Delphi Collected Works of Johann Wolfgang von Goethe \(Illustrated\) pdfdrive com

CHAPTER XI

The narrator made a pause, or rather he had already finished his story, before

he observed the emotion into which Charlotte had been thrown by it. She got up,

uttered some sort of an apology, and left the room. To her it was a well-known

history. The principal incident in it had really taken place with the Captain and a

neighbor of her own; not exactly, indeed, as the Englishman had related it. But

the  main  features  of  it  were  the  same.  It  had  only  been  more  finished  off  and

elaborated in its details, as stories of that kind always are when they have passed

first through the lips of the multitude, and then through the fancy of a clever and

imaginative narrator; the result of the process being usually to leave everything

and nothing as it was.

Ottilie followed Charlotte, as the two friends begged her to do; and then it was

the Earl’s turn to remark, that perhaps they had made a second mistake, and that

the subject of the story had been well known to, or was in some way connected

with, the family. “We must take care,” he added, “that we do no more mischief

here;  we  seem  to  bring  little  good  to  our  entertainers  for  all  the  kindness  and

hospitality which they have shown us; we will make some excuse for ourselves,

and then take our leave.”

“I  must  confess,”  answered  his  companion,  “that  there  is  something  else

which  still  holds  me  here,  which  I  should  be  very  sorry  to  leave  the  house

without seeing cleared up or in some way explained. You were too busy yourself

yesterday when we were in the park with the camera, in looking for spots where

you  could  make  your  sketches,  to  have  observed  anything  else  which  was

passing. You left the broad walk, you remember, and went to a sequestered place

on the side of the lake. There was a fine view of the opposite shore which you

wished  to  take.  Well,  Ottilie,  who  was  with  us,  got  up  to  follow;  and  then

proposed that she and I should find our way to you in the boat. I got in with her,

and was delighted with the skill of my fair conductress. I assured her that never

since I had been in Switzerland, where the young ladies so often fill the place of

the boatmen, had I been so pleasantly ferried over the water. At the same time I

could not help asking her why she had shown such an objection to going the way

which you had gone, along the little by-path. I had observed her shrink from it

with  a  sort  of  painful  uneasiness.  She  was  not  at  all  offended.  ‘If  you  will

promise  not  to  laugh  at  me,’  she  answered,  ‘I  will  tell  you  as  much  as  I  know

about  it;  but  to  myself  it  is  a  mystery  which  I  cannot  explain.  There  is  a

particular  spot  in  that  path  which  I  never  pass  without  a  strange  shiver  passing

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over  me,  which  I  do  not  remember  ever  feeling  anywhere  else,  and  which  I

cannot the least understand. But I shrink from exposing myself to the sensation,

because  it  is  followed  immediately  after  by  a  pain  on  the  left  side  of  my  head,

from  which  at  other  times  I  suffer  severely.’  We  landed.  Ottilie  was  engaged

with  you,  and  I  took  the  opportunity  of  examining  the  spot,  which  she  pointed

out to me as we went by on the water. I was not a little surprised to find there

distinct  traces  of  coal  in  sufficient  quantities  to  convince  me  that  at  a  short

distance below the surface there must be a considerable bed of it.

“Pardon me, my Lord; I see you smile; and I know very well that you have no

faith in these things about which I am so eager, and that it is only your sense and

your kindness which enable you to tolerate me. However, it is impossible for me

to  leave  this  place  without  trying  on  that  beautiful  creature  an  experiment  with

the pendulum.”

The Earl, whenever these matters came to be spoken of, never failed to repeat

the same objections to them over and over again; and his friend endured them all

quietly  and  patiently,  remaining  firm,  nevertheless,  to  his  own  opinion,  and

holding  to  his  own  wishes.  He,  too,  again  repeated  that  there  was  no  reason,

because  the  experiment  did  not  succeed  with  every  one,  that  they  should  give

them  up,  as  if  there  was  nothing  in  them  but  fancy.  They  should  be  examined

into  all  the  more  earnestly  and  scrupulously;  and  there  was  no  doubt  that  the

result would be the discovery of a number of affinities of inorganic creatures for

one another, and of organic creatures for them, and again for each other, which

at present were unknown to us.

He  had  already  spread  out  his  apparatus  of  gold  rings,  marcasites,  and  other

metallic  substances,  a  pretty  little  box  of  which  he  always  carried  about  with

himself; and he suspended a piece of metal by a string over another piece, which

he placed upon the table. “Now, my Lord,” he said, “you may take what pleasure

you  please  (I  can  see  in  your  face  what  you  are  feeling),  at  perceiving  that

nothing will set itself in motion with me, or for me. But my operation is no more

than a pretense; when the ladies come back, they will be curious to know what

strange work we are about.”

The ladies returned. Charlotte understood at once what was going on. “I have

heard  much  of  these  things,”  she  said;  “but  I  never  saw  the  effect  myself.  You

have  everything  ready  there.  Let  me  try  whether  I  can  succeed  in  producing

anything.”

She took the thread in her hand, and as she was perfectly serious, she held it

steady,  and  without  any  agitation.  Not  the  slightest  motion,  however,  could  be

detected.  Ottilie  was  then  called  upon  to  try.  She  held  the  pendulum  still  more

quietly  and  unconsciously  over  the  plate  on  the  table.  But  in  a  moment  the

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swinging piece of metal began to stir with a distinct rotary action, and turned as

they moved the position of the plate, first to one side and then to the other; now

in circles, now in ellipses; or else describing a series of straight lines; doing all

the Earl’s friend could expect, and far exceeding, indeed, all his expectations.

The Earl himself was a little staggered; but the other could never be satisfied,

from delight and curiosity, and begged for the experiment again and again with

all sorts of variations. Ottilie was good-natured enough to gratify him; till at last

she  was  obliged  to  desire  to  be  allowed  to  go,  as  her  headache  had  come  on

again.  In  further  admiration  and  even  rapture,  he  assured  her  with  enthusiasm

that he would cure her forever of her disorder, if she would only trust herself to

his  remedies.  For  a  moment  they  did  not  know  what  he  meant;  but  Charlotte,

who comprehended immediately after, declined his well-meant offer, not liking

to have introduced and practised about her a thing of which she had always had

the strongest apprehensions.

The  strangers  were  gone,  and  notwithstanding  their  having  been  the

inadvertent  cause  of  strange  and  painful  emotions,  left  the  wish  behind  them,

that this meeting might not be the last. Charlotte now made use of the beautiful

weather  to  return  visits  in  the  neighborhood,  which,  indeed,  gave  her  work

enough  to  do,  seeing  that  the  whole  country  round,  some  from  a  real  interest,

some merely from custom, had been most attentive in calling to inquire after her.

At  home  her  delight  was  the  sight  of  the  child,  and  really  it  well  deserved  all

love and  interest.  People,  saw  in  it  a  wonderful,  indeed  a  miraculous  child;  the

brightest, sunniest little face; a fine, well-proportioned body, strong and healthy;

and what surprised them more, the double resemblance, which became more and

more  conspicuous.  In  figure  and  in  the  features  of  the  face,  it  was  like  the

Captain;  the  eyes  every  day  it  was  less  easy  to  distinguish  from  the  eyes  of

Ottilie.

Ottilie  herself,  partly  from  this  remarkable  affinity,  perhaps  still  more  under

the influence of that sweet woman’s feeling which makes them regard with the

most tender affection the offspring, even by another, of the man they love, was

as good as a mother to the little creature as it grew, or rather, she was a second

mother of another kind. If Charlotte was absent, Ottilie remained alone with the

child  and  the  nurse.  Nanny  had  for  some  time  past  been  jealous  of  the  boy  for

monopolizing  the  entire  affections  of  her  mistress;  she  had  left  her  in  a  fit  of

crossness, and gone back to her mother. Ottilie would carry the child about in the

open air, and by degrees took longer and longer walks with it, carrying a bottle

of milk to give the child its food when it wanted any. Generally, too, she took a

book  with  her;  and  so  with  the  child  in  her  arms,  reading  and  wandering,  she

made a very pretty Penserosa.

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