Chapter XVIII · LETTERS

A few weeks after Goethe's arrival in Frankfort he wrote the following letter to Alide:

"FRANKFORT-ON-THE-MAIN, Sept. 25, 1771.

"MY DEAR FRIEND,—I have only an hour ago, and in a quite accidental manner, heard of your recent illness. I can think of nothing else until I have expressed the sympathy and concern which I feel for you, and begged you to send me, as soon as you are able, a reassuring word of your convalescence, or, still better, your complete restoration. Fortunately for me, the tidings that you were already on the road to recovery came at the same time with those of your attack: so I have been spared the anxiety and suspense of thinking that a life which is so dear to me is actually endangered. Nevertheless, a strange, superstitious dread still haunts my heart, and my spirit is unaccountably oppressed. I cannot help associating this illness, which comes so soon after my departure, with the rupture of our affectionate, intimate relations. Can it be that you have suffered through me,—you whom I retain in my memory as an ideal of all that is precious and lovely in woman? I torment myself with a thousand questions, a thousand useless surmises. Can it be I who was to blame? I, who would not wittingly injure a hair of that golden little head which I have so often pressed to my lips? Surely, my friend, this may not be. And yet why does the thought constantly recur to my mind? Was it not yourself who saw that our union was incongruous, impossible? And since my return to Frankfort I am more than ever convinced that all your views were just and correct. I feel ceaselessly impelled to a larger and wider circle of activity; all is restless and at boiling heat within me, everything seethes and ferments in my mind and spirit. What I shall accomplish I scarcely know as yet, but I feel that I shall accomplish much. I cannot sufficiently admire your courage in confronting the necessity of our situation and daring to utter the truth for the sake of our future welfare at the risk of so much present pain. Meantime, dear friend, to whom I owe so many memorable hours of tranquil happiness, do we not clasp hands in closest, warmest friendship still? I long to hear from you the reassuring word, and am, with heartfelt wishes for your speedy restoration to health,

Your true

"Goethe."

"Please present my sincere regards to your dear parents, and recall me to the recollection of my good Fräulein Rahel."

In due time he received the following reply:

"SESENHEIM, October 8, 1771.

"MY DEAR FRIEND,—It is true that I have been ill; but I am already fast regaining my former health and spirits, and I cannot be grateful enough that my strength held out to the end. It was not till all was over that I succumbed. I feel as one who has been dead, and I seem to have won the right to speak to you from my heart without reserve or timidity, for the last time. No, you are not to blame for the rupture of our relations: reassure yourself on that point, dear friend. I have not to reproach you with a harsh word, an unkind look, throughout the course of our year's intimacy. Always gentle, generous, and noble, I will hold you in my memory as I knew you. But when you praised me, Goethe, in the arbor, for my 'heroism in speaking the truth fearlessly and simply,' every word I had uttered was a lie. God pardon me! but never for a moment, since I had first learned to love you, had I felt that I could not for your sake sacrifice parents, home, and life itself to follow and to serve you. A word, a gesture, a single impulse of the old tenderness, would have brought me to your side again, and made me deny every word I had that minute spoken. But it was not to be, and I knew it before I began. It was not there that I renounced you. I could easily then assume indifference, for the blow had long since been struck. It was in Strasburg, the day after your visit from Herr Breitkopf, that I said farewell to you in my heart. From that morning I knew that all was at an end between us. I watched you closely, jealously, and everything confirmed my fears. As soon as I was assured of the truth, I took my resolution. Dearly as I loved you, I could not have borne from you the cold neglect, the daily slights and wounds, which I foresaw from a continuation of our existing relations. I wronged you, Goethe: you were generous and upright to the last; but I knew that to ask me in marriage was a sacrifice of your dearest hopes and aspirations. Could I accept a union without love or sympathy? Not only for your sake, but selfishly for my own, I knew that I must reject it absolutely then and there. I thank God again and again that my purpose held firm, my strength endured till the end. Cease to reproach yourself, dear friend: these are events that could not have been foreseen. How could we choose but love each other? But you were destined for a lofty career, and God will chasten me for my foolish weakness.

"I have indeed been very ill, and caused my poor mother and all around me much anxiety. I am glad to be well again, for their sake and for my own. I could not have died with that lie upon my lips. I have not suffered much: it was nothing but a great weariness and exhaustion; and it has now passed away entirely.

"Rahel is to be married in a fortnight. Poor papa and mamma will be so lonely without her that it is a comfort to me to be with them. As long as I feel that my life is useful and almost necessary to these who are so dear to me, I cannot be quite unhappy. But I shall always be alone. The heart that has once loved Goethe can never love again.

"Pray do not write to me; it is best that we should remain apart. Only believe in the friendship of

"ALIDE DUROC."

"Alide's answer," says Goethe, "to the letter in which I had bidden her adieu tore my heart. I now for the first time became aware of her bereavement, and saw no possibility of alleviating it. She was ever in my thoughts; I felt that she was wanting to me, and, worst of all, I could not forgive myself. Gretchen had been taken from me, Annette had left me; but now for the first time I was guilty: I had wounded to its very depths one of the most beautiful and tender of hearts. And that period of gloomy repentance, bereft of the love which had so invigorated me, was agonizing, insupportable. But man will live. Under the broad, open sky, on the heights or in the valleys, in the fields and through the woods, my mind regained some of its calmness. I almost lived on the road, wandering between the mountains and the plains. Often I went alone, or in company, right through my native city, as though I were a stranger in it, dining at one of the great inns in the High Street, and after dinner pursuing my way. I turned more than ever to the open world and to nature; there alone I found comfort."

EPILOGUE

Late in the afternoon of the 24th of September, 1779, two young men alighted from the diligence in the court-yard of one of the principal inns in Strasburg. There was enough resemblance between them for a stranger to have supposed them to be brothers, though one seemed not less than thirty, and the other scarcely past his majority. Both had the same type of face,—handsome in outline, open, joyous, and animated in expression; but that of the elder had the advantage of exquisite refinement and extraordinary intellect. He was not remarkably tall, but the proportions of his figure were remarkable, and there was something majestic in the pose of his head. His companion, shorter, stouter, and more commonplace in appearance, was, nevertheless, a noble-looking fellow. Though by so much the younger of the two, he seemed to receive from his companion the trifling kindnesses which one traveler can render another, with the unconscious grace and dignity of one who is accustomed to be served. A frank equality of friendship must have existed between them, for they used the brotherly Thou in conversation; but at times a just-perceptible tone of deference in the voice of the elder implied some inferiority of station. The elder of these two young men was Geheimrath Goethe, the author of "Götz von Berlichingen," "Werther," and "Iphigenia;" and his fellow-traveler was Prince Karl August, Duke of Saxe-Weimar.

The Prince had violated all regulations of court etiquette by starting incognito on a pleasure-excursion to Switzerland with his inseparable friend. They had already stopped at Frankfort, and visited Goethe's home, and from thence had come by short and easy stages to Strasburg. Having shaken off the dust of their journey and refreshed themselves at the inn, they set out for a walk through the city after sunset. Goethe had not been here since he had bidden farewell to Alide, eight years ago: everything recalled vividly to his mind her beautiful personality and that brief and happy episode of his life. He began by narrating to the Duke some pleasant incidents of his residence and studies here, but gradually, as the twilight deepened, the two friends fell into a serious conversation on the subjects which they most enjoyed discussing together,—philosophy, religion, art, and even love. The image of Alide, an insubstantial, mocking vision, floated continually before Goethe: he could not banish the recollection of all the joy, passion, and misery crowded into one year for that poor little generous soul.

The two young men mounted to the platform of the Cathedral after the moon had risen; and there, softened by so many sweet and sad reminiscences, Goethe opened his heart to his friend, and confided the story of his love for Alide,—pointing out in the wide-lying country, illuminated by that silver light, the spot, far beyond the city, where, shadowed by its mountains, lay the village of Sesenheim. He would go to-morrow and satisfy himself as to how that kindly family fared, and whether they still held a friendly remembrance of him; and he begged Karl August to accompany him on his day's jaunt. But the Prince said it was not fitting that he should be present at the reunion of such old acquaintances. Goethe must go, but he must go alone: if he were coldly received, he would not be mortified before his friend; and if he met with a cordial greeting, he would be sure that it was owing to a sincere regard for himself, "and not," added the Duke, modestly, "to the obligation of extending hospitality to a stranger."

The next day, at noon, Goethe started on his ride to Drusenheim. He left his horse at the inn, and approached the parsonage, just as he had done years before, in the glow of an autumn afternoon. It might have been yesterday that he was here, for all the changes that had taken place in the house or its surroundings. The roses bloomed in the garden, the woodbine flourished over the porch, the same air of serene prosperity enveloped orchard and vineyard and shining meadow; the immortal purple light streamed again on the luxuriant slopes of the far-away mountains.

A little girl, some five or six years old, was playing with her doll in the garden. As Goethe entered the gate, she was about to run into the house; but he called her back gently.

"Do not be afraid, my little friend. Does the Pastor Duroc live here still?"

Reassured by his winning voice, she turned towards him, but, without advancing, waited until he reached her. He patted her on the head, and, looking into the wondering, upturned face, he saw a curious blending of the faces he so well remembered. The child had the golden hair, Saxon mouth, and broad cheeks of Waldstein, and the dark, brilliant eyes and rich complexion of Rahel. Goethe had never seen a more dainty, exquisite little creature.

"Will you take me into the house?" said he. "I am an old friend of your grandpapa's, and I should love dearly to see him again. And your mamma,—is she at home?"

"I have no mamma," answered the child, quietly, without taking her eyes from the stranger's face. "How funny his hair is,—all in rings!" she was saying to herself.

The shock of her words was so great to Goethe, as he stood in the bright sunshine, expecting momently to see the laughing face of Rahel beam out upon him from the door or the window, that the sudden tears started in his eyes. All that exuberant life and spirit already passed from earth! He was afraid to ask the child any more questions; but she had taken such a fancy to his appearance that she was bold enough to begin prattling herself. "Papa is away; but all the rest are at home,—grandpapa, and grandmamma, and Aunt Alide." And, with a charming confidence that made Goethe smile again, she put her tiny hand in his.

"Come, and I will take you to the house," she said: "if you knew mamma, I am sure they will be glad to see you; you must be a very, very old friend. I never knew her myself, and I am nearly seven years old. But who shall I tell them is here?"

"I am Herr Goethe," answered he. "Shall you remember that name, my clever little girl? Tell your grandmamma that Goethe is here."

He entered the library with his heart beating high in his breast. What changes he must expect to find in this household where already a breach had been made! He could not realize that Rahel was dead: it seemed impossible that she should not enter this room, where everything reminded him so vividly of her picturesque presence. A cheerful cry of welcome startled him from the gloomy reflections into which he had fallen, and the pastor stood before him with outstretched hands. He was much moved to see again Goethe, who could not fail to remark the traces of age and trouble in the old man's demeanor and appearance. The greeting of Madame Duroc was not less friendly and hearty than that of her husband, though her manner was quieter and more composed.

Immediately after her came Alide. She was still beautiful, though she had matured and suffered so much since he had seen her. Her face was paler and more delicate, but the large gray eyes had lost none of their soft, tender radiance; her form was slender, and seemed to have gained height and graceful stateliness, owing to the difference in her costume, for she wore a long French gown. The little girl was with her, hand in hand, and Alide advanced to meet her old lover with as much dignity and frank pleasure as if she were a young mother. After she had welcomed him she brought forth the child, saying, with a smile, "I believe you have already made friends with Fräulein Clara;" and then added, in a low voice, "We think she looks like her dear mother: do you find it so? Come, Clärchen, you must shake hands with this gentleman, and when you grow to be an old, old woman like grandmamma, you can boast that you have shaken hands with the great Goethe."

"Why do you put such foolish ideas in the young one's head?" said Goethe, laughing, but with visible embarrassment. "We are already good friends, as you say, and you must not make her afraid of me. It is your aunt who is great," he said to the child, as he bent and kissed her forehead to conceal his agitation; "and may you grow to be as true and noble a woman as she is!"

Goethe's own words will best describe the remainder of the day which he passed at the parsonage: "On the 25th I rode towards Sesenheim, and there found the family which I had left eight years ago. I was welcomed in the most friendly manner. The second daughter loved me in those days better than I deserved, and more than others to whom I have given so much passion and faith. I was forced to leave her at a moment when it nearly cost her her life: she passed lightly over that episode, to tell me what traces still remained of the old illness, and behaved with such exquisite delicacy and generosity from the moment I stood before her unexpected on the threshold, that I felt quite relieved. I must do her the justice to say that she made not the slightest attempt to rekindle in my bosom the cinders of love. She led me into the arbor, and there we sat down. It was a lovely moonlight, and I inquired after every one and everything. Neighbors had spoken of me not a week ago. I found old songs which I had composed, and a carriage which I had painted. We recalled many a pastime of those happy days, and I found myself as vividly conscious of all as if I had been away only six months. The old people were frank and hearty, and thought me looking younger. I stayed the night there, and departed at dawn, leaving behind me friendly faces, so that I can now think once more of this corner of the world with comfort, and know that they are at peace with me."

THE END