Part 2 (1/2)

CHAPTER II

My Student's Days at Greifswald--Victor Bole and his tragical End--A Servant possessed by the Devil--My Brother Johannes' Preceptors and Mine--My Father's never-ending Law Suits

Having acquired the certainty that the Hartmanns would never consent to my father's return to Greifswald, my parents, like the conscientious married couple they were, desired to bear in common the domestic burdens. In the spring of 1528 my mother, after having let her dwelling at Greifswald, joined her husband at Stralsund, where he had the freeman's right and a tumble-down old house. My maternal grandfather, Christian Schwarz, at that time city treasurer, kept me with him in order to let me pursue my studies. I underwent the ceremonial of installation, a kind of burlesque function of initiation applied to novices. My tutor was George Normann, of the island of Rugen, who terminated his career in the service of the King of Sweden. I was the reverse of a studious boy and fonder of roving about with my relative in his journeys about Greifswald than of books. As a consequence my mental progress was in proportion to my efforts.

There was at Greifswald a burgomaster named Victor Bole, belonging to a notable family of the island of Rugen. Before he attained his civic honours he was a good evangelical and a zealous friend of the preachers, but his apostasy was thorough. As much as he had supported the ministry before his election, as much did he oppose them afterwards. I remember seeing him at the meetings of the corporation seated in the front place in virtue of his dual quality of eldest member and burgomaster, more or less in liquor, browbeating and talking everybody down (in High-German always). As he had taken part in several expeditions, fighting was the invariable theme of his discourses. He generally summoned the musicians, cymbal players and pipers before him.

”Dost thou know a war cry?” he asked of a piper. ”Yes, certainly,” was the reply, while shrill notes rent the air. But the burgomaster was beaming. ”This, at any rate, is a useful kind of fellow; while that Knipstro of Stralsund stammers in the pulpit about _pap_, _pap_, _pap_, I am sure he could play a war cry. Then what's the good of him?”

”Those who laugh last laugh loudest,” says the proverb. That same year, 1528, the King of the May was Bertrand Smiterlow. I walked in front of him carrying his crown. Bole did Smiterlow the honour to prance by his side, being very pleased to parade his servants and his horses, of the latter of which he had four in his stable. If the skies had shown a little bit more clement we should have been very happy. But though it was the 1st May, there was not a bud nor a blade of gra.s.s to be seen.

On the contrary, the snow powdered our procession with large flakes, both on coming and on going. As a consequence everybody was in a hurry to get back again. Odd to relate, the seed did not seem to suffer.

After they had presented the crown to the May King in the city, everybody galloped back to his own roof tree. When the burgomaster reached his house he was taken with such violent colic that he had scarcely time to hand his horse to his servant before he dropped down dead. His neck was entirely twisted round, and his face was black. As a matter of course, people ascribed it to a visitation of G.o.d for having made fun of those who preached His Word.

In 1528 the States were called together at Stettin to ratify the pact of succession between the Elector of Brandenburg and the Dukes of Pomerania. The deputy of Greifswald, Burgomaster Gaspard Bunsaw, my mother's first cousin, took me with him as page, or rather as companion, and also to enable me to see something new. Our host had a magnificent garden; on the banks of a vast lake uprose a vast tower with an inside staircase, closed by a trap. One day that the company was amusing itself in watching the carps from that tower, I hauled myself up to the window out of curiosity, but I forgot the yawning trap door behind me, and was flung right to the bottom. It was a miracle that I did not break my neck, or, at any rate, my arms and my legs.

Heaven preserved me by means of its angels, who frustrate the tricks of the Evil One.

At the age of five, Nicholas, the eldest son of Bertrand Smiterlow, was already much taller and stronger than I; this incarnate fiend worried all the children of the neighbourhood, and instead of reprimanding him, his father took no notice of the complaints against him. This indulgence bore such excellent fruit that in order to prevent disputes and perhaps personal violence between young Nicholas' father and the neighbours, Christian Schwarz considered it advisable to take Nicholas to live with him, and so we shared the same bed. One morning as we were dressing on the big locker at the foot of the bed, the youngster, without saying a word and out of sheer mischief, hit me right in the chest and made me tumble backward, a downright dangerous fall. The grandfather gave a dinner-party to his children and other people. Late in the evening the servants came with links to take their masters home.

While they were waiting for that purpose, Nicholas began to play them tricks, which they endured from fear of the grandfather. Rendered bold by impunity, Nicholas struck some of the servants on the lips, but one of these retorted by a box on the ears which sent Nicholas whining to his grandfather. After the banquet the lanterns were lighted, and everybody was preparing to get home quietly when Bertrand Smiterlow, drawing his knife, rushed at the offending servant, who was lighting his master on his way, and wounded him seriously in the shoulder. On account of all this Christian Schwarz preferred to send me back to Stralsund to leaving me to enjoy the risky society of Nicholas. The boy grew up and his faults with him, for they amused his father, who encouraged them while n.o.body dared to say a word in protest. Nicholas had reached the age of twenty-seven when travelling to Rostock, he stopped for the night at Roevers.h.a.gen. Some travellers, knowing his quarrelsome character, preferred to take themselves and their conveyance to the inn opposite. One of these had a sporting dog, which, running about, found its way into the hostel where Smiterlow was staying. The latter tied up the animal, did not send it back, and next morning the rightful owner saw it being taken away on a leash.

Naturally, the man claimed his dog. Smiterlow, instead of giving him a civil answer, takes aim at him; the other, more prompt, quickly fires a bullet into the thigh. Smiterlow, in his wounded condition, got as far as Rostock, had his wound attended to; nevertheless died a few days later in consequence. The merchant continued his route without troubling himself, and no one lodged a complaint. Bertrand Smiterlow contracted the itch in the back; father and son, therefore, had their just reward. Heaven preserve me from criticizing the descendants of Herr Smiterlow, to whom I am doubly related, but I trust that mine will bring up their children in a more severe discipline and in the respect of their fellow-men.

In 1529 the English pest which had already been spoken of during the previous year, carried away many people at Stralsund. My mother had two attacks, from both of which she fortunately recovered. Being _enceinte_ with my brother Christian, she ordered, like the good housewife she was, a general cleaning before her confinement. It so happened that we had a servant-girl who was possessed. n.o.body had the faintest suspicion of this. When, at the moment of cleaning the kitchener and cooking utensils, she began noisily to fling about saucepans, frying-pans, etc., crying at the top of her voice, ”I want to get out, I want to get out.” Her mother, who lived in the Zinngiesser Stra.s.se (Pewterers'

Street), had to take her back. The poor girl was taken several times in a sleigh to St. Nicholas's, and they exorcised her after the sermon.

Her case, as far as the answers tended to show, was as follows: The mother had brought new cheese at the market. In her absence, the daughter had opened the cupboard and made a large breach in the cheese; the mother, on her return, had expressed the wish that the devil might take the perpetrator of this thing, and from that moment dated the ”possession.” The girl had, nevertheless, been to Communion since; how, then, could the Evil One have kept his position? The priest, interrogated on that point, had answered: ”The scoundrel, who has hidden himself under a bridge, lets the honest man pa.s.s over his head”; in other words, during the sacramental act, the Evil One hid himself under the girl's tongue. The Evil One was excommunicated and exorcised by the faithful on their bended knees. The formula of exorcism was received with derision. When the priest summoned him to go, he exclaimed: ”I am agreeable, but you do not expect me to go with empty hands. I want this, and that, and the other.” If they refused him one thing he asked for something quite different; and inasmuch as one of the faithful had remained ”covered” during prayers, the Evil One politely s.n.a.t.c.hed up his hat, and if G.o.d had let him have his own way, hair and skin would have accompanied the headgear.

At about the same period I witnessed an a.n.a.logous fact. Frau Kron, an honest and pious matron, was possessed by a demon; the minister was preparing to drive it out at all costs when Frau Wolff entered. She was a young woman who surpa.s.sed her sisters in the art of beautifying her face, arranging her cap, and posing before the looking gla.s.s. When the evil spirit caught sight of her, he shouted. ”Ah, you are here, are you? Just wait a bit till I arrange your cap before the mirror. Your ears shall tingle, I can tell you.”

To come back to our own servant. When the power of mischief noticed that the time for tormenting her had pa.s.sed away, and that the Lord was granting the prayers of the faithful, the Evil One asked in a mocking tone a pane of the belfry's window, which request was no sooner accorded to him than the pane s.h.i.+vered into ever so many splinters. The girl, however, ceased to be possessed; she married in the village, and had several children.

My brother Johannes had for his first tutor Herr Aepinus, before the latter had his doctor's degree,[14] and afterwards Hermannus Bonus,[15]

who would have been pleased to settle at Stralsund with fifty florins per annum, but the council of that particular period did not contain one member who had had a university training. Like the princes the council inclined towards papism, and looked askance at men of letters; hence, it rejected Bonnus' overtures. The latter soon afterwards became the tutor of the young King of Denmark, for whose use he composed his _Praecepta Grammaticae_, which was much more easy than the Donat Grammar, and prevails to the present day under the t.i.tle of the _Grammatica Bonni_. At his return from Denmark, Bonnus was appointed superintendent at Lubeck, where he is interred _honorifice_ behind the choir.

When my brother left the school at Lubeck, my parents made many heavy sacrifices to keep him at Wittemberg for several years, where, notwithstanding some _delicta juventutis_, he studied with advantage.

My tutor's name was Matthias Bra.s.sa.n.u.s. At the outset of his career he had been a monk at the monastery of Camp, but at the suppression of the inst.i.tution he had lived at Wittemberg at the cost of the prince, like Leonard Meisisch, the future court preacher and minister at Wolgast, and afterwards pastor at Altenkirchen--a downright Epicurean pig!

Bra.s.sa.n.u.s, on the other hand, was a small, polite, temperate, well-bred, evenly balanced man. After his stay at Wittemberg he became the preceptor of George and Johannes Smiterlow, and afterwards _rector scholae_. Their wors.h.i.+ps of Lubeck having prevailed upon the council of Stralsund to part with this able teacher, Bra.s.sa.n.u.s devoted the whole of his life successfully directing the school of Lubeck.

I profited as much by the lessons as my natural restlessness of character permitted. There was a great deal of apt.i.tude, but the application failed. In the winter time I ran amusing myself on the floating ice with my fellow-scholars of my own age. Johannes Gottschalk, our ringleader, always got scot-free, thanks to his long legs, while the rest of the gang (and I was invariably with them) took many enforced footbaths in order to get safely to the banks. My father, in crossing the bridge had occasion more than once to witness the prowess of his son, who received many a sound drubbing when he came to dry himself before the stove, for my father was a choleric gentleman.

In summer I was in the habit of bathing with my chums behind Lorbeer's grange, which at present is my property. Burgomaster Smiterlow, having noticed me from his garden, told of me, and one day, while I was still asleep, my father planted himself in front of my bed, flouris.h.i.+ng a big stick. He spoke very loudly while placing himself into position, and I was obliged to open my eyes. The sight of the club told me that my hour had come; I burst into tears and pleaded for mercy. ”Very well, my good sir,” said my father; when he called me ”my good sir” it was a bad sign. ”Very well, my good sir, you have been bathing; now allow me to rub you down.” Saying which, he got hold of his weapon, pulled my s.h.i.+rt over my head, and did frightful execution.

My parents brought us up carefully. My father was somewhat hasty, and now and again his anger carried him beyond all bounds. I put him out of temper one day when he was in the stable and I at the door. He caught up a pitchfork and flung it at me. I had just time to get out of the way; the pitchfork stuck into a bath made of oak, and they had much trouble to get it out. In that way the Evil One was frustrated in all his designs against me by Providence. In a similar case, my mother, who was gentleness and tenderness itself, came running to the spot. ”Strike harder,” she said, ”the wicked boy deserves all he gets.” At the same time she slyly held back the arm of her husband, preventing the stick from coming down too heavily. Oh, my children, pray that the knowledge may be vouchsafed to you of bringing up your family in the way they should go. Correct them temperately, without compromising either their health or their intelligence, but at the same time do not imitate the apes who from excess of tenderness, smother their young.

Rector Bra.s.sa.n.u.s insisted upon his pupils being present when he preached. Some were clever enough to get away on the sly; they went to buy pepper cakes, and repaired afterwards to the dram shop. The trick was done before there was time to look round. When the sermon drew to its close, every one was in his place again, and we went back to school as if nothing had happened. One day, however, we drank so much brandy that I felt horribly sick and vomited violently, and found it impossible either to keep on my legs or to articulate a syllable. The strongest of my schoolfellows took me home. My parents were under the impression that I was seriously ill; had they suspected the real cause of my malady, their treatment would have been less tender. When, at last, I avowed the truth, the fear of punishment had long ago vanished.

The adventure was productive of some good. It inspired me with a thorough disgust for brandy, so that I could not even bear the smell of it.

My daily playmate was George Smiterlow, for we were neighbours, nearly relatives, and of about the same age, I being but a year older than he.

One day he cut me with his knife between the index and the thumb, and I still bear the scar.