remains unshaken, that we shall wake to
reason at the right time. To begin with, there is no need of thinking
of such a thing as an upset, but only of the breakdown, the collapse,
of an antiquated view of the world. Things can come to an upset, i.e.
a topsy-turvy state, a reign of terror, only if the representatives of
the hitherto-existing order, in melancholy blindness or from outright
selfish motives, contumaciously oppose the collapse of antiquated
notions, set themselves against the breakdown of untenable social
formations. That they can prevent the collapse is of course a thing
not to be thought of, no more than any one may imagine that he
occasioned this breakdown.

Egidy’s style acquires a distinct individuality from its conciseness and
perspicuity of expression, which are the consequences of the absolute
honesty and straightforwardness of his thought. Never, for the sake of a
fine-sounding phrase or a rhetorical effect, will a superfluous word or
a periphrasis be found in it; but the heartfelt quality of the thought
does now and then create for itself new words and new compoundings which
unintentionally become stylistic beauties:

The community is a living organism, in which injuries can be cured
only from within outward, only by a new, pure, warm heart-blood. No
sentimentality, no full-toned din of words. The will to resolve. The
doing, also, by each in his own way. We want to be practical
idealists, idealists in realization, idealists in act.[37]

We were entertaining callers when Lieutenant Colonel von Egidy was
announced: our ambassador Count Szechenyi, and Ossip Schubin the famous
Austrian novelist, who had moved from Bohemia to Berlin awhile
previously with her sister the painter. A pretty, vivacious, elegant
lady. A new novel of hers had just been published, adding yet more to
her already well-established reputation as a notable delineator of
Austrian high life. When Egidy came in Count Szechenyi took his
departure, but Ossip Schubin remained awhile longer. Joyously we went
forward to greet our caller and shake hands with him. After a long
correspondence a first meeting is the meeting after an absence.

Egidy, although rather short in stature, had a very martial appearance;
his bearing, his voice, his accent, were altogether those of a Prussian
officer of hussars. But the rigorous face with its thick mustache was
lighted up by a pair of smiling, gleaming blue eyes.

The presence of the strange lady kept the conversation in conventional
channels at first; there was no talk about the things that were close to
our hearts. The lieutenant colonel and the authoress had ten minutes of
very lively converse. Then Ossip Schubin took leave of us. Later it came
out that neither of them had ever heard of the other. Evidently Egidy
was not interested in fiction and Ossip Schubin cared still less for
political addresses.

Then, as soon as we were alone, we broached the subject of the efforts
in which we were respectively engaged. I had not then heard any of
Egidy’s public speeches, but even in his conversation words flowed
warmly and eloquently from his lips. He was so completely penetrated
with his ideas, his plans, his hopes, that he uttered what he was full
of. Such an utterance were his speeches also, as I afterward discovered;
only in them he spoke with an exceptionally loud, clear, and deliberate
utterance, and was often carried to heights of eloquence by his inward
fire. In the drawing-room, of course, he spoke gently and more simply,
but still with ever logical fullness of thought, always consistent with
himself. We now let him know our ideas and aims also. The peace cause
Egidy had not yet included in his programme, although theoretically he
agreed with us.

The next day we visited him in his home. A beautiful, harmonious family
circle. A congenial wife—born Princess of something, I have forgotten
the name—and ten children. To be sure, not all ten were at home. The
oldest son was serving in the navy; one daughter was studying in Sweden;
but at any rate there was a fine bunch of Egidy children present, and
all seemed to worship their father. One of the daughters acted as his
secretary. Charming hours those were which we spent in the plainly
furnished home in eager speech and reply, in which the wife and the
older children took part, about the loftiest aims of human struggle and
labor,—reconciliation, peace, consecration of life. “We are pulling on
different ropes,” said Egidy to us, “but it is the same bell.”

Later, when on the occasion of his candidacy I wrote to him how
desirable it was that such servants of the community, such thinkers who
stood above narrow party interests, should be members of the popular
assembly, and how different everything would then at once be, he wrote
back to me:

Everything will not be different at once, but gradually—of course; but
the tempo decides. “Gradually” everybody says; the point is whether it
is slow step by numbers—One—back again—One—back again—Twooooo (you
surely know something of the drillground?) or, of course, rather
livelier, try even a bit of quick step for aught I care—no need that
it be a double quick with _tambours battants_. And it is coming. It
has to come. What phases we may still have to pass through I would not
say, in view of the latest phenomena in our public life. As yet I
still do not believe in a bloody settlement. The incoming of the new
view of the world will come about, not without tears and outcries, but
still as a natural process, as a birth.

You speak of my working power. Well, yes, I have working power and
creative impulse, and how I yearn to be able to bring both
“immediately” into service. Inwardly I am so well prepared and
equipped that at a second’s notice I could take up my duties. I am
sure of myself. If one chooses to speak at all of a value which I may
be supposed to represent (as your words do in such a wonderfully
pretty way), this value can only be seen in the future. Many have
already spoken and written, but if they were put before the “doing”
they gave out; they made miserable compromises with shallow
unchangeableness and other wretched notions. Honesty, concord, the
bringing into concord of preaching and practice, is what the business
means for me. And in this matter I will not yield a hair’s breadth
from my apprehension of the truth.

On our return from Hamburg, where we had gone after my Berlin address,
we stopped in Berlin (as has already been mentioned) for only an hour at
the railway station. Thereupon Egidy wrote me the following letter,
which also I will put on record here because it shows so very clearly
how Egidy conceived of his busy work and of a possible coöperation with
me:

Berlin, N. W., Spenerstrasse 18, May 11, 1892

Highly honored Lady:

You passed through Berlin and we knew nothing about it, when we had
been taking so much pleasure in the anticipation and planning
everything so as to enjoy, if possible, a few more hours of
interchange of thought with you and Herr von Suttner.

For in truth I had my heart very much set on it. I would gladly have
anchored our acquaintance on a ground that might be fruitful for the
community. We must act (operate) on one set of principles. Guerrilla
warfare of individuals, or even of groups, must be superseded by a
systematic action of all under one controlling idea, with each one
conscious of the object to be attained. The heads of all columns must
now appear on the battlefield; those who always do nothing but talk of
religion, Christianity, and the Church, without being honest men or
thinking of their brothers,—those we leave to march in circuit around
the battlefield as they have been doing in the past. Our idea is the
conquest, not merely the combating, of the old view of the world; the
new appears to me under the name “Christianity,” to you under the name
“Humanity.” That ought not to separate us, however, but should make
the one complement the other. Perhaps, too, with the meaning which I
give to the concept “Christianity,” “Humanity brought closer to the
Godhead,” you may be able to accept the word. For the success of our
endeavors, and _that_ is the only point that concerns us, the word
“Christian” is indispensable. Yes, the circles that you already have
will be content with the word “Man”; but millions will not accept it.

We must take Christianity _seriously_—that is the sentence which I
lately cried out to the literary world when I had invited them to meet
in the Chamber of Deputies. In speech and writing, in our own lives,
wherever we come forward, we must verify the Christian consciousness,
must “_live love_” I was understood without doubt—but faith is
lacking; faith in the possibility of a realization of my endeavors.
And that is fearfully sad!

Others again, who share the faith with me, cannot conceive the
realization with retention of the external forms, as I strive for it;
often, therefore, they scarcely believe in the audacity and
intrepidity of my will. The sort of spiritualization of the
established (altar and throne), or “idealization,” is to them
unthinkable, and just as unthinkable to them is it that in my concrete
demands on the future I go beyond them all. None of all these dream of
anything _so_ radical as the changes I want to make, because in many
cases, it must be admitted, they lack the clear conscience: they want
to “destroy”—much at any rate—while I would only build up.

I recently had an intensely serious interview with two teachers. One
of them wanted to compile the views of the most prominent champions of
the development of mankind relative to the schools: the anonymous
author of _Maschinenzeitalter_—I helped him over the anonymity to
begin with (could do so the more freely because on the day before that
splendid booklet _Wilhelm II., Romantiker oder Sozialist_ had come
into my hands, on the cover of which Frau v. S. is named as the author
of that work). It was highly interesting to hear and to see how the
two developed the fact that, and the reasons why, they had believed,
not believed, believed again, and ultimately not believed, this or
that. The other observations of these (still rather young) men were
also very noteworthy, their zeal for the development of mankind
downright magnificent. And of such there are thousands—only the faith
is lacking, and for that we ourselves are to blame, if we do not work
unitedly and so become to those who are striving and willing,
demanding and yearning, a real _safeguard_ for their hopes.

Therefore, Frau von Suttner, place your efforts also under the banner
of a pure religiousness, true and genuine;[38] only so can you _uphold
them before every one_ as justified. Those who care nothing for the
word “Religion” will not ostracize your efforts because of a word; and
those to whom religion is everything will recognize your efforts for
very religion’s sake. But religion in a sense which excludes any
limitation of belief, any Churchism and any Judaism, all sectarianism,
and the like.

I had my heart too much set on saying these additional words, highly
honored lady; I may take it, since the acquaintance we have formed,
that you have a friend’s comprehension of the unreservedness of my
discussion. We are dealing here with something too high for
phrase-making. Above all, I beg you to see in the fact that I have
written you thus at all a proof of pure and genuine esteem—else had I
remained silent. And this honest and convinced esteem I feel (together
with all my family) in no less a degree for your husband, whom I
respectfully salute. My wife and daughter desire me to express to both
of you their warmest greetings and respects. Your visit remains for us
all a valued memory.

Sincerely yours
M. von Egidy

I should not be at a loss to characterize the whole man Egidy in one
word. Just as there are, for example, men of steel and iron, so hard and
keen; men of gold, so good and true; men of wax, so soft and plastic; so
is Egidy, in his transparent luster, a man of crystal.

XXXVI
VARIOUS OPINIONS
Letters from Alphonse Daudet, Paul Heyse, the Bishop of Durham, Ruggero
Bonghi, and Count Kamarofski

After our return from Berlin we gave ourselves up once again to our
literary and propagandist labors. We exerted ourselves to find out what
distinguished contemporaries thought of our purposes, and to utilize
their approval if we got it. So it was that I gained the authoritative
approval of Björnson and Fulda and Edmondo de Amicis and Émile Zola and
many others. But we also encountered opposition and doubt, though only
rarely. My husband, who during our stay in Paris had won Alphonse
Daudet’s sympathies, now wrote to him about the founding of the Peace
Society and about the Congress in Rome, and asked him if he would help
in the cause. Here is the answer:

My dear Colleague,

War is odious and your work is fine. So I am with you against war; but
do you really believe that we can do anything in behalf of peace
except wave our arms and utter sounds? To me war is a thing fated, and
the _apple_ side of my nature—mankind is divided into pears and
apples, idealists and others—the terrible apple side of me, then,
takes from me all hope of success in the campaign which I am ready to
undertake with you.

Remember me to Madame Suttner, and believe me wholly

Yours, Alphonse Daudet

And to me a famous German poet wrote:

Honored Baroness:

Is there need of an express assurance of my warmest approbation of the
ends and aims of the Peace League? And yet, as I am convinced that
mankind, ruled as they are more by passions and instincts than by
reason and love, will approach these ends only by the civilizing
labors of centuries if they ever do at all, it goes against my grain
to express in solemn protests, from which I am unable to hope for any
practical result, pious wishes which for a nobler humane minority are
self-evident. As long as European civilization is still threatened by
a half-Asiatic barbarism which will never submit to an arbitrator’s
decision but will yield only to force, I regard the _Ceterum censeo_
of such congresses even as a danger, like everything else by which our
readiness for defense, indispensable in the interest of the world’s
peace, is impaired.

With sincere respect
Yours very devotedly
Paul Heyse

Munich, October 31, 1891

I append a few other letters from that time:

Auckland Castle Bishop Auckland
July 12, 1892

Dear Madam:[39]

Englishmen cannot but hail with the fullest, heartiest sympathy the
work which you have taken in hand, as well as the success that has
attended it. The promotion of the business of peace in the nearest
future depends in large measure on the mood of the German race, and on
this you have already made a deep impression.

As far as I am personally concerned, I have faith enough—may I say, I
have confidence enough in the power of the Christian faith?—to expect
that if once the magnanimity of opposing nations is awakened, which is
quite within the range of possibility, there will also be found a way
to obviate the persistent causes of mutual irritation. Then the
natural institutions of peace will suffice to furnish the nations with
that powerful discipline, consisting in self-denial, which at present
has to be maintained by perpetual readiness for war.

Would it be going too far to express the hope that even our generation
may yet live to see France, Germany, Russia, fenced in as it were by a
neutral girdle, enabled to improve their resources without being
obliged to anticipate untoward events, and to perform their functions
in the service of man—at the same time forwarding the kingdom of God
on earth.

May a rich blessing attend your efforts!

With the sincerest feelings of respect, dear Madam, I am
Yours truly
B. F. Dunelm.[40]

I had kept up a correspondence with the chairman of the Congress at
Rome, Minister Ruggero Bonghi. Here is one of his letters (the original
in Italian):

Anagni, July 9, 1892

Dear Friend:

Since you permit me to call you “friend,” I will no longer give you
any other name, for there is none tenderer. And the consciousness that
I am speaking to a friend sweetens writing for me, makes it almost
seem pleasanter to me than wandering about the fields to breathe in
the fresh breezes which blow here on the heights of the Apennines in
these early morning hours—here where I now, as Petrarch says, “dwell
serious and sad” (_doglioso e grave or seggio_), and where in days
gone by so much martial rage was let loose, while to-day such deep
peace and quiet reign. Here in this ancient Anagni whose origin is
lost in gray antiquity, which took the highest place in a people that
had been subjected by Rome, and which was once the home of haughty
popes who from their dwelling-place there ruled the world—here, I say,
I indulge in considerations about the fortunes of my country, about
the difficult remedies for its ailments; and withal, in my orphanage I
watch the little girls grow up. And I instruct them so that when they
have grown big, and return to their families, they may have an
influence upon them to make them better and may turn the future into a
more friendly channel....

It almost seems to me, dear friend, that I am thus doing a work
perhaps more useful—though it may be insignificant—than the work of
very many who carry their chatter into the assemblies, and their
passions and infatuations into the privy council. And when I think of
you I rise to that ideal of unity and peace which lives in your spirit
and your heart, and which bears witness to nobility of soul in those
who can grasp it and love it,—while despising it, deriding it, and
denying it, attests the opposite.

What has war accomplished here? It has laid waste these landscapes,
and often in the course of the centuries scattered the inhabitants so
that even the traces of their habitations have disappeared. Often,
also, in the course of the centuries, Anagni and the Secco valley
above which it lies have risen; and as often it has been again reduced
by the power of arms and the ambition of the great. And now the valley
is unhealthy; one can scarcely get safety from its miasmas up here,
about five hundred meters above the level of the sea.

I have an idea, and I am almost afraid to express it, my dear lady. It
is this: I believe that Rome, by which the first conquest of these
territories was effected, also brought the first misfortune upon them.
Either the whole history of the first centuries of Rome is false, or
else the peoples which first fell under the Roman yoke were previously
happier and more numerous and lived on healthier and more fruitful
lands and in more widely spread residences than after that. What
benefit has war realized here or anywhere else?

If in the deeds to which it constrains men not all is evil, and if
many a virtue shines out in connection with them, this is because man,
savage and—I feel like saying—bestial as he may become, still never
wholly ceases to be human, and in some way mitigates the harm which
his own work inflicts. If war has done anything good in any respect,
this has been done, one may say, in its own despite and contrary to
its intent. Even if many instincts impel man to war, how much nobler
are those that repel him from it! How august sounds the voice that
would restrain him from it, in comparison to the angry shout that eggs
it on! To-day I read the maxim of old Lao-Tse: “If two armies of equal
strength are pitted against each other, the victory belongs to that
one whose leader was the more merciful.”

That is—unfortunately—not correct. But it is one of those human
illusions that are more valuable than a truth, because they prove that
man feels ruth at the use of arms, that his conscience is not easy
even when he is compelled to use them, and that he seeks the basis for
victory in some virtue, in some feeling that might absolve him. We
promoters of peace, who work for it with glowing zeal, have in the
last analysis no other object than this,—that man shall become _wholly
human_.

And, as I am in the habit of ultimately ending my letters to my
friends, I make an end of this one. Have a little affection for your

Bonghi

After my trip to Berlin I received from Bonghi the following lines, this
time written in French:

Rome, April 26, 1892

I follow you and applaud you. You have everything that is necessary
for the beneficent and intelligent part that you are playing. You have
had the courage to go and plant our banner in Berlin, in the very
fortress of our enemies.

Write me, dear Baroness, as often as you can; you will be doing me a
very great favor. A thousand greetings to your husband.

Yours altogether
R. Bonghi

From the famous Russian folklorist and professor in Moscow University,
Count Kamarofski, I had received an article for my review and the
following letter:

Moscow, May 18/30, 1892

Highly honored Lady:

Accept my thanks for your letter and the pamphlets accompanying it.
You are right: you are no stranger to me since I have learned to
esteem you from your beautiful story, _Die Waffen nieder_. I am
sending you herewith my lecture which I delivered in behalf of the
famine-stricken, and give you permission to make such extracts from it
as you may see fit. As for an original article for your review, I will
get one ready as soon as I find the opportunity.

In Russia people defend the tremendous military preparations as
necessary on account of the Triple Alliance, and especially of
Germany; thus every one talks of his merely defensive designs, and
attributes to his neighbor the most threatening plans. Surely a
melancholy sign of the times!

In view of this, all friends of peace are called upon to act on public
opinion, and through it on the governments, as much as possible; and
certainly the chief part in this noble effort belongs to women, for
they are most able to influence education and morals.

I am yours, etc.
Graf L. Kamarowsky

XXXVII
THE BERN SESSIONS
Journey to Switzerland · Poem by Count Hoyos · Letter from Prince
Camillo Starhemberg · Opening of the Congress · First impulse to
arbitration treaties, from America · League of European states · Social
life of the Congressists · Arturo de Marcoartu · Alfred Nobel complies
with my invitation · On the Lake of Lucerne · A parable by Ruchonnet ·
Protest against distorted reports · A lively debate · Arrival of the
Interparliamentarians · The Conference · A prophetic toast

In August, 1892, we proceeded to Bern, where the fourth World’s Peace
Congress and the fourth Interparliamentary Conference were invited to
meet. It was our first journey to Switzerland—for us both an intense
delight. The name Switzerland awakens in the mind a whole mass of
mountain poetry and ideals of freedom: glaciers and Rütli oath, cow
bells and Tell’s arrow. To go with this, a highly modern international
hotel life. The plainest and most democratic country in Europe, and
withal the meeting-place of the traveling aristocrats and plutocrats of
the Old and New Worlds.

The way to Bern took us to the Lake of Zurich. My Own reveled in the
spectacle of this magnificence of nature. Curious—when my mind reverts
to the journeys which I took with my husband, it is only through the
medium of the pleasure which _he_ found in them that I recall all the
beauties of art and nature which we enjoyed. Now I myself am also
susceptible to such enjoyments; but when I was with him I felt only the
reflex of his feelings.

We put up at the Berner Hof. On our first arrival, although it was
late in the evening, we met many of our friends of the Rome
Congress,—Frédéric Passy, Ducommun, the Moscheles pair, Hodgson Pratt,
Pandolfi, Émile Arnaud, and many others. The next morning a new,
joyous surprise: the glass door of our room opened out on a great
terrace, and from here the gaze swept over the hotel garden, over the
city, and over the horizon of snow-glittering peaks of the surrounding
mountains.

“It is beautiful here, my Löwos!”

“Yes, My Own, beautiful; and we will have our breakfast here on the
terrace.”

So the luminous pictures flash, so fresh breezes of happiness blow over
from the past into my gray, lonely present, as I look back upon the
journeys which we two took together, when we carried with us everywhere,
into the most serious days filled with work and political problems and
into the different imposing surroundings, our modest, sunshiny bit of
home. On that first morning in the capital of the Swiss Confederation
the mail brought me various letters,—from Count Hoyos a poem dedicated
“to the Peace Council at Bern,” and entitled

NEVER THROW DOWN YOUR WEAPONS

_Wenn blinder Haft die Krallen regt_

When blindfold Hatred’s claws are shown
And Falsehood’s wings come dark behind,
Stand to your arms, and lay not down
The weapons of the Mind!

The war of nations, demon strange,
Before the truth shall shrieking flee;
Man’s genius good shall fearless range
After the victory.

Pour from your sword-blade floods of light,
Be love the sign upon your shield;
These arms by their o’erwhelming might
Shall make the tempter yield.

From the Liberal member of the Herrenhaus, Fürst Camillo
Starhemberg, whom I had requested and half persuaded to come to the
Interparliamentary Conference at Bern, I received the following
communication, interesting from many points of view:

Schloss Hubertendorf, Nied.-Oest.
August 21, 1892

Honored Baroness:

The quite abnormal heat that has been prevalent for some time has so
affected my nerves and made me so unwell that I shall hardly be able
to carry out my intention of taking part in the Conference at Bern.

I will not yet definitively decline, but I hardly believe that I can
get to Bern. I have no desire to act as a dumb listener and looker-on,
and for taking a part in word and deed I do not, to speak frankly,
feel myself either in the mood or well enough.

At the request of Baron Pirquet I have, during the recent sessions,
put questions to various members of the Herrenhaus, and sounded them
as to whether they would not be pleased to take part in the
deliberations of the Conference, and, anyhow, to express their
sympathy with our endeavors by letting their names appear on the list
of those who are working for peace in the world.

Unfortunately, the least that I got was a courteous declination; in
most cases it was an ironical answer, of course always in such polite
terms as admitted of no decided protest. I had also the opportunity of
speaking with a personage of exalted position about the idea of peace
in general, but everywhere I found expressed more or less the idea
that the German lady betrothed to a German officer, on page nine of
the Festival Number of _Die Waffen nieder_, develops:[41] Sooner
sacrifice millions, sooner bring upon men limitless misery, sooner
ruin states financially, decimate the population, plunge families in
want, mourning, and the deepest distress, than be unfaithful to
traditional ideas; every thought of a peace movement of that kind is
actually interpreted as if there must be cowardice back of it.

I cannot say that these utterances which I have recently heard enhance
my hopes of _a speedy success_, but none the less I harbor the
conviction that sometime the idea will make its way, and that at least
the civilized nations of Europe will acknowledge allegiance to the
principle of arbitration and will bring their controversies to a
decision in that way.

I had not very long ago an extremely interesting letter from a Pole
who is very warm on the peace question and sends me all sorts of peace
journals and bits of news, but will not agree to peace, to the idea of
a _permanent_ peace anyway, till Poland is an independent kingdom and
free both from Russia and from Austria—and he himself admits that of
course this could not be attained until after a bloody war and strife.
And this is the way with a good many adherents of the peace idea:
first they want to see their own object attained, they shrink from no
difficulties, no deluge of blood, and only when they have gained their
own ends are they willing to make peace. The fact is, to accept
subordination, to submit, is what individual men cannot do, much less
peoples and nations; and just as we stand for the idea of peace and
are carrying on a propaganda for it—of course only with very slight
progress against the existing hostility to it—so others are fanning
the hatred and discord of the nations, are egging on the nations to
senseless national hatred, and use this to serve their own foul
purposes, to attain their own despicable ends.

Most heartily wishing the best success to you at Bern, highly honored
Baroness, and promising that in thought and feeling I shall be one at
this so honorable assemblage which is striving for the ennobling of
humanity, I sign myself with the assurance of my fullest respect and
devotion,

Your sincerely admiring and appreciative
Starhemberg

I had also written to Alfred Nobel asking him to come to Bern and attend
the deliberations of the Congress, but had received no answer to this.

—So after the festive breakfast on our terrace we went with tense
anticipation to the opening of the Congress. The great hall of the
Bundesrat was filled to the last seat. The galleries were crowded as
densely as on days when an especially interesting parliamentary session
is expected.

Louis Ruchonnet, who the year before had been President of the Swiss
Republic, was to be chairman. In the hall we met several more friends.
Professor Wilhelm Löwenthal of Paris was among them. After Ruchonnet’s
inaugural address a representative from each of the different nations
made remarks; and that brought the first formal session to a close. The
deliberations did not begin till the second session, which took place in
the afternoon in the hall of the Museum.

In the course of years I have attended more than a dozen peace
congresses and conferences, the protocols of which I possess in as many
volumes. I cannot propose to insert in these recollections of my life
the speeches, resolutions, and festivities which this small library
chronicles. I shall reproduce only what especially impressed itself on
my mind, what was a part of my experience so to speak, and thereby
afford to such of my readers as here seek a historical sketch of the
movement with which my name and activities are associated a glance at
its development. It is always interesting to follow the line along which
certain phenomena of contemporary history move—now swiftly, now slowly,
now standing still or even backing, to go forward again with all the
greater rapidity; it is noteworthy, too, how many an after-phase is
prophetically adumbrated, how projects come up and are dropped and
afterward come up again as something entirely new; how that which is at
first a matter of contention gradually becomes a matter of course, and
how apparently insurmountable obstacles, which one does not even try to
remove, are later found to have simply vanished away.

In Berlin no peace society had as yet been formed, so Germany was not
represented by any one from its capital, but by Dr. Adolf Richter from
Württemberg. From the United States Dr. Trueblood, president of the
Boston Peace Society (founded in 1816), was there. Ducommun was in the
chair at the second session, and made a report on the establishment of
the permanent International Bureau, the honorary secretary of which this
splendid man continued to be until his death in 1906.

Hodgson Pratt brought an interesting piece of information: the President
of the United States had sent to all governments a letter announcing the
resolution of the United States Senate and House of Representatives
expressing the wish to have permanent arbitration treaties concluded
with all other nations. Hodgson Pratt added to this communication the
proposal that we should work in every country to have this letter
answered by the respective governments. So that was the
beginning—suggested by America, supported by England—of “permanent
arbitration treaties.”

There was debated, and adopted, a motion proposed by E. T. Moneta, S. J.
Capper, and the Baroness Suttner, with the title, “A Confederation of
European States.”

Oh, that Capper! What a half comical but wholly pleasing figure of a
congressman! The white beard of a prophet and a tall white hat. A
vibrant voice that uttered itself by preference in French but with the
most exaggerated English accent; enthusiasm and fire, and at the same
time solid common sense.

But to return to the motion, “A Confederation of European States.” At
that time the idea had not yet begun to be understood at all; it was
generally confounded with “United States,” after the pattern of North
America, and proscribed for Europe. So thoroughly proscribed that a
Swiss paper called _Les États-Unis d’Europe_ was forbidden to be brought
into Austria.

The Capper-Moneta-Suttner motion read:

Whereas both the injury caused by armed peace and the danger that is
ever threatening the whole of Europe from a possible great war have
their basis in the condition of lawlessness in which the different
states of Europe stand toward one another;

Whereas a confederation of European states, which would be desirable
also in the interest of the commercial relations of all countries,
would do away with this condition of lawlessness and create permanent
legal relations in Europe;

And finally, whereas such a confederation would in no wise impair the
independence of the individual nations as regards their internal
affairs, and therefore as regards their forms of government:

The Congress invites the European peace societies and their adherents
to exert themselves, as the highest aim of their propaganda, for the
formation of a confederation of states on the basis of the solidarity
of their interests. It moreover invites all the societies in the
world, especially at the time of political elections, to draw
attention to the necessity of a permanent congress of nations, to
which every international question should be submitted, so that every
conflict may be settled by law and not by force.

The members of the Congress—at least the greater part—were together the
whole day long, for most of them lodged in the same hotel and took their
meals there at a great common table between the sessions. There they
went on conferring during luncheon and dinner. Especially at the
after-dinner coffee, which was taken in a covered veranda adjoining the
dining-room, groups of friends were formed and indulged in unconstrained
conversation.

One afternoon a large circle of us was gathered in this veranda to hold
a mock trial. At table a little controversy had arisen between the
Marchese Pandolfi of Rome and Senator Arturo de Marcoartu of Madrid.
Now, in jest, a court of justice was appointed; the two contending
parties had to submit their cases, each of them chose an advocate, and
the judge was to give his decision. I no longer remember what it was all
about; I only know that it was very amusing. One of the advocates—it was
Gaston Moch, a former French artillery officer—proved to be very witty,
and the two opponents likewise put the whole tribunal in the merriest of
moods by their repartee.

Arturo de Marcoartu was the only Spaniard who attended the Peace
Congress; I believe the Spanish Interparliamentary Group and the Spanish
Peace Society consisted of himself and no one else,—at least he was the
only active member. He spoke a good deal and was very long-winded, and
he was not a popular speaker because he had a very indistinct
enunciation and he was all the time repeating himself; but when his
speeches were read they were found to contain notable ideas. He had been
working for years with the greatest zeal to help spread the idea of
universal peace. Even before the first London Conference he had tried in
Vienna to win to the cause a number of prominent politicians and
aristocrats, and had found appreciation and assistance in Fürst Joseph
Colloredo, a very liberal-minded man. The beginning of an activity had
ensued, but this first stream was soon lost in the sand. I shall by and
by introduce a letter from Marcoartu, containing many interesting
discussions and observations which have been justified by events. As
long as he lived Marcoartu never was missing at a Peace Congress or an
Interparliamentary Conference; since his death, Spain has been
unrepresented at the Congresses.

To return to that afternoon in the veranda: my husband, who was employed
as Pandolfi’s advocate, was in the act of delivering a humorous plea,
when a waiter came to me where I sat at one side, said that a gentleman
in the drawing-room wished to speak to me, and handed me the man’s
card,—Alfred Nobel. Joyfully surprised, I hastened to the drawing-room,
where my friend came to meet me.

“You called me,” he said; “here I am. But incognito, so to speak. I do
not want to take part in the Congress or make any acquaintances, only to
hear something specific about the matter. Tell me what has been done so
far.”

We remained absorbed in a long conversation. Alfred Nobel displayed much
skepticism, yet he seemed anxious to see his doubts dispelled. He left
Bern that same evening, but he made my husband and me promise to come
and visit him for two days at Zurich after the Congress was adjourned.

Among the festivities which were arranged for the benefit of the
Congressists was an excursion to the Lake of Lucerne. It was a grand
trip. We had a collation at Lucerne. Of course toasts were made; but all
after dinner eloquence evaporates with the froth of the champagne.
Nevertheless, something that Ruchonnet said—not in a speech but in
conversation with his vis-à-vis—made a great impression on me, and I
copied it into my diary. Some one had spoken of the objection that is
often heard made by the opposing party that it would be an
impossibility, a misfortune, to reduce the armies—it would be simply
unthinkable from the standpoint of civilization and political economy.
Then Ruchonnet made this comparison: If to-day, by some misfortune, the
sun should be darkened, then men would use every effort to provide
artificial light and artificial heat; new industries and new professions
would come into existence; and then, if after a few generations people
should come along with the proposition to abolish the sun’s eclipse,
there would be a general outcry, “That would be a calamity, an
impossibility—what would become of the heat factories, of the numberless
light-makers?”

On the day after the excursion to Lucerne the deliberations were
resumed. First of all, A. G. von Suttner took the floor to protest
against the false, distorted reports of a certain correspondent. The
person inculpated had done nothing less than to send the newspapers a
telegram in which the opening assembly was pictured as a turbulent scene
among people who were stirring up war in their own camp. The speaker
read aloud the distorted reports in question, which had furthermore
given the foreign press material for sarcastic comments, and called on
the chair to send an official denial to the newspapers; and this was
done. It proved later that the correspondent was an avowed opponent, who
had declared to a colleague that he was not willing that the movement
should take root in Switzerland.

There did come a somewhat lively scene in the course of the Congress,
however, when the Polish member of the Austrian Parliament made a speech
in which he demanded the restoration of Poland as an independent
kingdom. Ducommun, who was in the chair at that session, as well as
several other speakers, notably Frédéric Passy, laid down the law to the
Polish patriot, who would not accept the partition of his fatherland,
declaring that the Congress could not possibly occupy itself with the
revision of Polish history. The justice of the future is to be made
ready for; the individual injustices of history cannot now be rectified,
for all the divisions of the land as at present constituted are based on
the ground of force; new laws, new ordinances—and they must be worked
for—have no retroactive power.

Now the Parliamentarians too took their turn in Bern. Their Conference
was to be opened after the close of our Congress, on the twenty-ninth
of August. There we again met many old acquaintances: Dr. Baumbach and
Dr. Hirsch from Berlin; Frédéric Bajer from Denmark; Philip Stanhope,
brother of the Minister of War, Cremer, Dr. Clark, from England; and
many others. We also learned to know many new faces: from Norway the
president of the Storthing, Ullman, was present, and Honduras and San
Salvador were this time represented by Minister Plenipotentiary
Marquis de Castello Foglia. Altogether thirteen nations were
represented. The sessions were held in the Federal Palace. The rest of
us—non-parliamentarians—were allowed to be present in the galleries.
The Conference was received by the director of the Department of the
Exterior, Bundesrat Droz. Of the transactions I note the following:

The French Senator Trarieux and the Englishman Stanhope took up the
American overture in regard to arbitration treaties and proposed the
establishment of an international tribunal. Pandolfi pleaded for “a
permanent International Conference.” Marcoartu demanded the
neutralization of isthmuses and straits. Baumbach, vice president of the
German Reichstag,—even then the German politicians were showing
themselves very reserved toward the idea of peace,—spoke in behalf of
the protection of private property at sea in times of war. The debate on
this topic became rather excited. The Frenchman Pourquery de Boisserin
explained in fiery words that a Peace Conference could not, on
principle, take under advisement any eventualities of war—and there he
was right, a hundred times right!

The other standpoints, however,—“that we cannot be satisfied with pious
wishes; we cannot as yet proclaim permanent peace, so we must content
ourselves with what is attainable, and every factor that works toward
the humanizing of war, the diminution of its horrors, is itself a mighty
step toward better things,”—these standpoints won the day, and the
Baumbach motion was passed.

Even at luncheon—I sat between Baumbach and Pourquery—the controversy
was kept up. And it has lasted till to-day. There are still those who
want to guide the work of peace along the course of mitigating and
regulating the phenomena of war, in order to demonstrate thereby that
they are too practical to strive for the “impossible,” and in order to
postpone to misty future times the attack on the real enemy, “war,” for
which they show especial regard and respect; and in contradistinction to
these there are those who assert that if the goal lies in the south one
ought not to pave the way toward the north.

During the session of the Conference the Parliamentarians were given a
festival at Interlaken. On that occasion Schenk, who afterward became
President of the Confederation, offered a toast containing a prophecy
for which even the speaker himself probably did not foresee so speedy a
fulfillment.

“I am glad,” said he, “to see the representatives of parliaments here
assembled to deliberate about peace and arbitration; still more glad
should I be on the day when the official commissioners of the
governments should assemble for the like purpose—and that day will
come.”

That day arrived only seven years later, when twenty-seven governments
sent their official representatives to The Hague for that same purpose.

XXXVIII
VISIT TO ALFRED NOBEL
Arrival at Zurich · Nobel begins to take an interest in the peace
movement, and joins us · Trips on the lake · A glimpse into his views of
life · His first project for an act in furtherance of the cause of peace

We left Bern a few days before the close of the Conference in order to
accept the invitation of Alfred Nobel, who was staying at Zurich. Our
host had put at our disposal in the Hotel Bauer _au lac_, where he
himself lodged, a suite of rooms that the Empress Elisabeth had vacated
the day before after a short visit. I found still lying on the toilet
table a pale faded rose....

Alfred Nobel came to meet us at the railway station and conducted us to
the drawing-room prepared for us, and there, a half hour later, he
joined us at dinner. He had us tell him all about the meetings of the
Bern Congress. He also gave us his name as a member of the Austrian
Peace Society, with a contribution of two thousand francs. He had sent a
like sum through me to the Congress committee at Rome the year before.

“What you are handing me,—and I thank you for it,”—I said, “comes from
amiability rather than from conviction. A few days ago in Bern you
expressed your doubts regarding the cause....”

“Regarding the cause and its justice—no, I have no doubts about that,
but only as regards the question whether it can be realized; nor do I
yet know how your Unions and Congresses propose to take hold of the
work....”

“Then if you knew that the work was being well taken hold of would you
take a hand and help?”

“Yes, I would. Inform me, convince me,—and then I will do something
great for the movement.”

I replied that I could not then, _entre la poire et le fromage_, explain
the whole matter, expel deeply-rooted doubts, and evoke firm conviction;
but I would from that time forth keep him posted, send him regularly my
review and other publications appertaining to the matter, and would
endeavor to give him not only “information” but enthusiasm.

“All right, try for that—I like nothing so much as to be able to feel
enthusiasm, a capacity which my experiences in life, and my fellow-men,
have greatly weakened.”

Nobel owned a tiny aluminium motor boat, in which we took delightful
trips around the lake in his company; the silvery craft darted swiftly
over the waters without rocking. We sat leaning back in comfortable deck
chairs covered with soft plaids, let the magic panorama of the lake
shores pass before our eyes, and talked about a thousand things between
heaven and earth. Nobel and I even agreed that we would write a book
together, a polemic against everything that keeps the world in
wretchedness and stupidity. Nobel was very strongly inclined to
Socialism in his views: thus, he said it was improper for rich men to
leave their property to their relatives; he regarded great inheritances
as a misfortune, for they have a paralyzing effect. Great accumulations
of property should go back to the community and common purposes; the
children of the rich should inherit only so much that they could be well
educated and kept from want, but little enough so that they should be
stimulated to work, and through this to renewed enrichment of the world.

The days in Zurich went swiftly. Trips on the lake, excursions to places
within and without the city, during which I admired the opulence of the
villas that fringe the city, which all look more like castles.

“Yes, the silkworms have spun all that,” said Nobel.

“Perhaps dynamite factories are even more profitable than silk mills,” I
remarked, “and less innocent.”

“Perhaps my factories will put an end to war even sooner than your
Congresses; on the day when two army corps may mutually annihilate each
other in a second, probably all civilized nations will recoil with
horror and disband their troops.”

It was his belief that scientific progress and technical discoveries are
destined to regenerate mankind. “Every new discovery,” he wrote me once,
“modifies the human brain and makes the new generation capable of
receiving new ideas.” From a letter of Alfred Nobel’s which was not
addressed to me, but came under my eyes, I copied the following passage;
it gives a glimpse into his philosophy of life:

To spread the light is to spread prosperity (I mean general
prosperity, not individual wealth), and with prosperity will disappear
the greatest part of the evils that are the inheritance of dark ages.

The conquests of scientific investigation, and its ever-widening
field, awaken in us the hope that the microbes—the soul’s as well as
the body’s—will gradually disappear, and the only war which mankind
will wage will be the war against these microbes. Then Bacon’s
splendid phrase that there are deserts in time will be applicable only
to times that lie far back in the past.

On our departure I had to reiterate my promise to keep Alfred Nobel
regularly informed about the progress of the peace movement; and from
that time forth, though (alas!) I never saw him again, I corresponded
with him indefatigably in regard to the cause of peace. As a testimony
of how quickly and eagerly he became interested in its behalf I include
here a letter which he wrote me a few months after our meeting in
Switzerland:

Paris, January 7, 1893

Dear Friend:

May the new year prove prosperous to you and to the noble campaign
which you are carrying on with so much power against human ignorance
and ferocity.

I should like to dispose of a part of my fortune by founding a prize
to be granted every five years—say six times, for if in thirty years
they have not succeeded in reforming the present system they will
infallibly relapse into barbarism.

The prize would be awarded to him or her who had caused Europe to make
the longest strides toward ideas of general pacification.

I am not speaking to you of disarmament, which can be achieved only
very slowly; I am not even speaking to you of obligatory arbitration
between nations. But this result ought to be reached soon—and it can
be attained—to wit, that all states shall with solidarity agree to
turn against the first aggressor. Then wars will become impossible.
And the result would be to force even the most quarrelsome state to
have recourse to a tribunal or else remain tranquil. If the Triple
Alliance, instead of comprising only three states, should enlist all
states, the peace of the centuries would be assured.

XXXIX
ESTABLISHMENT OF THE GERMAN PEACE SOCIETY IN BERLIN

When we came home from Bern much work was waiting for us. The editing of
the review, the duties of the presidency in our two Unions, and at the
same time uninterrupted literary activity,—all this gave us much to do.
My correspondence had greatly increased. It was my ardent wish that a
peace society should be established also in Berlin. During my visit
there the matter had indeed been broached, but had not come to anything.
Now once more I began correspondence with prominent persons in Berlin in
order to take further steps in this matter. Even at the beginning of the
year I had written letters with this object in view, and now I resumed
these connections with redoubled zeal.

Passages from my own letters give some precise basal facts about the
course of events connected with the founding of that society. I will put
down these passages. The material lying before me consists of the
letters that I wrote in those years to my publisher, A. H. Fried, who
zealously coöperated with me in this matter—who indeed had really given
the first impulse to it. He preserved all my letters, and has, at my
request, put at my service the package containing those of 1892, from
which there clearly appear, authentically and in chronological sequence,
certain data which I should otherwise have forgotten long since,
relating to that enterprise which lay so close to my heart.

January 2, 1892

There is really as yet no German peace society. Virchow was persuaded
originally, but has since then relapsed into silence. Max Hirsch,
member of the Reichstag, now wants to found one. Dr. Barth, the editor
of the _Nation_, is also on our side. In Frankfurt there is also a
Union, I believe.

January 14, 1892

Your question about Dalberg is justified too, for such a party
politician as Hirsch would not be the right man at the head of the
movement. I am just at work getting into communication with others in
Berlin.

January 29, 1892

It is almost certain that there is now going to be a peace society in
Germany. Hirsch wrote me to-day that the sixty deputies of the peace
bureau of the Reichsrat[42] will doubtless effect the formation of a
society, and that I shall find it already in existence when I reach
Berlin. That would doubtless mean a growth for our paper.

March 1, 1892

Laying of the corner stone during my visit—that would be splendid! I
would see to communicating a great declaration of sympathy from the
French Parliament on that occasion. If only a revolution does not
break out in your beautiful Berlin between now and then, and the Lord
God of Dannewitz throw in a bomb[43]....

March 9, 1892

Gustav Freytag would doubtless be the right man as to his standing,
but, I believe, not as to his opinions.

April 4, 1892

Dr. Hirsch has written me that the question [as to the establishment
of a society] cannot come to discussion in the assembly mentioned; but
that I must not be troubled. Well, for a time I will not be troubled,
and then I shall go to writing letters and articles until a German
peace society is formed. We _must_ have it. Karpeles ought to talk
with Hirsch. To get signatures, a provisory committee must first be
made up, which then signs under the reservation that they will _not_
have to be active afterwards. That is the way I did in Vienna. Then
the big fish remain only as honorary presidents. That suffices
perfectly.

April 9, 1892

To-day I wrote a long letter to Karpeles to push the Berlin peace
society; if you have the opportunity, look up Karpeles and talk with
him about the matter. If only Du Bois-Reymond would lend us his name!
A German society must be called into existence before Bern.

Bern, August 31, 1892

Because of the society forming here you need not discontinue your
labors there. Just go ahead gathering names, please. It will
ultimately centralize itself in Berlin all the same.

September 5, 1892

Yes, the Berlin movement will halt—that I understand [because of the
worthless partisan reports about the Bern Congress]; but between now
and the next Congress societies must be formed and they will be.

September 10, 1892

The Grelling news is very good. I can now see that the society in
Berlin will be formed. I will write to Grelling.

Karpeles is quite right in his unwillingness to serve; the thing to do
is for him to coöperate, to get people into the committee, but not to
sign. As things stand, the initiative must not have too many Jews back
of it, else it will be immediately classified; no more than it could
afford to be, say, too strongly Social Democrat. The Austrian comic
papers are caricaturing me as the leader of a troop of Polish Jews as
it is.

I will name several other people who will be helpful to the German
society. The time for founding the society is the most propitious
conceivable on account of the impending military bills. In order that
the mammoth petition which our Bureau has drafted may get signatures
in Germany as well as elsewhere, societies must also exist there. The
manifestation may become just as imposing as that against the school
laws,—even more imposing! since it is to spring up simultaneously all
over Europe.

September 1, 1892

Here are two more letters of adhesion to the Berlin peace society.
Hirsch’s is indeed good news.

October 24, 1892

—No, nothing can be done with the party men who will not do anything
but go with Rickert and the opponents of the Peace Union there;
especially if they take the view that the military bill—that splendid
occasion for a mammoth protest—is a _hindrance_. Nor do we need the
Radicals; they constitute the Peace-Conference group anyhow—others
will surely join. Only there must be one to appear as chairman.

October 27, 1892

I will try to induce Hoyos, Starhemberg, or the Duke of Oldenburg to
come to the Berlin assembly, or at least to write. Wrede will write—he
cannot take the journey. Am looking forward to a bulletin with keen
anticipation. Südekum must write me fully and frequently.

October 28, 1892

Dr. Förster will not be willing, I think. Also too much worried.
Bothmer, perhaps—I am writing to him and others. I do not know whether
his means will permit. So you need titles, you Democrats?—Don’t see
the need of it. He who was born in Bethlehem had no title either, and
his Union is still flourishing.

November 1, 1892

It seems things have got into a scrape. Well, it will go through; it
cannot get wholly to sleep again now.... The notice of an incipient
society—how am I to do that? Without names, without details.... I have
often announced that one was going to be formed,—before my Berlin trip
and before Bern,—and nothing ever came of it. People will not believe
my word any longer. Possibly the inclosed? If you agree, send it to
the printer. Anyhow, such a notice can be made at the last moment, and
you who are on the spot will know best what there is that can be said.

November 1, 1892

What our Südekum—he is one of us—writes me causes me to doubt whether
the peace society that we need is going to be formed. In the inclosed
I have set down a few thoughts relating to that. Herewith I send also
a letter to Hetzel. Please see that it reaches him. I wrote to
Oldenburg yesterday, also to Hoyos. But of course all these suppose
that it is to be a Union after the pattern of the Austrian one. If,
however, it is the forming of a new political party, so be it; but
outside of the great Union which women and teachers may join. Our head
center is at present the Bern Bureau. That is the rendezvous of
nonpolitical Unions. The politicians meet in the Interparliamentary
Conference; and even they must have the tact not to trot out the
_status quo_, else the French members instantly leave the hall, and
what is the good? In the same way the French must keep quiet about
their hopes of recovering their lost provinces through the future
arbitration tribunal or future congresses of governments, else the
Germans would have to leave. There will be time to get an agreement on
these matters when, through the power of public opinion, the
governments shall be compelled—with a view to the assurance of
peace—to adjust such questions. Adieu! it is to be hoped that the
majority of the preliminary committee will vote for the formation of a
nonpolitical Union. And it is to be hoped that then Dr. Schlief will
not deprive us of his energies.

November 4, 1892

Received your two letters to-day simultaneously. Am highly delighted
about Förster, Spielhagen, etc. Well, I will not exult until I know
definitely how the session of Thursday resulted, since it is still
possible that an agreement was not reached. But then I shall scream
with delight. Oldenburg has been predisposed through me. A request to
join the committee will then have more of a chance to succeed if
coming from Förster and Spielhagen. Especially Spielhagen, because
Oldenburg is literary too and must therefore be taken hold of on the
fellow-craftsman side. The incendiary letter desired I will write to
the Excellency mentioned.[44] Next thing you will be putting me into
correspondence with Death.... Am eager for the next news; but should
not be surprised, and _not discouraged_, if the thing did not get into
running order at once.

November 5, 1892

My dear Friend:

I have not in a long time experienced a greater joy than that which
your dispatch afforded me! That is splendid. What we owe to you in
this matter is incalculable; if you had not kept tirelessly at work,
nothing would have been effected,—at least not for a long time.

Fifteen founders! Of these Förster and Spielhagen alone would be
sufficiently influential. If Levysohn is also of the number, then the
_Berliner Tageblatt_ will do much for its reception among publicists,
and Mosse, we may hope, for the pecuniary side. Wrede’s dispatch went
off without my having anything to do with it, else I should not have
permitted my name to be put in the foreground. Well, of course the
main thing will be the greetings for the first great public meeting;
and I will be trying to induce Krafft-Ebing, Starhemberg, Oldenburg,
etc., to be on hand. Then will the Germans and Austrians be working
“shoulder to shoulder,” but not in the old teeth-showing style.

You must now endeavor to have our review the “official organ” of the
German society. The secretary would then have to send a short report
each month. If in the other cities of Germany still other societies
should arise, so much the better for the movement.

November 7, 1892

Through a blunder my letter to Roggenbach only went off to-day, so
that it will not be in his hands before Wednesday. Passy wrote me
to-day a delighted card about the _bonne nouvelle_ from Berlin,—as if
I were not aware of it! Your letter came too late, because it was
addressed to the Chamber of Deputies. His address is Frédéric Passy,
de l’Institut, Neuilly, near Paris.

It is too bad that Schlief stays out; but the Union could not be
political. If on the outside there is formed a political party devoted
wholly to the interests of peace, that would be fine, of course. It is
good that the A.-L.[45] question is passed over in silence; but it
must be real silence, not saying in the appeal that we say nothing of
it because we do not recognize it; that would render the international
relations of the new society more difficult. The solution must be, “We
do not say where the right lies in the pending conflicts; we only
desire that a system of law and a tribunal should be created in which
those who are competent and _in authority_ (as we are not) should
settle the conflicts without violence.”

November 9, 1892

Grelling’s words in the first meeting give me great pleasure. Let
Schlief just form his political party outside; all the better.

November 13, 1892

Virchow’s sympathy is valuable. I would propose to make use of this
sympathy in this way,—to add to the appeal something like the
following:

“Prevented by professional obligations in other departments from
taking an active part in the management of our society, but penetrated
with perfect sympathy for our aims, the following persons have
permitted us to use their names in this appeal and so to make known
their agreement with what is here said:

“Virchow. Schönaich-Carolath. Etc.”

The page proofs of this appeal must be sent to such of the persons
concerned as we wish to draw in further. To-morrow I will let you have
a sketch; to-day no time.

If so be that the appeal is already made, I hope it is as brief as
possible. That avoids contradiction. It does not need to make converts
before it can do its work. Only sympathizers come in, anyhow; and they
are—God be praised—numerous.

November 14, 1892

Here is that sketch. Perhaps the gentlemen will find in it something
to start from. I think perhaps what is good in it may be the fact that
it contains a programme which marks out the line for further activity
and eliminates that which a peace union cannot do; that is to say,
_itself_ founding peace, removing the political causes of war.

Here is also a second sketch for notices in the papers—will be easier
to find room for than the big appeal. Oh, this overloading with work!
One is caught in the wheels of so many machines that one scarcely
knows where one is. _You_ are in it too now. It is lucky, anyhow, that
Südekum can help. The unpleasantnesses and difficulties in the birth
and infancy of the Union—oh, I know them too; the only thing that
helps one over them is a look toward the loftiness of the goal. With
hearty hand-clasp to the brave comrade in arms, etc.

November 16, 1892

From Roggenbach I received the inclosed letter, which I beg that I may
have back after a few days. I send it because it contains so much that
is important, and what it contains is so useful for the formation and
the programme of the new society, that it is well for you and the
comrades to read it. The point is—this grows clearer and
clearer—neither to deny nor to affirm the _status quo_; simply to
leave it unmentioned. Only in this way can Frenchmen and Germans work
in common for our end.

November 21, 1892

In your letter received to-day I am startled by “Förster is not
willing.” Had he not already given his adhesion? Have we not published
the news a little too soon? To-day I have written twelve pages again
to Roggenbach.

November 29, 1892

I am very much delighted at the organization of the Committee. If a
session took place, please get this intelligence into No. 12....
Unfortunately, Oldenburg will not come forward. He declares he has
never wanted to go before the public politically, and as a colonel
still less can he do so in the peace movement. But perhaps I may
accomplish something yet. On the seventh of December he is coming to
the General Assembly; on the eighth we dine with him and his wife at
Castle Erlaa; perhaps at dessert he can be brought to something.

December 3, 1892

The remissness of Förster and G[isitzky] I can very easily explain to
myself; they are with their whole soul “Ethics,”[46] and in that case
one cannot take charge of any second undertaking. The position of
president might well remain temporarily vacant. The main thing is the
secretary. Besides him, all the great names as “Honorary Presidents.”

December 5, 1892

Here is the letter desired. Write address and name on it. Perhaps in
the meantime K. [Professor Kohler] has already declined or you have
another in mind.

December 5, 1892

That was right unfriendly of Spielhagen. In the very lines in which he
declined [the presidency] he might have included a manifesto. The
_heart_ must be in it. Well,—and thank God,—ours is!

December 16, 1892

As to the election of a president, I think once more that if worst
comes to worst the position can remain vacant and two vice presidents
can be chosen. The main thing would be an energetic secretary. To
_drop_ the matter is no longer admissible. They are rejoicing over it
too warmly in Bern; besides, it has already been announced everywhere
by the autograph correspondence of the Bureau. Hodgson Pratt is in
raptures. So stick tight and hold out. If they do not at once get a
clear idea of what they are about, no matter; the important thing is,
to be; the rest takes care of itself.

December 21, 1892

How my heart throbs at it! [That is, at the meeting of the German
Peace Society set for the twenty-first of December.] How I rejoiced
over your _Habemus Papam_! Yes, that _is_ a Christmas deed!

Thus the long-desired formation of the Society had become an
accomplished fact!

-----

Footnote 1:

_Sitten_, like French _mœurs_ and Latin _mores_, has the double
meaning of “morals” and of “customs,” “manners.”—TRANSLATOR.

Footnote 2:

_La Dame blanche_, opera by Adrien François Boïeldieu,
composed in 1825. Theodor Formes died in 1874, at the age of
forty-eight.—TRANSLATOR.

Footnote 3:

From the word “Past!” on, these inscriptions are in English. Of course
the fifteen-year-old German girl’s English is literally reproduced
here; it is much better than most of our schoolgirls could do in
German.—TRANSLATOR.

Footnote 4:

Pseudonym of Anton Alexander Graf von Auersperg, a distinguished
liberal Austrian epic and lyric poet, born 1806, died
1876.—TRANSLATOR.

Footnote 5:

Born 1791, died 1872; published his last drama 1840; began to be very
famous as a dramatist about 1850.—TRANSLATOR.

Footnote 6:

Pseudonym of Nikolaus Franz Niembsch Edler von Strehlenau, born 1802,
became insane 1844, died (in an asylum at Oberdöbling near Vienna)
1850.—TRANSLATOR.

Footnote 7:

Count Friedrich Heinrich Ernst von Wrangel, Prussian general, was
born 1784, was made Field Marshal 1856, died 1877; commanded the
troops of the Germanic Confederation against Denmark in 1848, and
the allied troops of Prussia and Austria against Denmark in 1864,
but withdrew from the command in May of the latter year. But
Lieutenant Field Marshall Felix Ludwig Johann Friedrich von
Schwarzenberg, Austrian statesman and general, died in 1852, before
Wrangel received the title of Field Marshal. I infer from this, and
from the following sentence, that these signatures did not
constitute a single inscription.—TRANSLATOR.

Footnote 8:

The joke is the same as in the story of the Englishman who mistook the
American ambassador in his plain evening dress for a waiter, and gave
him the order, “Call me a cab,” to which Ambassador Choate replied,
“You’re a cab,” and afterwards defended himself by saying, “He asked
me to call him a cab, and I did; and I would have called him a
han’som’ cab if he hadn’t been so ugly.” But in English the
troublesome words are a mere ambiguity; in German it is a case of
erroneously using for the one sense the forms that properly convey the
other sense, so that the interpretation which the father-in-law puts
upon the suitor’s words, strained as it looks in the translation, is
really the only interpretation which the words as spoken will
bear.—TRANSLATOR.

Footnote 9:

Observe that previous to 1870 it was patriotic, not unpatriotic, for a
Bavarian to speak of an Austrian as a fellow-countryman. It is quite
likely, however, that the land of Parnassus is here meant.—TRANSLATOR.

Footnote 10:

The centennial anniversary of Schiller’s birth.—TRANSLATOR.

Footnote 11:

Schiller’s birthday.—TRANSLATOR.

Footnote 12:

If the illegible word is a proper name, it should be a masculine name
of four syllables with accent on the third. If not a proper name, it
should be preceded by “the” in the translation.—TRANSLATOR.

Footnote 13:

Too great a reward for my poor labors is the sympathy of so courteous
and lofty a soul as is manifested in the letter which you have done me
the honor to write to me. In such a soul it is a matter of course that
indulgence also must find a place; and if in this case it is
excessive, this is one reason the more why it should arouse in me a
lively sense of gratitude. For the rest, excess in kindly feelings is
one of the least dangerous disorders in this world. May God preserve
and reward the noble inclinations which he has bestowed upon you.

Pray accept the respectful expression of my gratitude, and the
assurance of the high esteem with which I have the honor of signing
myself

Your most humble and devoted servant
Alessandro Manzoni

Footnote 14:

Compare the dates of the autographs in the preceding
chapter.—TRANSLATOR.

Footnote 15:

Both titles are “countess” in English; but in German _Gräfin_ is the
count’s wife or widow, _Komtesse_ his unmarried daughter.—TRANSLATOR.

Footnote 16:

Manoel Garcia del Popolo Vicente, a native of Seville, born 1775, died
1832, was successful as singer and composer, and supreme as music
teacher. The reputation of his book _Metodo di canto_ is high and
permanent. He had two daughters, Maria born in 1808 and Pauline born
in 1821. The elder, named Malibran by marriage, was one of the most
renowned singers of the nineteenth century; she died in 1836. Pauline
made her first appearance on the stage in 1837; married Louis Viardot,
at that time director of the grand opera at Paris, in 1840; remained
on the stage, with much success, till 1863; and settled in Paris as a
teacher of singing in 1871.—TRANSLATOR.

Footnote 17:

To wit, Heine’s verses:

Du hast Diamanten und Perlen,
Hast alles, was Menschenbegehr,
Und hast die schönsten Augen—
Mein Liebchen, was willst du mehr?
—TRANSLATOR

Footnote 18:

Later, and as a result of this visit, married to Prince Louis Murat,
Prince Achille’s youngest brother.

Footnote 19:

The stream mentioned above, the Tzkhenitz-Atzkhali—the Hippus of the
classic writers—forms the dividing line between Mingrelia and
Imeretia.

Footnote 20:

Or “Throw Down your Arms.” One translation bears the title “Ground
Arms,” but that does not convey the idea.

Footnote 21:

Chère Baronne et amie!

Je viens d’achever la lecture de votre admirable chef-d’œuvre. On dit
qu’il y a deux mille langues—ce serait 1999 de trop—mais certes il n’y
en a pas une dans laquelle votre délicieux ouvrage ne devrait être
traduit, lu et médité.

Combien de temps vous a-t-il pris de composer cette merveille? Vous me
le direz lorsque j’aurai l’honneur et le bonheur de vous serrer la
main—cette main d’amazone qui fait si vaillamment la guerre à la
guerre.

Vous avez tort pourtant de crier “à bas les armes” puisque vous-même
vous en faites usage, et puisque les vôtres—le charme de votre style,
et la grandeur de vos idées—portent et porteront bien autrement loin
que les Lébel, les Nordenfelt, les de Bange et tous les autres outils
de l’enfer.

Yours for ever and more than ever
A. Nobel

Paris, le 1 / 4 1890

Footnote 22:

All hail to weapons! They are man’s by right!
Let woman hold her tongue when men must fight.
And yet, ’tis true, in these days men are found
Who rather should in petticoats be gowned.

Footnote 23:

Corresponding (see top of page 353) nearly to our “Puss in the Corner.”

Footnote 24:

“We must make him speak, however we do it.”

“But he notified me himself, yesterday, that he has not prepared a
speech.”

“Call on him all the same; then he will have to say something!”

Footnote 25:

“Monsieur Friedrich Bodenstedt of Berlin has the floor!”

Footnote 26:

—“but even if I had prepared a speech I would not deliver it here
to-day—”

“Why not? Why not?”

“I will tell you why frankly. I have been running my eyes over this
immense hall where all the civilized nations of the globe are seen
represented by their flags; but the flag of the most civilized nation,
the German flag, is not there!”

Footnote 27:

“Sir, you are the living flag of Germany here!”

Footnote 28:

“M. de Girardin begins to flutter in the wind.”

Footnote 29:

“Thanks for the compliment, though I cannot accept it with all its
implications, since I do not flutter in the wind!”

Footnote 30:

Bodenstedt gives the Russian’s word in German, the Frenchman’s in
French, and the line “Jesus Christ” etc. in English, implying that this
was said by the Archbishop of Canterbury or some other Englishman,
though the speaker is not named.—TRANSLATOR.

Footnote 31:

Here my correspondent was in error; Professor Suess does not think
otherwise than his utterances indicate. Eduard Suess is one of our
profoundest intellects and noblest characters.—B. S.

Footnote 32:

“_On n’humanise pas la guerre, on la condamne parce qu’on s’humanise_,”
says Frédéric Passy.—B. S.

Footnote 33:

Tolstoi’s letter is in French.—TRANSLATOR.

Footnote 34:

_Zusammengehörigkeit_, “together-belongingness.”

Footnote 35:

The original of Nobel’s letters is in French, except that of September
14, 1891, which is in English.—TRANSLATOR.

Footnote 36:

The title of A. G. v. Suttner’s first novel with scene laid in the
Caucasus.

Footnote 37:

The new lexical formations which this quotation professes to exemplify
will be best seen in the original: _Keine Empfindelei, kein klingendes
Wortgetöse. Sich-entschließen-wollen. Jeder in seiner Weise auch tun.
Wir wollen praktische, wollen Verwirklichungs-, wollen Tatidealisten
sein._ The translator finds himself unable to reproduce these compounds
in English without losing their quality as “stylistic beauties”; for he
does not recognize the language of recent newspaper headlines as English
until he shall hear the same sort of language in conversation, or read
it in letters, or at least see it in the newspapers themselves elsewhere
than in headlines.

Footnote 38:

The longing for higher development, and the faith in it, _is_
religiousness.—B. S.

Footnote 39:

The letter of the Bishop of Durham is given by the Baroness in German,
without any such note as she appends to the next letter. Presumably,
then, the Bishop himself translated his English thoughts into German
when he wrote. But even on this assumption the present version has
substantially the character of a retranslation, and retranslations must
be largely conjectural.—TRANSLATOR.

Footnote 40:

That is, Brooke Foss Westcott.—TRANSLATOR.

Footnote 41:

An article by Björnson, in which he relates this anecdote: “A German
lady betrothed to a German officer was making a journey through Norway.
Certain persons were talking with her about the war that might soon
break out over Alsace-Lorraine, and some one said it would be best if
Alsace-Lorraine could dispose of itself in accordance with its own will.
At this the German lady replied, ‘Rather than that, two million
soldiers, my fiancé among them, should lie dead on the battlefield!’”

Footnote 42:

The Baroness inserts “_sic!_” probably with reference to the wording of
her own letter rather than of Hirsch’s.—TRANSLATOR.

Footnote 43:

Upper and Lower Dannewitz are in Moravia, fifty miles or so north of
Vienna. Grimm says that to speak of the Lord God of one or another town
is a popular German form of asseveration, probably originating from the
former presence of a miracle-working image of Christ in the place
named.—TRANSLATOR.

Footnote 44:

Minister von Roggenbach.

Footnote 45:

In the German “E.-L.,” of course.—TRANSLATOR.

Footnote 46:

The main thing in Professor Wilhelm Förster’s life in 1892 was the
founding of the German Society for Ethical Culture.—TRANSLATOR.

------------------------------------------------------------------------

TRANSCRIBER’S NOTES

1. Silently corrected obvious typographical errors and variations in
spelling.
2. Retained archaic, non-standard, and uncertain spellings as printed.
3. Enclosed italics font in _underscores_.
4. Denoted superscripts by a caret before a single superscript character
or a series of superscripted characters enclosed in curly braces,
e.g. M^r. or M^{ister}.

*** End of this LibraryBlog Digital Book "Memoirs of Bertha von Suttner (Vol. 1 of 2) - the records of an eventful life." ***

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