The golden pot, p.15
The Golden Pot, page 15
“You are mistaken, my dear friend,” replied Ferdinand, “your thoughts on the matter fully concur with those that immediately came to mind and drove me into dark despair, which affords me wondrous reassurance; cognizant as I am of the fact that I have to go about this by myself, it is a comfort to know that my cherished secret is safe, since my friend will faithfully keep it to himself like a sacred object entrusted to his care. But I must now mention a particular circumstance I had not thought of until now. As the Turk spoke the fateful words, it was as if I heard that ever-mournful melody sounding in my ears: ‘Mio ben ricordati s’avvien ch’io mora’ in broken syllables – and then again it was as if a long-held note of that godly voice I heard that night wafted by.”
“Then let me not conceal the fact,” said Ludwig, “that just as you received the whispered answer, I happened to have my hand on the parapet surrounding the figure. I felt a vibration in my hand and it was as if a musical note – I can’t well call it singing – glided along, resounding in the room. I did not pay it particular attention, since, as you well know, my entire imagination is forever infused with music, and I have consequently been deluded in the most wondrous ways; but I was more than a bit taken aback deep in my heart upon learning of the mysterious connection between that mournful note and the fateful occurrence in D—— that sparked your question to the Turk.”
Ferdinand merely held it to be proof of his psychic rapport with his beloved that this invisible being behind the Turk should have likewise heard the music, and when the two friends proceeded in their discussion to delve deeply into the psychic connections between kindred spiritual principles, when the discussion gave rise to ever more lively and wondrous examples, it seemed to him as if the heavy burden of despair that had weighed down on his breast ever since receiving the Turk’s answer was lifted from him; he felt himself emboldened to reflect on that fateful prediction. “How can I lose her,” he said to himself, “she who forever holds sway in my heart of hearts, and manifests such an intense existence that could only be dissolved by my own demise?”
Hopeful at the prospect of shedding light on some of the conjectures that bore for both friends the weight of inner truth, they paid a visit to Professor X——. They found him to be a gentleman advanced in age, but with an alert appearance, girded in old Frankish attire, with small, gray eyes, and an unpleasant piercing gaze, his mouth twisted into a sarcastic smile that put them off.
When they expressed the wish to see his automata, he replied, “So, are you also lovers of mechanical artworks, perhaps even dilettante builders? You will find here in my collection devices that you won’t find in all of Europe, indeed in the entire known world.” The professor’s voice had something extremely repugnant about it; it was a high-pitched, screeching, dissonant tenor that perfectly suited the market crier manner with which he touted his artworks. Making quite a racket, he fetched the keys and opened the tastefully, downright sumptuously decorated hall in which the works were kept. On a platform in the middle of the room stood a grand piano; directly beside it to the right there was a life-sized male figure with a flute in hand; to the left sat a female figure before a pianolike instrument, behind it two boys with big drums and a triangle. Far to the rear the two friends noticed the orchestrion, with which they were familiar, and the surrounding walls were all hung with chiming clocks. The professor ambled past the orchestrion and the clocks, and surreptitiously touched the automata; then he sat himself down at the piano and began playing pianissimo a marchlike andante; at the reprise, the flute player raised the flute to his lips and played the musical theme, and the boy quietly struck the drum in perfect rhythm, just as another brought a hardly audible chime from the triangle. Soon thereafter, the woman at the piano broke into hearty chords and, while pressing down on the pedals, managed to emit a harmonica-like sound. But then the music grew brisker and livelier, resounding in the entire hall; the clocks chimed in with the greatest rhythmic precision, the boy struck all the more loudly on his drum, the triangle rang out shrilly, and finally the orchestrion trumpeted and pounded in fortissimo, so loud that everything trembled and quaked, until with one last stroke the professor wrapped up his performance with a final chord. The friends applauded heartily, paying him the tribute that his self-satisfied smile seemed to demand. Approaching the automata, he prepared to offer up music-making of the same sort, but Ludwig and Ferdinand, as if they had previously agreed to do so, both offered the pretext of some pressing appointment that precluded their staying any longer, and promptly left the mechanic and his machines.
“Now wasn’t all of that artful and beautiful?” asked Ferdinand.
But Ludwig let loose, as if in a fit of long-suppressed fury, “The devil take that damned professor— how badly we’ve been had! Where are the revelatory bits of information we were after? Whatever became of the instructive entertainment in which the professor was supposed to enlighten us, like the novices of Sais?
Ferdinand countered, “We did, after all, see some remarkable mechanical wonders, from a musical standpoint as well! The flute player is clearly the famous Vaucanson device, and judging from the finger movements, the same mechanism likewise appears to power the female figure, who manages to produce resonant, powerful tones: the coordination of the machines is remarkable.”
“All that,” replied Ludwig, “is precisely what drove me out of my mind! I am mightily worked up about and fed up with all that mechanical music – in which I include the professor’s performance at the piano – so much so that I feel the strain in all my limbs, and won’t get it out of my system for a good long time.
“For me, even the link between human beings and lifeless figures that mimic the human in appearance and movement, in actions and impulses, has something oppressive, uncanny, indeed something ghastly about it. I can well imagine that it must be possible by means of a built-in gearbox to have figures dance in an artful and nimble manner, and they must surely also be able to dance with people and engage in all manner of twists and turns, so that the living dancer grasps his lifeless, wooden partner, and swings her around, permitting the spectator to look for a minute without being revolted. But mechanical music is for me an entirely frightful and ghoulish thing, and in my view a good stocking-knitting machine infinitely surpasses the most perfect, splendid-looking music box.
“Is it only the breath blowing from the mouth that animates a wind instrument? Is it only the agile, supple fingers plucking notes from a string instrument that grip us with their mighty magic, stirring up in us such unknown, ineffable feelings linked to no earthly source, that arouse in us inklings of a distant spirit realm, awakening our higher being? Is it not, rather, the human spirit that just uses these physical devices to bring forth resounding notes from our deepest depths to the perceptible reality of life, so as to make them audible to the ears of others, and thereby elicit a wondrous hint of eternity from each note, like sparkling rays of light in the harmonic echo chamber of the spirit? To seek to manipulate valves, coil springs, levers, cylinders, and whatever else may comprise a mechanical device to make it sound musical constitutes, to my mind, a foolish and futile effort to make the medium itself spurt out that secret something that only the inner strength of the human spirit can bring to life and modulate by an absolute mastery of every movement. The greatest reproach one can make of a musician is that his playing is expressionless, thereby compromising the very essence of music, or rather eradicating the musical core of music; and even so, the most spiritless and insensitive instrumentalist can perform infinitely more subtly than the most sophisticated machine, it being unthinkable that the human essence should not find fleeting expression, even if but once in his playing, which, of course, in the case of the machine can never be possible.
“The effort of mechanics to imitate more and more closely the effect produced by human organs in eliciting musical notes, or by mechanical means to substitute for the same, constitutes for me a declared war against the human spirit, the power of which shines forth all the more brilliantly the more seemingly oppositional forces are wielded against it. It is for this very reason that the most accomplished mechanical music device is the most reprehensible to me, and a simple barrel organ that merely intends to produce mechanical effects by mechanical means is for me infinitely preferable to the Vaucansonian flute or harmonica player.”
“I am absolutely in agreement,” said Ferdinand. “For you have just expressed clearly in words what I have for the longest time felt in my heart of hearts, particularly so on our visit to the professor today. Without living and breathing so totally immersed in music as you, and consequently without being as sensitive as you to all musical abuses, the lifelessness and stiffness of mechanical music has repelled me for as long as I can remember, so much so that even as a child in my father’s house a big chiming clock that sounded off every hour really grated on my nerves. What a shame that skillful mechanics apply their artistry and know-how to such wretched gadgets, rather than to the perfection of musical instruments.”
“That’s all too true,” Ludwig replied. “Particularly in this regard, much could be done to perfect keyboard instruments; a skilled mechanic could do wonders, and it is really remarkable how far the piano, for instance, has advanced in its mechanical structure to favor tone and finger technique. But should it not be the task of top-notch musical mechanics to listen in on the most singular sounds of nature, to probe the musical notes that emanate from the most heterogenous bodies, and to attempt to capture this mysterious music in some sort of organon that complies with human will and sounds in response to his touch? All attempts to elicit notes out of metallic or glass cylinders, glass filaments, glass or marble strips, or to make strings vibrate and resound in ways other than the ordinary finger plucking or bow stroking, seem, therefore, to be most worthy of note. The only thing standing in the way of further progress in the endeavor to sound the depths of nature’s profound acoustical secrets is that every flawed attempt pursued for the sole sake of ostentation or monetary gain is praised and shown off as the ultimate invention. It is for this reason that so many new instruments have come into being in such a short time, many with curious or showy names, and promptly disappeared and been completely forgotten.”
“Your notion of a most highly developed musical mechanics is indeed very interesting,” said Ferdinand, “although I cannot conceive the point or object of such an endeavor.”
“We are speaking of nothing else here but the discovery of the most complete tone,” replied Ludwig, “but I consider the musical note to be all the more complete the more closely it resembles the secret notes of nature which are not yet altogether severed from the earth from which they emerged.”
“It may well be,” said Ferdinand, “that I have not delved as deeply as you into these musical mysteries, but I admit that I do not completely catch your drift.”
“Allow me at least to hint at my sense and concept of all this,” Ludwig continued. “In the prehistoric beginnings of mankind, to borrow the notion of a brilliant writer on the subject (Schubert in his ‘Thoughts on the Nocturnal Side of Natural History’), in man’s primordial holy harmony with nature, infused with the godly instinct of prophesy and poesy, when the spirit of humanity did not embrace nature, but it was rather nature that embraced the human spirit, and the mother still nurtured from the depths of her being the wondrous person to whom she gave birth – at this time humanity was still enveloped, as if in a cloud of eternal rapture, with holy music, and wondrous notes heralded the arcane mysteries of its eternal ferment. I inferred an echo of the depth of our primordial attachment to music in the splendid legend of the music of the spheres, of which I first read as a boy in The Dream of Scipio, which filled me with fervent devotion, so that I often pricked up my ears on moonlit nights to try to detect a trace of such wondrous sounds in the whisper of the wind. But as I said before, such audible murmurings of nature have not as yet abated, for how else can we conceive of that air music or devil’s bellowing from Ceylon, to which the aforementioned author Cicero alludes – a phenomenon that has such a profound effect on the human disposition that even the most serene spectator cannot fend off a deep sense of horror, and a shattering sympathy with those murmurings that so closely mimic human wailing. Years ago, I myself experienced a very similar natural phenomenon near the Curonian Lagoon in East Prussia. Far into the fall, I held up for a time on an estate in the area, and on quiet nights on which gentle winds blew all about, I heard long drawn-out tones that sometimes sounded like a deep, muffled pipe organ, sometimes like the muffled vibrating clang of a bell. I was often able to distinguish a deep F paired with augmented fifth C, and often I heard a resounding third E-flat, so that a piercing seventh chord chimed out with the sound of the deepest lament, filling my breast with the most profound melancholy, indeed riddling my heart with horror.
“There is something in the unnoticed genesis, crescendo, and dissipation of those natural notes that irresistibly grips our spirit, and the instrument set at its disposal will necessarily affect us to the same degree. It therefore seems to me that, taking its tone into account, the accordion most closely approximates that perfection, the measure of which is its effect on the spirit of the listener, and it is telling that precisely this instrument that so faithfully imitates those natural notes and has such a profound influence on the mood of the listener, should be not at all amenable to levity and insipid ostentation, but rather is grounded in the sacred simplicity of its idiosyncratic nature. Much in this regard will no doubt be accomplished by the recently invented so-called harmonichord, which by means of a secret mechanics set in motion by a touch of the keys and the swing of a barrel, in lieu of bells, makes strings vibrate and resonate. The player has almost greater control over the formation, crescendo, and gradual fading of musical notes than with the accordion, and it is only the tone of this instrument that sounds like it emanated from another world that has kept the harmonichord from becoming more popular.”
“I have heard this instrument played,” said Ferdinand, “and must confess that its tone moved me deeply, even though, in my view, it was not played to its best advantage. I feel I understand you now, even though I don’t quite get the link between those natural notes, of which you speak, with the music produced by these instruments.”
“Can it be,” replied Ludwig, “that the music that resides in our innermost self is anything other than the music of nature, a secret sound hidden only from our higher consciousness, and which resounds only when compelled to do so, by passing through the body of the instrument mastered by the one who plays it? But in our dreams, in the strictly psychic workings of the spirit, the spell is lifted, and we hear those notes of nature wondrously produced and played in concert by familiar instruments, wafting down upon us, rising to a crescendo, and fading away.”
“Your words bring to mind the aeolian harp,” Ferdinand interrupted his friend, “what do you make of that ingenious invention?”
“Its attempts to coax out the notes of nature are indeed beautiful and most praiseworthy,” Ludwig replied, “but to date it has evolved into little more than a piddling plaything, its potential thus reduced to naught. To my mind, much more impressive in concept than the aeolian harp, which as a mere musical deflector of wind currents has been reduced to a childish toy, is the weather harp, of which I once read. Rather thick wires spanned in the open air are made to vibrate by the passing breeze, and are said to resound in mighty tones. A broad field of inquiry in this domain remains open to the soulful, enlightened physicist and mechanic, and I believe that, given the momentum of advances in the natural sciences, further research will break in upon the sacred secrets of nature, and some things that are only now suspected will be revealed and made perceptible in the mysteries of life.”
All of a sudden, a curious clang resounded in the air around them, which in its powerful crescendo greatly resembled the sound of the accordion. Gripped by terror, the two friends froze; the sound transformed itself into the mournful melody of a woman’s voice.
Ferdinand reached for his friend’s hand and pressed it hard against his breast; but Ludwig spoke softly and in a trembling voice, “Mio ricordati s’avvien ch’io mora.“
They happened to be standing outside the city, in front of the entrance to a garden surrounded by high hedges and tall trees. Right there before them, heretofore unnoticed, a sweet little girl who had been seated on the lawn playing, jumped up and said, “Oh how lovely, my sister is singing again, I must bring her another flower, since I already know that if I bring her brightly colored carnations, she’ll sing even lovelier and longer.” At this, she leapt forward with a great big bouquet of flowers in hand into the garden, the gate of which stood open, allowing the friends to peer in. But how stunned they were, seized with horror, upon spotting Professor X—— standing there in the middle of the garden under a towering ash tree. Instead of the disconcerting ironic smile with which he received the two friends in his house, his face was now draped by a profoundly melancholic gravity, and his transfigured gaze seemed to peer upward into the hereafter hidden behind the clouds, the existence of which the wondrous sounds like a tremulous puff of wind passing through the air attested. He strode slowly and with a measured step up and down the central allée through the garden, everything in his path stirring with life; all around him a crystal tinkling rang out from the dark bushes and trees and streamed in wondrous concert like flames through the air, penetrating the soul of all who heard it and stirring the greatest rapture with inklings of the heavenly hereafter. The sun set, the professor disappeared among the hedges, and the plaintive notes faded in pianissimo.
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