“I pulled myself together with my innate dignity and loudly told the strange crowd around me that I hoped to find myself in a civilised state and that I would turn to the police and the law courts to avenge the injustice I had suffered. Then they all began to growl; even those who had not previously been smoking pulled the apparatus designed for that purpose out of their pockets, and they all blew thick clouds of smoke into my face, which, as I only now noticed, stank unbearably and stunned my senses. Then they pronounced a type of curse on me, the words of which I absolutely cannot repeat to you, dear Rufin, on account of their hideousness. I myself cannot recall it without a deep horror. They finally left me, with loud, mocking laughter, and it seemed to me that the word ‘hunting-whip’ 8 was dying away in the breeze.

  “My driver, who had seen and heard everything, wrung his hands and said: ‘Oh, my dear Sir! Now that what’s happened has happened, don’t under any circumstances enter that city! No dog would take bread from your hands, as the saying goes, and constant danger would threaten you, beat-’

  I did not let the sturdy fellow finish, but turned my steps as quickly as I possibly could to the next village. I am sitting in a lonely chamber in the only inn in this village and writing all of this to you, my dear Rufin! As far as possible, I shall collect news about the barbaric foreign race that resides in that city. I have already been told much that is highly strange about their customs – their habits – their language etc. and shall faithfully inform you of everything etc. etc.”

  You perceive, my dear Reader, that one may be a great scholar – and yet be unacquainted with some of life’s ordinary phenomena; and yet get into the oddest dreams over things known throughout the world. Ptolomäus Philadelphus had studied and yet did not know a student when he saw one; and he did not even know that he was sitting in Hoch-Jakobsheim village which, as is well known, lies close to the famous University of Kerepes, when he wrote to his friend about an occurrence that had reshaped itself in his mind into the strangest adventure. The good Ptolomäus was startled when he met students wandering at their leisure, blithely and in high spirits, out into the country. What terror would have gripped him, had he arrived in Kerepes an hour earlier and had chance led him before the house of the Professor of Natural History Mosch Terpin! Hundreds of students, streaming out of the house, would have surrounded him, disputing noisily, and this babble, this bustle would have led to even stranger dreams crossing his mind.

  Of all the lectures in Kerepes, those by Mosch Terpin were the most frequently attended. He was, as stated, Professor of Natural History; he explained how it rains, thunders and lightnings, why the sun shines by day and the moon at night, how and why the grass grows etc., in such a way that any child could understand. He had compressed all of Nature into a dainty little compendium, so that he could quite comfortably handle her as he pleased, and pull out the answer to any question as from a drawer. His reputation was first founded on his having made the happy discovery, after many physics experiments, that darkness principally stems from a lack of light. This, as well as his ability to convert, with a great deal of skill, these same physics experiments into charming tricks, thus making a thoroughly delightful hocus-pocus, procured him an unbelievable popularity.

  Allow me, my benevolent Reader, as you are much better acquainted with students than is the renowned scholar Ptolomäus Philadelphus, as you know nothing of his dreamy timorousness, to lead you to Kerepes, before Professor Mosch Terpin’s house, when he has just this moment finished a lecture. Among the students pouring out there is one who immediately holds your attention. You perceive a well-made youth of twenty-three, twenty-four, from whose darkly shining eyes a marvellous, lively inner spirit speaks with eloquent words. His gaze could almost be called saucy, if the infatuated grief spread over his pale countenance had not covered the burning rays like a veil. His coat of fine black cloth, trimmed with velvet, is almost cut in the Old German fashion, and is admirably complemented by the dainty, dazzling-white lace-collar, and the velvet cap that sits on the beautiful chestnut-brown curls. This costume suits him very nicely because he, in his whole being, in his propriety of gait and bearing, in the meaningful formation of his face, really seemed to belong to an earlier, beautiful, pious age; and one would therefore not think of the mere ornamentation, which is often the order of the day with the petty imitation of misunderstood models according to the equally misunderstood requirements of the present.

  This young man, whom you, dear reader, find so pleasing at first sight, is none other than the student Balthasar, child of respectable, wealthy people, gentle – sensible – hard-working – about whom I have a great deal to tell you, oh my reader, in the curious story I have undertaken to set down. –

  Serious, engrossed in thought, as he was wont to be, Balthasar walked out of Mosch Terpin’s lecture towards the gate, heading not for the fencing-ground, but for a pleasant little forest lying hardly a few hundred paces from Kerepes. His friend Fabian, a handsome lad of a cheerful appearance and just such a character, ran after and caught up with him just before the gate.

  “Balthasar!” shouted Fabian, “now, Balthasar, are you going out into the forest again, to wander around on your own like a melancholic Philistine, while stalwart lads bravely practise the noble art of fencing? – I’m begging you, Balthasar, will you please drop this foolish, sinister behaviour and be really cheerful and happy again, as you always used to be? Come on! – We’ll try a few bouts, and if you still want to go out after that, I’ll run along with you.”

  “You mean well,” replied Balthasar, “you mean well, Fabian, and for that reason I don’t feel any resentment towards you for occasionally running after me up hill and down dale like a madman, thus depriving me of much pleasure of a kind that you cannot conceive. You’re simply one of those strange people who take everyone, whom they see walking alone, for a melancholic fool, and who want to handle and cure him their way, like that fawning courtier with the worthy Prince Hamlet, who then, when the little man assured him that he knew nothing of the flute, gave him a proper lesson. Now I shall certainly spare you that, dear Fabian, but I will ask you with all my heart to look for another mate for your noble fencing with rapier and broadsword and let me continue on my way in peace.”

  “No, no,” cried Fabian, laughing, “you won’t escape me like that, my dear friend! – If you won’t come with me to the fencing-ground, then I’ll go with you out to the forest. It’s the duty of a true friend to brighten your melancholy. So come, dear Balthasar, come, if you won’t have it any other way.”

  With that he grabbed his friend under the arm and strode, leading him, sprightly away. Balthasar clenched his teeth in silent fury and persisted in a dark silence, while Fabian breathlessly related merry anecdotes and more merry anecdotes. These included much that was of a foolish nature, which always tends to happen with merry, breathless relations.

  Now when they finally stepped into the cool shadows of the fragrant forest, when the bushes seemed to whisper yearning sighs, when the magical melodies of the murmuring streams and the songs of the wood-fowl resounded far into the distance, waking an answering echo from the mountains, – then Balthasar suddenly stood still and cried, spreading his arms out wide as if about to clasp them lovingly around the trees and bushes:

  “Oh, now I feel well again! – Indescribably well!”

  Fabian looked at his friend, somewhat perplexed, like one who cannot make head or tail of another’s speech, who doesn’t have a clue what he should make of it. Then Balthasar grabbed his hand and cried with sheer delight:

  “Admit it, brother, now you too feel your heart uplifted, now you too comprehend the blessed secret of sylvan solitude?”

  “I don’t entirely understand you, dear brother,” replied Fabian, “but if you mean that a walk here in the forest does you good, then I wholeheartedly share your opinion. Don’t I too like going for a walk, especially in good company, with whom one can hold a rational, instructive conversation? – It is, for example, undoubtedly a real pleasure to go for a walk in the country with our Professor Mosch Terpin. He knows every little plant, every blade of grass, its name and which class it belongs to, and he’s an expert on the wind and the weather.”

  “Stop right there,” cried Balthasar, “I beg you, stop right there! – You’re touching on something that would drive me mad, if there weren’t a consolation for it! The way in which the Professor talks about Nature rends my very heart. Or rather, I am seized by a sinister horror, as if I saw the madman who, King and Ruler in his foppish folly, caresses the straw-puppet he is controlling, imagining he has his arms around the royal bride’s neck! His so-called experiments seem to me to be an abominable mockery of the Divine Being, whose breath blows on us in Nature and excites the deepest, holiest presentiments in the innermost depths of our soul. I was often tempted to smash his glasses, his phials, all his junk to pieces, if I hadn’t thought that the ape doesn’t desist from playing with fire until he has burnt his paws.

  “You see, Fabian, these feelings frighten me, constrict my heart in Mosch Terpin’s lectures, and then I probably appear to you to be more profound and introspective than ever. Then I feel as if the houses were about to come crashing down over my head, an indescribable dread drives me out of the town. But here, here a sweet peace soon fills my soul. Lying on the flowery turf, I look up into the blue breadth of Heaven, and over me, away over the rejoicing forest, the golden clouds pass like glorious dreams from a distant world full of blissful joys!

  “Oh my Fabian, then a miraculous spirit rises from my, my breast, and I hear it talking in mysterious words with the bushes, with the trees, with the surging of the forest brook, and I just cannot give a name to the delight that then flows through my whole being as a sweet, melancholy yearning!”

  “Well!” cried Fabian, “well, once again it’s the old never-ending song of melancholy and bliss and talking trees and forest brooks. All your verses are bursting with these good things, which fall very pleasingly on the ear and can be profitably used, so long as you don’t look for anything more behind them.

  “But tell me, my most excellent melancholicus, if Mosch Terpin’s lectures really do offend and annoy you so terribly, just tell me why on earth you run into every one, why you don’t miss a single one, only to sit there, on every occasion, dumb and rigid with your eyes closed, like a dreamer?”

  “Don’t ask,” replied Balthasar, lowering his eyes, “don’t ask me about that, my dear friend! – Every morning an unknown force draws me into Mosch Terpin’s house. I feel my torment approaching, and yet I cannot resist, a dark fate drives me onwards!”

  “Ha, ha,” Fabian burst out laughing, “ha, ha, ha – how excellent – how poetic, how mystical! The unknown force that draws you into Mosch Terpin’s house lies in the dark-blue eyes of the lovely Candida! – We have all known for a long time that you’re head over heels in love with the Professor’s pretty little daughter, and so we make allowances for your fantasising, your foolish behaviour. After all, that’s how it is with those in love. You find yourself in the first stage of lovesickness and must, in your late youth, force yourself to do all those strange pranks that we, I and many others – may Heaven be thanked! – went through at school without a large, attentive audience. But believe me, my dear heart –”

  Fabian had in the meantime again seized his friend Balthasar by the arm and had walked rapidly onwards with him. They were just stepping out of the thicket on to the broad road that led through the middle of the forest, when Fabian noticed a riderless horse in the distance, enveloped in a cloud of dust, and trotting towards them.

  “Hey, hey!” he cried, interrupting himself, “hey, hey, there’s a damned nag that has bolted and thrown its rider – we must catch it and then search the forest for the rider.” And he placed himself in the middle of the road.

  The horse came nearer and nearer; then it seemed as if a pair of riding boots was swinging up and down in the air on both sides and something black was stirring and whirling on the saddle. Straight in front of Fabian there rang out a long, shrill Prrr-Prrr – and at the same moment a pair of riding boots really did fly around his head, and a strange little black thing shot off and landed between his legs. The large horse stood stock still, its long neck stretched forward, and sniffed its tiny master, who rolled about in the dust and finally, laboriously, raised himself to his feet. The little squirt’s head was set deep between his high shoulders; with the outgrowths on his chest and back, with his short body and his high, spidery little legs, he resembled an apple skewered on a fork, on which someone had carved a grotesque face. Now when Fabian saw this strange little monster standing before him, he burst out into loud laughter. But the little one defiantly squashed the small cap, that he had snatched up from the ground, down over his eyes and asked in a husky, deeply hoarse tone, looking fiery daggers at Fabian:

  “Is this the right way to Kerepes?”

  “Yes, sir,” replied Balthasar in a soft, serious voice; and, having collected the boots, he handed them to the little one. All the little one’s efforts to put the boots on were in vain; he toppled over again and again and rolled, groaning, in the dust. Balthasar stood both boots up together, gently lifted the little one up and then gently lowered him, until both his little feet were in the too heavy, too wide cases. With a proud bearing, one hand pressed into his side, the other touching his cap, the little one cried, “Gratias, sir!”, strode over to the horse, and grasped its reins. However, all attempts to reach the stirrups or scramble up onto the large animal were in vain. Balthasar, serious and gentle all the while, stepped over and lifted the little one up into the saddle. He may well have given himself too strong a push, because one moment he was sitting on top, the next he was lying on the ground again on the far side.

  “Hold your horses, my dear M’sieu!” cried Fabian, once more bursting out into peals of laughter.

  “To Hell with your dear M’sieur,” screamed the little one, quite enraged, beating the dust from his clothes, “I am a studiosus, and if you’re one too then it’s Tusch 9 to laugh in my face like a lunatic, and you must fight me in Kerepes tomorrow!”

  “Heavens!” cried Fabian, laughing incessantly, “Heavens, now that’s a solid lad, a Jack of all trades, when it comes to pluck and the proper code of conduct.”

  And he lifted the little one up, despite all his struggling and wriggling, and placed him on the horse which, merrily neighing, immediately trotted away with its little master.

  Fabian was holding both his sides, about to choke with laughter.

  “It is cruel,” said Balthasar, “to laugh at a human being whom Nature has abandoned in such an appalling way as the little rider over there. If he really is a student, then you’ll have to fight him, and indeed with pistols, even if it runs contrary to all academic custom, as he’s unable to wield rapier or broadsword.”

  “How seriously,” said Fabian, “how seriously, how gloomily you’re taking all this once again, my dear friend Balthasar. It has never occurred to me to laugh at a deformed person. But tell me: may such a gristly hop-o’-my-thumb mount a horse whose neck he can’t see over? May he stick his little feet into such despicably wide boots? May he wear a tight-fitting kurtha with a thousand laces and tassels, may he wear such a strange velvet cap? May he adopt such an arrogant, defiant bearing? May he force such hoarse, barbaric sounds from his throat? –

  “May he do all this, I ask you, without being rightfully laughed at as a confirmed idiot? – But I must go in, I must be there to see the racket there’ll be when the knightly studiosus rides in on his proud steed! – You’re no fun at all today! Look after yourself!”Fabian ran back post-haste through the forest to the town.

  Balthasar left the open road and lost himself in the deepest thickets, then sank down on a mossy spot, seized – indeed, overwhelmed – by the bitterest feelings. It may well have been that he truly loved the fair Candida, but he had locked this love, like a deep, tender secret, in his innermost soul, hidden from human eyes, and indeed from his own. Now when Fabian spoke of it so openly, so thoughtlessly, he felt as if rough hands were boldly and arrogantly tearing down the veil from the Holy Image that he had not dared to touch; as if the Holy One must now be eternally angry with him. Yes, Fabian’s words seemed to him an abominable mockery of his whole being, of his sweetest dreams.

  “So,” he cried out in an excess of irritation, “so you hold me for an enamoured fop, Fabian! – for a fool who runs into Mosch Terpin’s lectures to at least spend a whole hour under the same roof as the lovely Candida, who wanders around the forest on his own to think up pitiful verses to his loved one and write them down even more pitifully, who spoils the trees by carving silly names in their flat bark, who cannot bring one intelligent word to market in the presence of girls, but only sighs and groans and makes lamentable faces, as if he were afflicted with cramp, who wears on his bare breast the faded flowers she wore on her bosom, or even the glove she lost – in short, who commits a thousand childish follies!

 

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