Volume 2 — TWENTY-FIFTH JUBILEE.

TWENTY-FIFTH JUBILEE.

The Dream.—The Journey.

99. CYCLE.

It was late when the Knight of the Fleece arrived. Schoppe showed him joyfully the sleeping countenance, whose rose-buds seemed to burst as in a moist, warm night. The Knight manifested great exhilaration at this, and still more did Doctor Sphex, who looked in quite late. The latter found the pulse not only full, but even slow, and on the way to a still greater repose. He appealed, at the same time, to Chaudeson, and several other professional examples, that great mental sufferings had often been relieved and removed very successfully by the internal opium of lethargy.

At last Schoppe acquainted the father with Idoine's whole method of cure. Gaspard haughtily replied, "You still, however, knew my opinion, Mr. Librarian?" "Certainly, but my own too," said, with bitterness, the disturbed Schoppe. The Knight, however, entered no further into anything,—quite after his manner of never giving the least light upon his real self, however much it might gain thereby,—but gave the friend a very cold signal of retreat.

The next morning, Schoppe found his beloved still in the soul's cradle of sleep. How he budded and bloomed! How slowly, yet strongly, like a freeman's, moved the breath in his unchained breast! Meanwhile, Gaspard's packed carriage, which was to trundle the youth away to Italy, stopped already, at this early hour, before the door, with its snorting, pawing horses, and the Knight expected every minute the waking up and the—jumping in.

The physician came also, praised crisis and pulse, added that the cream-o'-tartar (which he had prescribed among the rest) was the cream of life, and said, right to the father's face, when the latter was about to wake the youth for starting, he had never yet, in all his praxis, known any one who had so little acquaintance with critical points as he; any waker would be in this case a murderer, and, as physician, he most expressly forbade it.

From hour to hour Schoppe grew more and more out of humor with the father; he thanked God now—when he considered how the Knight's treatment had beat upon and washed over this fruit-bearing island—that Albano had not only the heat, but also the hardness of a rock.

Dr. Sphex, equally fond of his art and his reputation, watched like a threatening Esculapius-serpent over the pillow, and grew more hilarious. Schoppe lingered there, nerved against any degree of severity. The Knight took leave of every one in his son's name, and sent all soft hearts home; for the foster-mother, Albina and others, were not suffered so much as to see the sleeper,—because tears were to him a cold, disagreeable Scotch mist. The Princess and her retinue were already streaming along with the gay pennons of hope on their way to the shining Italy.

The evening was now irrevocably set for departure, especially as, in the night, the sleeping Liana was to be carried into the bed-chamber, which men never again open.

Already was the blooming Endymion overspread with smiles and radiance of joy, as a precursive morning-star of his waking day. His soul roamed, smiling, through the sparkling-cave of subterranean treasures, which the genius of dream unlocks; while the common waking eye stood blind before the spirit's Eldorado, so near and yet walled round by sleep. At last an unknown over-measure of bliss opened Albano's eye,—the youth immediately rose with vigor,—threw himself with the rapture of a first recognition on his father's breast, and seemed, in the first dreamy intoxication, not to remember the spent storm behind him, but only the blissful dream,—and in ecstasy related it thus:—

"I sailed in a white skiff on a dark stream which shot along between smooth, high marble walls. Chained to my solitary wave, I flew anxiously through the winding, rocky narrows, into which, at times, a thunderbolt darted. Suddenly the stream whirled round and descended, growing broader and wilder, over a winding stairway. There lay a broad, flat, gray land around me, tinged by the sickle of the sun with a loathsome, lurid, earthy light. Far from me stood a coiled-up Lethe-flood, which crawled round and round itself. On an immense stubble-field innumerable Walkyres,^[68] on spider's-threads, shot by to and fro with arrowy swiftness, and sang, 'The fight of life 'tis we that weave'; then they let one flying summer after another soar invisibly to heaven.

"Overhead swept great worlds; on every one dwelt a human being; he stretched out his arms imploringly after another, who also stood on his world and looked across; but the globes ran with the hermits round the sun-sickle, and the prayers were in vain. I, too, felt a yearning. Infinitely far before me reposed an outstretched mountain-ridge, whose entire back, looming out of the clouds, glittered with gold and flowers. Painfully dragged the skiff through the flat, lazy waste of the shallow stream. Then came a sandy tract, and the stream squeezed through a narrow channel with my jammed-up skiff. And near me a plough turned up something long; but when it came up it was covered with a pall—and the dark cloth melted away again into a black sea.

"The mountain-ridge stood much nearer, but longer and higher before me, and cut through the lofty stars with its purple flowers, over which a green wild-fire flew to and fro. The worlds, with the solitary beings, swept away over the mountains, and came not back; and the heart yearned to mount up and soar away after them. 'I must, I will,' cried I, rowing. After me came stalking an angry giant, who mowed away the waves with a sharp moon-sickle; over me ran a little condensed tempest made out of the compressed atmosphere of the earth; it was called the poison-ball of heaven, and sent down incessant pealings.

"On the high mountain-ridge a friendly flower called me up; the mountain waded to meet and dam up the sea, but it almost reached now to the worlds that were flying over, and its great fire-flowers seemed only like red buds scattered through the deep ether. The water boiled,—the giant and the poison-ball grew grimmer,—two long clouds stood pointing down like raised drawbridges, and the rain rushed down over them in leaping waves; the water and my little bark rose, but not enough. 'No waterfall,' said the giant, laughing, 'runs upward here!'

"Then I thought of my death, and named softly a holy name. Suddenly there came swimming along high in heaven a white world under a veil, a single glistening tear fell from heaven into the sea, and it rose with a roar,—all waves fluttered with fins, broad wings grew on my little skiff, the white world went over me, and the long stream snatched itself up thundering, with the skiff on its head, out of its dry bed, and stood on its fountain and in heaven, and the flowery mountain-ridge beside it, and lightly glided my winged skiff through green rosy splendor and through soft, musical murmuring of a long flower-fragrance, into an immense radiant morning-land.

"What a broad, bright, enchanted Eden! A clear, glad morning sun, with no tears of night, expanded with an encircling rose-wreath, looked toward me and rose no higher. Up and down sparkled the meadows, bright with morning dew. 'Love's tears of joy lie down below there,' sang the hermits overhead on the long, sweeping worlds, 'and we, too, will shed them!' I flew to the shore, where honey bloomed, while on the other bloomed wine; and as I went, my gayly decorated little skiff, with broad flowers puffed out for sails, followed, dancing after me over the waves. I went into high blooming woods, where noon and night dwelt side by side, and into green vales full of flower-twilights, and up sunny heights, where blue days dwelt, and flew down again into the blooming skiff, and it floated on, deep in wave-lightnings, over precious stones, into the spring, to the rosy sun. All moved eastward, the breezes and the waves, and the butterflies and the flowers, which had wings, and the worlds overhead; and their giants sang down, 'We fondly look downward,—we fondly glide downward, to the land of love, to the golden land.'

"Then I saw my face in the waves, and it was a virgin's, full of high rapture and love. And the brook flowed with me, now through wheat-fields; now through a little, fragrant night, through which the sun was seen behind sparkling glow-worms; now through a twilight, wherein warbled a golden nightingale. Now the sun arched the tears of joy into a rainbow, and I sailed through, and behind me they sank down again, burning like dew. I drew nearer to the sun, and he wore already the harvest-wreath. 'It is already noon,' sang the hermits over my head.

"Slowly, as bees over honey-pastures, swam the thronging clouds in the dark blue, over the divine region. From the mountain-ridge a milky-way arched over, which sank into the sun. Bright lands unrolled themselves. Harps of light, strung with rays, rang in the fire; a tri-clang of three thunders agitated the land. A ringing storm-rain of dew and radiance filled with glitter the wide Eden; it dissolved in drops, like a weeping ecstasy. Pastoral songs floated through the pure blue air, and a few lingering, rosy clouds danced out of the tempest after the tones. Then the near morning-sun looked faintly out of a pale lily-garland, and the hermits sang up there, 'O bliss, O bliss! the evening blooms!' There was stillness, and twilight. The worlds held themselves in silence round the sun, and encircled him with their fair giants, resembling the human form, but higher and holier. As on the earth the noble form of man creeps downward by the dark mirror-chain of animal life, so did it, overhead there, mount up along a line of pure, bright, free gods, sent from God. The worlds touched the sun, and dissolved upon it; the sun, too, fell to pieces, in order to flow down into the land of love, and became a sea of radiance. Then the fair gods and the fair goddesses stretched out their arms towards each other, and touched each other, trembling for love; but, like vibrating strings, they disappeared from sight in their blissful trembling, and their being became only an invisible melody; and the tones sang to each other, 'I am with thee, and am with God'; and others sang, 'The sun was God.'

"Then the golden fields glistened with innumerable tears of joy, which had fallen during the invisible embrace; eternity grew still, and the breezes slept, and only the lingering, rosy light of the dissolved sun softly stirred the flowers.

"I was alone, looked round, and my lonely heart longed dyingly for a death. Then the white world with the veil passed slowly up the milky-way; like a soft moon, it still glimmered a little; then it sank down from heaven upon the holy land, and melted away upon the ground; only the high veil remained. Then the veil withdrew itself into the ether, and an exalted, godlike virgin, great as the other goddesses, stood upon the earth and in heaven. All rosy radiance of the swimming sun collected in her, and she burned in a robe of evening-red. All invisible voices addressed her, and asked, 'Who is the Father of men, and their Mother, and their Brother, and their Sister, and their Lover, and their Beloved, and their Friend?' The virgin lifted steadfastly her blue eye, and said, 'It is God!' And thereupon she looked at me tenderly out of the high splendors, and said, 'Thou knowest me not, Albano, for thou art yet living.' 'Unknown virgin,' said I, 'I gaze with the pangs of a measureless love upon thy exalted countenance. I have surely known thee; name thy name.' 'If I name it, thou wilt awake,' said she. 'Name it!' I cried. She answered, and I awoke."

100. CYCLE.

"Thou canst surely keep awake and travel one night?" With this question, his father hastily conducted him to the carriage that stood ready for the journey, in order to steal him away while yet in the midst of the glowing dream, with his recollections lulled to slumber, and in order especially to get the start of the pale bride, who this very night, by the same road, was to go home to the last heritage of humanity. "In the carriage thou shalt hear all," replied Gaspard to his son's mild question respecting their destination. Still entranced with the light of the shining land of dreams, Albano willingly and blindly obeyed. He still saw Liana in lofty, divine form, standing on the evening-red ground of the sun, which was bespangled with the dew-drops of joy, and his eye, full of splendor, reached not down into the earth-cellar, and to the narrow cast-off chrysalis-shell of the liberated and soaring Psyche.

Schoppe accompanied him to the torch-lighted carriage, but in perfect silence, in order not to awaken his heart by intimating the destination of the journey. He pressed with warmth the hand of the beautiful and beloved youth, which returned the pressure, and said nothing but "We shall see each other again, brother!" Thereupon, honored by no parting look from the imperious father, he stepped back with emotion from his friend, who continued to wave his warm farewells; and the carriage rolled off, and, leaving a long gleam of torch-light behind it, flew out into the high, starry night.

Freshly and meaningly did the glimmering creation broaden out before the convalescent. Saturn was just rising, and the god of time set himself, as a soft, flashing jewel, in the glittering magic belt of heaven. With sealed eyes was the unconscious youth conducted down from the pastoral cottage of his early years, and out of the shepherd's vale of his first love, away where the great, eternal constellations of art beckoned, into the divine land, where the dark ether of heaven is golden, and the lofty ruins of the earth are clothed with grace, and the nights are days. No eye looked over to the heights of Blumenbühl, from which, at this very moment, a black train of coaches was passing slowly down, with upright-burning funeral torches, like a moving shadow-realm, to convey the still, good heart, wherein Albano and God lived, with its dead wounds, to the soft place of rest. Flaming rolled the torch-carriage up the mountain-road towards Italy.

Tearless and far-gazing, Albano's eye rested on the glimmering, ceaselessly moving fountain-wheel of time, eternally drawing up constellations in the east, and pouring them out in the west; and his childlike hand gently clasped his father's.