“Carl, I’ve come to talk to you. I’ve a letter from a brother-minister in St. Louis, America, about which I want to speak. Are you ready to hear?”
“Most certainly.”
“Bertha, leave us. Take care that the children come not upon us.”
“Carl, you are unwise and cruel. Nay, nay, list! Start not away. You are unwise and cruel.”
“To whom?”
“To Bertha, your wife,—Fritz and Herman, your children. That man is cruel who gives not to his young ones the means of raising themselves; you do not, you are cruel;—that man is cruel who taxes a woman’s strength beyond its proper limit; you do it, and you are cruel;—that man is unwise who makes no provision for his old age; you do not, you are unwise.”
“What would you have me do? I’m at work from morning till night, and they will not buy my pictures when I’ve painted them.”
“Therefore, why paint them?”
“In hope. They ought to sell.”
“Nay, they ought not to sell, for they are not good; they are not excellent art; and you are not an artist. You have the artist’s soul, but you are not an artist. You lack knowledge; you lack that proficiency of hand which only springs from practice begun almost in infancy, or from a genius that knows no law. You began too late in life to succeed.”
“I took the prize, though, three years since.”
“I know. What did you paint?”
“The view from the hill up yonder, on the left of the town.”
“Most true, and whose house was it that was in the view? The Burgomaster’s, was it not?”
“Truly.”
“And who was the head of the judges to award the prize but Master Wanslieben, the Burgomaster? Who bought the picture? Master Wanslieben. His house, not your merit, sold the picture—gained the prize. You know yourself that it was not a good picture. Three years’ work have taught you that—learn more.”
“But what can I do? Bertha’s little money is all but spent; I must paint.”
“Truly; but not here—not here. I looked in at the window, last evening just before sunset, and saw you all. The old man sitting by the fire stretching out his feeble hand for the poor porridge your Bertha had made for him; Fritz reading his book—he’s like your wife, that son of yours; let him not read too much now, he should play. Herman, your youngest, (with his father’s feelings, but not his father’s skill) was sketching the face of Bertha’s mother, as he leaned against her. He holds his pencil badly, does Herman—he has no freedom—you should see to this; had your father done so, I should not have had to tell you what I have. And you, Carl, were painting as usual. I like not to break up this group, but it must be some day. Death will take the old man Teutzel this winter—he must go; I have seen Death before; I know his mark. He will leave you, and you must leave her.”
“Her! Whom?”
“Your children’s grand-dame, Charlotta Teutzel. She is dead to feeling now—dead to you and to her daughter Bertha; she felt not, saw not, your little Herman last night, though his weight was on her; she is in her second childhood—it may last years, but she is all but dead—you must leave her in my care.”
“Thanks, father! but where must I go?”
“If my advice is taken, to St. Louis. I will read what my brother pastor says: ‘The young man of whom you speak would, I think, do well out here; wages for the class of labour are high; many of our merchant-princes spend sums almost fabulous in the decorations of their mansions, and eagerly employ artists of talent and taste at good salaries for the purpose. If, as you say, your young friend is not likely to take a high position in his own country as an artist in the highest sense of the term, let him come here at once, for employment is abundant and the wages dependent on his industry alone.’”
“And you,” said Carl, “wrote to him of me?”
“I did—for I love you, Carl. Had you been rich, you would have had many friends; but, being poor, your poetic temperament—your artist nature—is to you but the thin garment of a man who treads through a forest of briars, which, while it leaves him sensitive to the gentlest breath of the winds of heaven, is therefore the less protection from the thorns of earth; and your path here, poor Carl, has too many of the thorns: this is neither the climate nor the age when it can be said, “truly happy are the poor” in anything. You must go.”
“I would it could be otherwise, and besides, I have no means to reach this Elysium—this Paradise.”
“Despise not the unknown, Carl.”
“How shall I get there?”
“Carl, I am not rich, you know well. I hold that the shepherd should spend much for the good of the sheep. I’d rather leave behind me the weeping eyes of friends who held me dear for my help than much wealth. Still I have a little that I had, perhaps faithlessly, laid by should my voice fail; that little shall be yours, for your mother’s sake, Carl.”
The clouds were thick about him now, and one large drop slowly coursed down his cheek to the ground. It might have been the herald of a storm, but no storm came: if it fell it was in a rain of fire on the heart, there was none outwardly when the clouds cleared away.
“I can hardly accept it, but”
“But for Bertha’s sake, and Fritz’s and Herman’s sake you will. I’ll give you a week to think of it.”
It was decided. He would go. Poor Carl! Vanished for him were all the fond dreams of youth. No fame! Her temple doors were shut to him; and henceforth he must live and work, hopeless of her crown.
Carl was not an idle man; he thought much, worked much, but did not get on. He had mistaken his vocation. Alas! how many are in his position—miserable, they know not how; unsuccessful, they know not why; and then drink soon dulls them too much to look for causes, and at last the poor-house or the grave finish the “tale of a mistaken vocation.”
