"Dear Herr Anselmus," said Archivarius Lindhorst, "you have indeed fine capacities for the art of calligraphy; but, in the meanwhile, it is clear enough, I must reckon more on your diligence and good-will than on your capacity."
The student Anselmus spoke largely of his often-acknowledged perfection in this art, of his fine Chinese ink, and most select crow-quills. But Archivarius Lindhorst handed him the English sheet, and said: "Be judge yourself!" Anselmus felt as if struck by a thunderbolt, to see his handwriting look so: it was miserable, beyond measure. There was no rounding in the turns, no hair-stroke where it should be; no proportion between the capital and single letters; nay, villainous school-boy pot-hooks often spoiled the best lines. "And then," continued Archivarius Lindhorst, "your ink will not stand." He dipped his finger in a gla.s.s of water, and as he just skimmed it over the lines they vanished without vestige. The student Anselmus felt as if some monster were throttling him; he could not utter a word. There stood he with the unlucky sheet in his hand; but Archivarius Lindhorst laughed aloud, and said: "Never mind it, dearest Herr Anselmus; what you could not accomplish before, will perhaps do better here. At any rate, you shall have better materials than you have been accustomed to. Begin, in Heaven"s name!"
From a locked press Archivarius Lindhorst now brought out a black fluid substance, which diffused a most peculiar odor; also pens, sharply pointed and of strange color, together with a sheet of especial whiteness and smoothness; then at last an Arabic ma.n.u.script; and as Anselmus sat down to work, the Archivarius left the room. The student Anselmus had often before copied Arabic ma.n.u.scripts; the first problem, therefore, seemed to him not so very difficult to solve. "How these pot-hooks came into my fine English current-hand, Heaven and Archivarius Lindhorst know best," said he; "but that they are not from _my_ hand, I will testify to the death!" At every new word that stood fair and perfect on the parchment, his courage increased, and with it his adroitness. In truth, these pens wrote exquisitely well; and the mysterious ink flowed pliantly and black as jet, on the bright white parchment. And as he worked along so diligently and with such strained attention, he began to feel more and more at home in the solitary room; and already he had quite fitted himself into his task, which he now hoped to finish well, when at the stroke of three the Archivarius called him into the side-room to a savory dinner. At table, Archivarius Lindhorst was in special gaiety of heart; he inquired about the student Anselmus" friends, Conrector Paulmann, and Registrator Heerbrand, and of the latter especially he had a store of merry anecdotes to tell. The good old Rhenish was particularly grateful to the student Anselmus, and made him more talkative than he was wont to be. At the stroke of four he rose to resume his labor; and this punctuality appeared to please the Archivarius.
If the copying of these Arabic ma.n.u.scripts had prospered in his hands before dinner, the task now went forward much better; nay, he could not himself comprehend the rapidity and ease with which he succeeded in transcribing the twisted strokes of this foreign character. But it was as if, in his inmost soul, a voice were whispering in audible words: "Ah! couldst thou accomplish it wert thou not thinking of _her_, didst thou not believe in _her_ and in her love?" Then there floated whispers, as in low, low, waving crystal tones, through the room: "I am near, near, near! I help thee; be bold, be steadfast, dear Anselmus! I toil with thee, that thou mayest be mine!" And as, in the fulness of secret rapture, he caught these sounds, the unknown characters grew clearer and clearer to him; he scarcely required to look on the original at all; nay, it was as if the letters were already standing in pale ink on the parchment, and he had nothing more to do than mark them black. So did he labor on, encompa.s.sed with dear, consoling tones as with soft, sweet breath, till the clock struck six, and Archivarius Lindhorst entered the room. He came forward to the table, with a singular smile; Anselmus rose in silence; the Archivarius still looked at him, with that mocking smile; but no sooner had he glanced over the copy than the smile pa.s.sed into deep, solemn earnestness, which every feature of his face adapted itself to express. He seemed no longer the same. His eyes, which usually gleamed with sparkling fire, now looked with unutterable mildness at Anselmus; a soft red tinted the pale cheeks; and instead of the irony which at other times compressed the mouth, the softly-curved, graceful lips now seemed to be opening for wise and soul-persuading speech. The whole form was higher, statelier; the wide nightgown spread itself like a royal mantle in broad folds over his breast and shoulders; and through the white locks, which lay on his high open brow, there was wound a thin band of gold.
"Young man," began the Archivarius in solemn tone, "before thou thoughtest of it, I knew thee, and all the secret relations which bind thee to the dearest and holiest I have on earth! Serpentina loves thee; a singular destiny, whose fateful threads were spun by hostile powers, is fulfilled should she be thine and thou obtain, as an essential dowry, the Golden Pot, which of right belongs to her. But only from effort and contest can thy happiness in the higher life arise; hostile Principles a.s.sail thee; and only the interior force with which thou shalt withstand these a.s.saults can save thee from disgrace and ruin. Whilst laboring here thou art pa.s.sing your apprenticeship; belief and full knowledge will lead thee to the near goal, if thou but hold fast what thou hast well begun. Bear _her_ always and truly in thy thoughts, her who loves thee; then shalt thou see the marvels of the Golden Pot, and be happy forevermore. Fare thee well! Archivarius Lindhorst expects thee tomorrow at noon in thy cabinet. Fare thee well!" With these words Archivarius Lindhorst softly pushed the student Anselmus out of the door, which he then locked; and Anselmus found himself in the chamber where he had dined, the single door of which led out to the lobby.
Altogether stupified with these strange phenomena, the student Anselmus stood lingering at the street-door; he heard a window open above him, and looked up: it was Archivarius Lindhorst, quite the old man again, in his light-gray gown, as he usually appeared. The Archivarius called to him: "Hey, worthy Herr Anselmus, what are you studying over there? Tush, the Arabic is still in your head.
My compliments to Herr Conrector Paulmann, if you see him; and come tomorrow precisely at noon. The fee for this day is lying in your right waistcoat-pocket." The student Anselmus actually found the clear speziesthaler in the pocket indicated; but he took no joy in it. "What is to come of all this," said he to himself, "I know not; but if it be some mad delusion and conjuring work that has laid hold of me, the dear Serpentina still lives and moves in my inward heart, and rather than leave her I will perish altogether; for I know that the thought in me is eternal, and no hostile Principle can take it from me; and what else is this thought but Serpentina"s love?"
EIGHTH VIGIL
The Library of the Palm-trees. Fortunes of an unhappy Salamander.
How the Black Quill caressed a Parsnip, and Registrator Heerbrand was much overcome with Liqueur.
The student Anselmus had now worked several days with Archivarius Lindhorst; these working hours were for him the happiest of his life; ever encircled with the lovely tone of Serpentina"s encouraging words, he was filled and overflowed with a pure delight, which often rose to highest rapture. Every strait, every little care of his needy existence, had vanished from his thoughts; and in the new life which had risen on him as in serene sunny splendor, he comprehended all the wonders of a higher world, which before had filled him with astonishment, nay, with dread. His copying proceeded rapidly and lightly, for he felt more and more as if he were writing characters long known to him; and he scarcely needed to cast his eye upon the ma.n.u.script, while copying it all with the greatest exactness.
Except at the hour of dinner, Archivarius Lindhorst seldom made his appearance, and this always precisely at the moment when Anselmus had finished the last letter of some ma.n.u.script; then the Archivarius would hand him another, and, directly after, leave him without uttering a word, having first stirred the ink with a little black rod and changed the old pens with new sharp-pointed ones. One day, when Anselmus, at the stroke of twelve, had as usual mounted the stairs, he found the door through which he commonly entered, standing locked; and Archivarius Lindhorst came forward from the other side, dressed in his strange flower-figured nightgown. He called aloud: "Today come this way, dear Anselmus; for we must to the chamber where Bhogovotgita"s masters are waiting for us."
He stepped along the corridor, and led Anselmus through the same chambers and halls as at the first visit. The student Anselmus again felt astonished at the marvelous beauty of the garden; but he now perceived that many of the strange flowers, hanging on the dark bushes, were in truth insects gleaming with lordly colors, hovering up and down with their little wings as they danced and whirled in cl.u.s.ters, caressing one another with their antennae. On the other hand again, the rose and azure-colored birds were odoriferous flowers; and the perfume which they scattered mounted from their cups in low, lovely tones, which, with the gurgling of distant fountains, and the sighing of the high shrubs and trees, melted into mysterious harmonies of a deep unutterable longing. The mocking-birds, which had so jeered and flouted him before, were again fluttering to and fro over his head and crying incessantly with their sharp, small voices: "Herr Studiosus, Herr Studiosus, don"t be in such a hurry! Don"t peep into the clouds so! You may fall on your nose--He, he! Herr Studiosus, put your powder-mantle on; cousin Screech-Owl will frizzle your toupee."
And so it went along, in all manner of stupid chatter, till Anselmus left the garden.
Archivarius Lindhorst at last stepped into the azure chamber; the porphyry, with the Golden Pot, was gone; instead of it, in the middle of the room, stood a table overhung with violet-colored satin, upon which lay the writing-materials already known to Anselmus; and a stuffed arm-chair, covered with the same sort of cloth, was placed before it.
"Dear Herr Anselmus," said Archivarius Lindhorst, "you have now copied me a number of ma.n.u.scripts, rapidly and correctly, to my no small contentment: you have gained my confidence; but the hardest is yet to come; and that is the transcribing or rather painting of certain works after the original, composed of peculiar signs; I keep them in this room, and they can be copied only on the spot. You will, therefore, in future, work here; but I must recommend to you the greatest foresight and attention; a false stroke, or, which may Heaven forefend, a blot let fall on the original, will plunge you into misfortune."
Anselmus observed that from the golden trunks of the palm-trees, little emerald leaves projected: one of these leaves the Archivarius took hold of; and Anselmus could not but perceive that the leaf was in truth a roll of parchment, which the Archivarius unfolded and spread out before the student on the table. Anselmus wondered not a little at these strangely intertwisted characters; and as he looked over the many points, strokes, dashes, and twirls in the ma.n.u.script, which seemed to represent either plants or mosses or animal figures, he almost lost hope of ever copying it. He fell into deep thought on the subject.
"Be of courage, young man!" cried the Archivarius; "if thou hast sterling faith and true love, Serpentina will help thee."
His voice sounded like ringing metal; and as Anselmus looked up in utter terror, Archivarius Lindhorst was standing before him in the kingly form, which, during the first visit, he had a.s.sumed in the library. Anselmus felt as if in his deep reverence he could not but sink on his knee; but the Archivarius stepped up the trunk of a palm-tree, and vanished aloft among the emerald leaves. The student Anselmus understood that the Prince of the Spirits had been speaking with him, and was now gone up to his study; perhaps intending to advise with the beams which some of the planets had dispatched to him as envoys, on what was to become of Anselmus and Serpentina.
"It may be too," thought he further, "that he is expecting news from the Springs of the Nile; or that some magician from Lapland is paying him a visit; me it behooves to set diligently about my task." And with this, he began studying the foreign characters in the roll of parchment.
The strange music of the garden sounded over to him and encircled him with sweet lovely odors; the mocking-birds too he still heard chirping and twittering, but could not distinguish their words--a thing which greatly pleased him. At times also it was as if the emerald leaves of the palm-trees were rustling, and as if the clear crystal tones, which Anselmus on that fateful Ascension-day had heard under the elder-bush, were beaming and flitting through the room. Wonderfully strengthened by this shining and tinkling, the student Anselmus directed his eyes and thoughts more and more intensely on the superscription of the parchment roll; and ere long he felt, as it were from his inmost soul, that the characters could denote nothing else than these words: _Of the marriage of the Salamander with the green Snake_. Then resounded a louder triphony of clear crystal bells; "Anselmus! dear Anselmus!"
floated to him from the leaves; and, O wonder! on the trunk of the palm-tree the green Snake came winding down.
"Serpentina! Serpentina!" cried Anselmus, in the madness of highest rapture; for as he gazed more earnestly, it was in truth a lovely, glorious maiden that, looking at him with those dark-blue eyes, full of inexpressible longing, as they lived in his heart, was hovering down to meet him. The leaves seemed to jut out and expand; on every hand were p.r.i.c.kles sprouting from the trunks; but Serpentina twisted and wound herself deftly through them; and so drew her fluttering robe, framing her as if in changeful colors, along with her, that, playing round the dainty form, it nowhere caught on the projecting points and p.r.i.c.kles of the palm-trees. She sat down by Anselmus on the same chair, clasping him with her arm, and pressing him toward her, so that he felt the breath which came from her lips, and the electric warmth of her frame.
"Dear Anselmus!" began Serpentina, "thou shalt now soon be wholly mine; by thy faith, by thy Love thou shalt obtain me, and I will bring thee the Golden Pot, which shall make us both happy forevermore."
"O thou kind, lovely Serpentina!" said Anselmus. "If I have but thee, what care I for all else! If thou art but mine, I will joyfully give in to all the wondrous mysteries that have beset me ever since the moment when I first saw thee."
"I know," continued Serpentina, "that the strange and mysterious things with which my father, often merely in the sport of his humor, has surrounded thee, have raised horror and dread in thy mind; but now, I hope, it shall be so no more; for I came now only to tell thee, dear Anselmus, from the bottom of my heart and soul, all and sundry to a t.i.ttle that thou needest to know for understanding my father, and so learn the real condition of both of us."
Anselmus felt as if he were so wholly clasped and encircled by the gentle, lovely form, that only with her could he move and stir, and as if it were but the beating of her pulse that throbbed through his nerves and fibres; he listened to each one of her words which penetrated his inmost heart, and, like a burning ray, kindled in him the rapture of Heaven. He had put his arm round that daintier than dainty waist; but the changeful glistering cloth of her robe was so smooth and slippery that it seemed to him as if she could at any moment wind herself from his arms, and glide away. He trembled at the thought.
"Ah, do not leave me, sweet Serpentina!" cried he involuntarily; "thou alone art my life."
"Not now," said Serpentina, "till I have told thee all that in thy love of me thou canst comprehend."
"Know then, dearest, that my father is sprung from the wondrous race of the Salamanders; and that I owe my existence to his love for the green Snake. In primeval times, in the Fairyland Atlantis, the potent Spirit-prince Phosphorus bore rule; and to him the Salamanders, and other Spirits of the Elements, were plighted. Once on a time, the Salamander, whom he loved before all others (it was my father), chanced to be walking in the stately garden, which Phosphorus" mother had decked in the lordliest fashion with her best gifts; and the Salamander heard a tall Lily singing in low tones: "Press down thy little eyelids, till my Lover, the Morning-wind, awake thee." He stepped toward it: touched by his glowing breath, the Lily opened her leaves; and he saw the Lily"s daughter, the green Snake, lying asleep in the hollow of the flower. Then was the Salamander inflamed with warm love for the fair Snake; and he carried her away from the Lily, whose perfumes in nameless lamentation vainly called for her beloved daughter throughout all the garden. For the Salamander had borne her into the palace of Phosphorus, and was there beseeching him: "Wed me with my beloved, for she shall be mine forevermore." "Madman, what askest thou!" said the Prince of the Spirits; "know that once the Lily was my mistress, and bore rule with me; but the Spark, which I cast into her, threatened to annihilate the fair Lily; and only my victory over the black Dragon, whom now the Spirits of the Earth hold in fetters, maintains her, that her leaves continue strong enough to inclose this Spark and preserve it within them. But when thou claspest the green Snake, thy fire will consume her frame; and a new Being, rapidly arising from her dust, will soar away and leave thee."
"The Salamander heeded not the warning of the Spirit-prince: full of longing ardor he folded the green Snake in his arms; she crumbled into ashes; a winged Being, born from her dust, soared away through the sky. Then the madness of desperation caught the Salamander, and he ran through the garden, throwing forth fire and flames, and wasted it in his wild fury, till its fairest flowers and blossoms hung down, blackened and scathed, and their lamentation filled the air. The indignant Prince of the Spirits, in his wrath, laid hold of the Salamander, and said: "Thy fire has burnt out, thy flames are extinguished, thy rays darkened; sink down to the Spirits of the Earth; let these mock and jeer thee, and keep thee captive, till the Fire-element shall again kindle and beam up with thee as with a new being from the Earth." The poor Salamander sank down extinguished; but now the testy old Earth-spirit, who was Phosphorus" gardener, came forth and said: "Master! who has greater cause to complain of the Salamander than I? Had not all the fair flowers, which he has burnt, been decorated with my gayest metals; had I not stoutly nursed and tended their seeds, and spent many a fair hue on their leaves? And yet I must pity the poor Salamander; for it was but love, in which thou, O Master, hast full often been entangled, that drove him to despair and made him desolate the garden. Remit him the too harsh punishment!"--"His fire is for the present extinguished," said the Prince of the Spirits; "but in the hapless time, when the Speech of Nature shall no longer be intelligible to degenerate man; when the Spirits of the Elements, banished into their own regions, shall speak to him only from afar, in faint, spent echoes; when, displaced from the harmonious circle, an infinite longing alone shall give him tidings of the Land of Marvels, which he once might inhabit while Faith and Love still dwelt in his soul--in this hapless time the fire of the Salamander shall again kindle; but only to manhood shall he be permitted to rise, and, entering wholly into man"s necessitous existence, he shall learn to endure its wants and oppressions. Yet not only shall the remembrance of his first state continue with him, but he shall again rise into the sacred harmony of all Nature; he shall understand its wonders, and the power of his fellow-spirits shall stand at his behest. Then, too, in a Lily-bush, shall he find the green Snake again, and the fruit of his marriage with her shall be three daughters, which, to men, shall appear in the form of their mother. In the spring season these shall disport them in the dark Elder-bush, and sound with their lovely crystal voices. And then if, in that needy and mean age of inward obduracy, there shall be found a youth who understands their song; nay, if one of the little Snakes look at him with her kind eyes; if the look awaken in him forecastings of the distant, wondrous Land, to which, having cast away the burden of the Common, he can courageously soar; if, with love to the Snake, there rise in him belief in the Wonders of Nature, nay, in his own existence amid these Wonders--then the Snake shall be his. But not till three youths of this sort have been found and wedded to the three daughters, may the Salamander cast away his heavy burden, and return to his brothers."--"Permit me, Master," said the Earth-spirit, "to make these three daughters a present, which may glorify their life with the husbands they shall find. Let each of them receive from me a Pot, of the fairest metal which I have; I will polish it with beams borrowed from the diamond; in its glitter shall our Kingdom of Wonders, as it now exists in the Harmony of universal Nature, be mirrored in glorious dazzling reflection; and from its interior, on the day of marriage, shall spring forth a Fire-lily, whose eternal blossom shall encircle the youth that is found worthy, with sweet wafting odors. Soon too shall he learn its speech, and understand the wonders of our kingdom, and dwell with his beloved in Atlantis itself."
"Thou perceivest well, dear Anselmus, that the Salamander of whom I speak is no other than my father. Spite of his higher nature, he was forced to subject himself to the paltriest afflictions of common life; and hence, indeed, often comes the mischievous humor with which he vexes many. He has told me now and then, that, for the inward make of mind, which the Spirit-prince Phosphorus required as a condition of marriage with me and my sisters, men have a name at present, which, in truth, they frequently enough misapply: they call it a childlike poetic mind. This mind, he says, is often found in youths, who, by reason of their high simplicity of manners and their total want of what is called knowledge of the world, are mocked by the populace. Ah, dear Anselmus, beneath the Elder-bush thou understoodest my song, my look; thou lovest the green Snake, thou believest in me, and wilt be mine forevermore! The fair Lily will bloom forth from the Golden Pot; and we shall dwell, happy, and united, and blessed, in Atlantis together!
"Yet I must not hide from thee that in its deadly battle with the Salamanders and Spirits of the Earth, the black Dragon burst from their grasp and hurried off through the air. Phosphorus, indeed, again holds him in fetters; but from the black Quills, which, in the struggle, rained down on the ground, there sprung up hostile Spirits, which on all hands set themselves against the Salamanders and Spirits of the Earth. That woman who so hates thee, dear Anselmus, and who, as my father knows full well, is striving for possession of the Golden Pot; that woman owes her existence to the love of such a Quill (plucked in battle from the Dragon"s wing) for a certain Parsnip beside which it dropped. She knows her origin and her power; for, in the moans and convulsions of the captive Dragon, the secrets of many a mysterious constellation are revealed to her; and she uses every means and effort to work from the Outward into the Inward and unseen; while my father, with the beams which shoot forth from the spirit of the Salamander, withstands and subdues her. All the baneful principles which lurk in deadly herbs and poisonous beasts, she collects; and, mixing them under favorable constellations, raises therewith many a wicked spell, which overwhelms the soul of man with fear and trembling, and subjects him to the power of those Demons, produced from the Dragon when it yielded in battle. Beware of that old woman, dear Anselmus! She hates thee because thy childlike, pious character has annihilated many of her wicked charms. Keep true, true to me; soon art thou at the goal!"
"O my Serpentina! my own Serpentina!" cried the student Anselmus, "how could I leave thee, how should I not love thee forever!" A kiss was burning on his lips; he awoke as from a deep dream; Serpentina had vanished; six o"clock was striking, and it fell heavy on his heart that today he had not copied a single stroke. Full of anxiety, and dreading reproaches from the Archivarius, he looked into the sheet; and, O wonder! the copy of the mysterious ma.n.u.script was fairly concluded; and he thought, on viewing the characters more narrowly, that the writing was nothing else but Serpentina"s story of her father, the favorite of the Spirit-prince Phosphorus, in Atlantis, the Land of Marvels. And now entered Archivarius Lindhorst, in his light-gray surtout, with hat and staff; he looked into the parchment on which Anselmus had been writing, took a large pinch of snuff, and said with a smile "Just as I thought!--Well, Herr Anselmus, here is your speziesthaler; we will now to the Linke Bath; do but follow me!"
The Archivarius stepped rapidly through the garden, in which there was such a din of singing, whistling, talking, that the student Anselmus was quite deafened with it and thanked Heaven when he found himself on the street.
Scarcely had they walked a few paces when they met Registrator Heerbrand, who companionably joined them. At the Gate, they filled their pipes, which they had about them; Registrator Heerbrand complained that he had left his tinder-box behind, and could not strike fire. "Fire!" cried Archivarius Lindhorst, scornfully; "here is fire enough, and to spare!" And with this he snapped his fingers, out of which came streams of sparks and directly kindled the pipes.--"Do but observe the chemical knack of some men!" said Registrator Heerbrand; but the student Anselmus thought, not without internal awe, of the Salamander and his history.
In the Linke Bath, Registrator Heerbrand drank so much strong double beer that at last, though usually a good-natured, quiet man, he began singing student songs in squeaking tenor; he asked every one sharply whether he was his friend or not; and at last had to be taken home by the student Anselmus, long after Archivarius had gone his way.
NINTH VIGIL
How the student Anselmus attained to some Sense. The Punch Parts.
How the student Anselmus took Conrector Paulmann for a Screech-Owl, and the latter felt much hurt at it. The Ink-blot, and its Consequences.
The strange and mysterious things which day by day befell the student Anselmus had entirely withdrawn him from every-day life. He no longer visited any of his friends, and waited every morning with impatience for the hour of noon, which was to unlock his paradise. And yet while his whole soul was turned to the sweet Serpentina and the wonders of Archivarius Lindhorst"s fairy kingdom, he could not help now and then thinking of Veronica; nay, often it seemed as if she came before him and confessed with blushes how heartily she loved him, how much she longed to rescue him from the phantoms which were mocking and befooling him. At times he felt as if a foreign power, suddenly breaking in on his mind, were drawing him with resistless force to the forgotten Veronica; as if he must needs follow her whither she pleased to lead him, nay, as if he were bound to her by ties that would not break. That very night after Serpentina had first appeared to him in the form of a lovely maiden, after the wondrous secret of the Salamander"s nuptials with the green Snake had been disclosed, Veronica, came before him more vividly than ever. Nay, not till he awoke was he clearly aware that he had been but dreaming; for he had felt persuaded that Veronica was actually beside him, complaining with an expression of keen sorrow, which pierced through his inmost soul, that he should sacrifice her deep, true love to fantastic visions, which only the distemper of his mind called into being, and which, moreover, would at last prove his ruin. Veronica was lovelier than he had ever seen her; he could not drive her from his thoughts: and in this perplexed and contradictory mood he hastened out, hoping to get rid of it by a morning walk.
A secret magic influence led him on to the Pirna gate; he was just turning into a cross street, when Conrector Paulmann, coming after him, cried out: "Ey! Ey!--Dear Herr Anselmus!--_Amice! Amice_! Where, in Heaven"s name, have you been buried so long? We never see you at all. Do you know, Veronica is longing very much to have another song with you! So come along; you were just on the road to me, at any rate."
The student Anselmus, constrained by this friendly violence, went along with the Conrector. On entering the house they were met by Veronica, attired with such neatness and attention that Conrector Paulmann, full of amazement, asked her: "Why so decked, Mam"sell? Were you expecting visitors? Well, here I bring you Herr Anselmus." The student Anselmus, in daintily and elegantly kissing Veronica"s hand felt a small soft pressure from it, which shot like a stream of fire over all his frame. Veronica was cheerfulness, was grace itself; and when Paulmann left them for his study, she contrived, by all manner of rogueries and waggeries, so to uplift the student Anselmus that he at last quite forgot his bashfulness, and jigged round the room with the light-headed maiden. But here again the Demon of Awkwardness got hold of him; he jolted a table, and Veronica"s pretty little work-box fell to the floor. Anselmus picked it up; the lid had sprung, and a little round metallic mirror was glittering on him, into which he looked with peculiar delight. Veronica glided softly up to him, laid her hand on his arm, and, pressing close to him, looked over his shoulder into the mirror also. And now Anselmus felt as if a battle were beginning in his soul; thoughts, images flashed out--Archivarius Lindhorst--Serpentina--the green Snake--at last the tumult abated, and all this chaos arranged and shaped itself into distinct consciousness.
It was now clear to him that he had always thought of Veronica alone; nay, that the form which had yesterday appeared to him in the blue chamber had been no other than Veronica; and that the wild legend of the Salamander"s marriage with the green Snake had merely been written down by him from the ma.n.u.script, but nowise related in his hearing. He wondered not a little at all these dreams and ascribed them solely to the heated state of mind into which Veronica"s love had brought him, as well as to his working with Archivarius Lindhorst, in whose rooms there were, besides, so many strangely intoxicating odors. He could not but laugh heartily at the mad whim of falling in love with a little green Snake and taking a well-fed Privy Archivarius for a Salamander: "Yes, Yes! It is Veronica!" cried he aloud; but on turning his head around he looked right into Veronica"s blue eyes, from which warmest love was beaming. A faint soft Ah! escaped her lips, which at that moment were burning on his.
"O happy I!" sighed the enraptured student: "What I yesternight but dreamed, is in very deed mine today."
"But wilt thou really wed me, then, when thou art Hofrat?" said Veronica.
"That I will," replied the student Anselmus; and just then the door creaked, and Conrector Paulmann entered with the words:
"Now, dear Herr Anselmus, I will not let you go today. You will put up with a bad dinner; then Veronica will make us delightful coffee, which we shall drink with Registrator Heerbrand, for he promised to come hither."
"All, best Herr Conrector!" answered the student Anselmus, "are you not aware that I must go to Archivarius Lindhorst"s and copy?"