Ottilia in the wildest corner of Ireland, where I never should have thought to hear her gentle name? Walking on that very Urrisbeg Mountain under whose shadow I heard Ottilia's name, Mackay, the learned author of "The Flora Patlandica," discovered the Mediterranean heath, such a flower as I have often plucked on the sides of Vesuvius, and as Proserpine, no doubt, amused herself in gathering as she strayed in the fields of Enna. Here it is the self-same flower, peering out at the Atlantic from Roundstone Bay; here, too, in this wild lonely place, nestles the fragrant memory of my Ottilia! gratify almost every stranger who came into his native town. Any old place with which I have once been familiar (as, perhaps, I have before stated in these "Confessions - but never mind that) is in some sort dear to me; and were I Lord Shootingcastle or Colonel Popland, I think after a residence of six months there I should love the Fleet Prison. As I saw the old familiar pipe, I took it down, and crammed it with Cavendish tobacco, and lay down on a sofa, and puffed away for an hour well-nigh, thinking of old, old times. "You're very entertaining to-night, Fitz," says young Blake, who had made several tumblers of Punch for "I am thinking, Blake," says I, "about Pumpernickel, where old Speck gave you this pipe." """Deed he did," replies the young man; "and did ye know the old Bar'n?" In a word, after a day on Bally-me, which I had gulped down withlynch Lake (where, with a brown fly out saying a word. "Don't ye think and a single hair, I killed fourteen ye'd be more easy in bed than snortsalmon, the smallest twenty-nine ing and sighing there on my sofa, and pounds weight, the largest some-groaning fit to make me go hang where about five stone ten), my young myself?" friend Blake Bodkin Lynch Browne (a fine lad who has made his continental tour) and I adjourned, after dinner, to the young gentleman's private room, for the purpose of smoking a certain cigar; which is never more pleasant than after a hard day's sport, or a day spent in-doors, or after a good dinner, or a bad one, or at night when you are tired, or in the morning when you are fresh, or of a cold winter's day, or of a scorching summer's afternoon, or at any other moment you choose to fix upon. What should I see in Blake's room but a rack of pipes, such as are to be found in almost all the bachelors' rooms in Germany, and amongst them was a porcelain pipe-head bearing the image of the Kalbsbraten pump! There it was the old spout, the old familiar allegory of Mars, Bacchus, Apollo virorum, and the rest, that I had so often looked at from Hofarchitect Speck's window, as I sat there by the side of Dorothea. The old gentleman had given me one of these very pipes; for he had hundreds of them painted, wherewith he used to "I did," said I. "My friend, I have been by the banks of the Bendemeer. Tell me, are the nightingales still singing there, and do the roses still bloom?" "The hwhat?" cries Blake. "What the divvle, Fitz, are you growling about? Bendemeer Lake's in Westmoreland, as I preshume; and as for roses and nightingales, I give ye my word it's Greek ye're talking to me." And Greek it very possibly was, for my young friend, though as good across country as any man in his county, has not the fine feeling and tender perception of beauty which may be found elsewhere, dear madam. "Tell me about Speck, Blake, and Kalbsbraten, and Dorothea, and Klingenspohr her husband." "He with the cut across the nose, is it?" cries Blake. "I know him well, and his old wife." "His old what, sir!" cries Fitz Boodle, jumping up from his "Klingensphor's wife old! married again? – Is Dorothea, d-d-dead? seat. | German albums, in which good simIs he ple little ledger every friend or acthen, quaintance of the owner inscribes a poem or stanza from some favorite "Dead! -no more dead than you poet or philosopher with the transcribare, only I take her to be five and er's own name, as thus: thirty. And when a woman has had nine children, you know, she looks none the younger; and I can tell ye, that when she trod on my corruns at a ball at the Grand Juke's, I felt something heavier than a feather on my foot.' Madame de Klingensphor, then," replied I, hesitating somewhat, "has grown rather - rather st-st-out?" I could hardly get out the out, and trembled I don't know why as I asked the question. "Stout, begad! she weighs fourteen stone, saddle and bridle. That's right, down goes my pipe; flop! crash falls the tumbler into the fender! Break away, my boy, and remember, whoever breaks a glass here pays a dozen." The fact was, that the announcement of Dorothea's changed condition caused no small disturbance within me, and I expressed it in the abrupt manner mentioned by young Blake. "To the true house-friend, and beloved "Sera nunquam est ad bonos mores "Professor at the Grand-Ducal Kalbsbrat- Turning over the leaves, I came presently on Dorothea's hand. There it was, the little neat, pretty handwriting, the dear old up-and-downstrokes that I had not looked at for many a long year, the Mediterranean heath, which grew on the sun Roused thus from my reverie, Iniest banks of Fitz-Boodle's existquestioned the young fellow about his ence, and here found, dear, dear litresidence at Kalbsbraten, which has tle sprig! in rude Galwagian bogbeen always since the war a favorite lands. "Look at the other side of the place for our young gentry, and heard with some satisfaction that Potzdorff page says Lynch, rather sarcastiwas married to the Behrenstein, Haar- cally (for I don't care to confess that bart had left the dragoons, the Crown I kissed the name of "Dorothea v. Prince had broken with the- but Klingenspohr, born v. Speck writmum! of what interest are all these ten under an extremely feeble passage details to the reader, who has never "Look at the other side of verse). been at friendly little Kalbsbraten? Presently Lynch reaches me down one of the three books that formed his library ("The Racing Calendar" and a book of fishing-flies making up the remainder of the set). "And there's my album," says he. "You'll find plenty of hands in it that you'll recognize, as you are an old Pumpernickelaner." And so I did, in truth: it was a little book after the fashion of of the ! paper I did, and what do you think I saw? I saw the writing of five of the little Klingenspohrs, who have all sprung up since my time. CHAPTER II. OTTILIA IN PARTICULAR. SOME kind critic who peruses these writings will, doubtless, have the goodness to point out that the simile of the Mediterranean heath is applied to two personages in this chapter to Ottilia and Dorothea, and say, Psha! the fellow is but a poor unimaginative creature not to be able to find a simile apiece at least for the girls; how much better would we have done the business! Well, it is a very pretty simile. The girls were rivals, were beautiful, I loved them both, which should have the sprig of heath? Mr. Cruikshank (who has taken to serious paint- | ing) is getting ready for the exhibition a fine piece, representing FitzBoodle on the Urrisbeg Mountain, County Galway, Ireland, with a sprig of heath in his hand, hesitating, like Paris, on which of the beauties he should bestow it. In the background is a certain animal between two bundles of hay; but that I take to represent the critic, puzzled to which of my young beauties to assign the choice. me? If Dorothea had been as rich as Miss Coutts, and had come to me the next day after the accident at the ball, and said, " George, will you marry it must not be supposed I would have done any such thing. That dream had vanished forever: rage and pride took the place of love; and the only chance I had of recovering from my dreadful discomfiture was by bearing it bravely, and trying, if possible, to awaken a little compassion in my favor. I limped home (arranging my scheme with great presence of mind as I actually sat spinning there on the ground) - I limped home, sent for Pflastersticken, the court-surgeon, and addressed him to the following effect: "Pflastersticken," says I, there has been an accident at court of which you will hear. You will send in leeches, pills, and the deuce knows what, and you will say that I have dislocated my leg: for some days you will state that I am in considerable danger. You are a good fellow and a man of courage I know, for which very reason you can appreciate those qualities in another; so mind, if you breathe a word of my secret, either you or I must lose a life." Away went the surgeon, and the next day all Kalbsbraten knew that I was on the point of death: I had been delirious all night, had had eighty leeches, besides I don't know how much medicine; but Kalbsbrateners knew to a scruple. Whenever anybody was ill, this little kind society knew what medicines were prescribed. Everybody in the town knew what everybody had for dinner. If Madame Rumpel had her satin dyed ever so quietly, the whole society was on the qui vive; if Countess Pultuski sent to Berlin for a new set of teeth, not a person in Kalbsbraten but what was ready to compliment her as she put them on; if Potzdorff paid his tailor's bill, or Muffinstein bought a piece of black wax for his mustaches, it was the talk of the little city. And so, of course, was my accident. In their sorrow for my misfortune, Dorothea's was quite forgotten, and those eighty leeches saved me. I became interesting; I had cards left at my door; and I kept my room for a fortnight, during which time I read every one of M. Kotzebue's plays. At the end of that period I was convalescent, though still a little lame. I called at old Speck's house and apologized for my clumsiness, with the most admirable coolness; I appeared at court, and stated calmly that I did not intend to dance any more; and when Klingenspohr grinned, I told that young gentleman such a piece of my mind as led to his wearing a large sticking-plaster patch on his nose: which was split as neatly down the middle as you would split an orange at dessert. In a word, what man could do to repair my defeat, I did. There is but one thing now of which I am ashamed-of those killing epigrams which I wrote (mon Dieu! must I own it?- but even the fury of my anger proves the extent of my love!) against the Speck family. They were handed about in confidence at court, and made a frightful sensation : "Is it possible? "There happened at Schloss P-mp-rn-ckel, A strange mishap our sides to tickle, To see a SPECK upon the floor!" wounding her accepted lover across the nose I determined to carry my revenge still further, and to fall in love with somebody else. This person was Ottilia v. Schlippenschlopp. Otho Sigismund Freyherr von Schlippenschlopp, Knight Grand Cross of the Ducal Order of the TwoNecked Swan of Pumpernickel, of the Porc-et-Siflet of Kalbsbraten, Commander of the George and Blue-Boar of Dummerland, Excellency, and High Chancellor of the United Duchies, lived in the second floor of a house in the Schwapsgasse; where, with his private income and his revenues as Chancellor, amount “La Perfide Albion; or, a Caution to ing together to some 300l. per annum, Waltzers. "Come to the dance,' the Briton said, And forward D-r-th-a led, Fair, fresh, and three and twenty! Ah, girls, beware of Britons red! What wonder that it turned her head? SAT VERBUM SAPIENTI." "Reasons for not Marrying. "The lovely Miss S. Says Georgy the wit, I've a much better SPEC in my eye!'" This last epigram especially was voted so killing that it flew like wildfire; and I know for a fact that our Chargé-d'Affaires at Kalbsbraten sent a courier express with it to the Foreign Office in England, whence, through our amiable Foreign Secretary, Lord P-lm-rston, it made its way into every fashionable circle: nay, I have reason to believe caused a smile on the cheek of R-y-lty itself. Now that Time has taken away the sting of these epigrams, there can be no harm in giving them; and 'twas well enough then to endeavor to hide under the lash of wit the bitter pangs of humiliation: but my heart bleeds now to think that I should have ever brought a tear on the gentle cheek of Dorothea. Not content with this-with humiliating her by satire, and with he maintained such a state as very few other officers of the Grand-Ducal Crown could exhibit. The Baron is married to Maria Antoinetta, a Countess of the house of Kartoffelstadt, branches of which have taken root all over Germany. He has no sons, and but one daughter, the Fräulein OT TILIA. The Chancellor is a worthy old gentleman, too fat and wheezy to preside at the Privy Council, fond of his pipe, his ease, and his rubber. His lady is a very tall and pale Roman-nosed Countess, who looks as gentle as Mrs. Robert Roy, where, in the novel, she is for putting Baillie Nicol Jarvie into the lake, and who keeps the honest Chancellor in the greatest order. The Fräulein Ottilia had not arrived at Kalbsbraten when the little affair between me and Dorothea was going on; or rather had only just come in for the conclusion of it, being presented for the first time that year at the ball where I — where I met with my accident. At the time when the Countess was young, it was not the fashion in her country to educate the young ladies so highly as since they have been educated; and provided they could waltz, sew, and make puddings, they were thought to be decently bred; being seldom called upon for algebra or Sanscrit in the discharge of the honest duties of their lives. But When they met, Ottilia would bounce towards her soul's darling, and put her hands round her waist, and call her by a thousand affectionate names, and then talk of her as only ladies or authors can talk of one another. How tenderly she would hint at Dora's little imperfections of education! - how cleverly she would insinuate that the poor girl had no wit! and, thank God, no more she had. The fact is, that do what I will I see I'm in love with her still, and would be if she had fifty children; but my passion blinded me then, and every arrow that fiery Ottilia discharged I marked with savage joy. Dolly, thank heaven, didn't mind the wit much; she was too simple for that. But still the recurrence of it would leave in her heart a vague, indefinite feeling of pain, and somehow she began to understand that her empire was passing away, and that her dear friend hated her like poison; and so she married Klingenspohr. I have written myself almost into a reconciliation with the silly fellow; for the truth is, he has been a good, honest husband to her, and she has children, and makes puddings, and is happy. Before the latter arrived from Strasburg (where she had been under the care of her aunt the canoness, Countess Ottilia of Kartoffelstadt, to whom I here beg to offer my humblest respects), Dorothea had passed for a bel esprit in the little court circle, and her little simple stock of accomplishments had amused us all very well. She used to sing "Herz, mein Herz" and 66 T'en souviens-tu," in a decent manner (once, before heaven, I thought her singing better than Grisi's), and then she had a little album in which she drew flowers, and used to embroider slippers wonderfully, and was very merry at a game of loto or forfeits, and had a hundred small agrémens de société which rendered her an acceptable member of it. But when Ottilia arrived, poor Ottilia was pale and delicate. She Dolly's reputation was crushed in a wore her glistening black hair in month. The former wrote poems bands, and dressed in vapory white both in French and German; she muslin. She sang her own words to painted landscapes and portraits in her harp, and they commonly insinreal oil; and she twanged off a rat-uated that she was alone in the world, tling piece of Listz or Kalkbrenner - that she suffered some inexpressiin such a brilliant way, that Dora ble and mysterious heart-pangs, the scarcely dared to touch the instrument lot of all finer geniuses, - that though after her, or venture, after Ottilia had she lived and moved in the world, she trilled and gurgled through "Una was not of it, - that she was of a voce," or "Di piacer" (Rossina was consumptive tendency and might look in fashion then), to lift up her little for a premature interment. She even modest pipe in a ballad. What was had fixed on the spot where she the use of the poor thing going to sit should lie: the violets grew there, in the park, where so many of the she said, the river went moaning by; young officers used ever to gather the gray willow whispered sadly over round her? Whirr! Ottilia went by her head, and her heart pined to be galloping on a chestnut mare with a at rest. "Mother," she would say, groom after her, and presently all the turning to her parent, "promise me young fellows who could buy or hire promise me to lay me in that spot horseflesh were prancing in her train. I when the parting hour has come!" |