Part 3 (1/2)
After having squandered his inheritance, Leveling died in the most abject poverty; his daughter Marie, the d.u.c.h.ess' G.o.ddaughter, sells fish in the market. Such was the end of the wealthy popinjay. Mother and son followed the traditions of their family without having profited by the lessons of the past; one of the woman Leveling's relatives was, in fact, that Burgomaster Wulf Wulflam, reputed the richest man on that part of the coast,[17] whose wife was so fond of show and splendour that at her second marriage she sent for the prince's musicians from Stettin and walked from her house to the church on an English carpet.
For her own wear she only used the finest Riga flax. So much vainglory was punished by the G.o.d of Justice, who expels from His kingdom the proud and haughty. The only thing she had finally left of all her magnificence was a silver bowl with which she went begging from door to door. ”Charity,” she cried, ”for the poor rich woman.” One day she asked from one of her former servants a s.h.i.+ft and some linen for a collar to it. Moved with pity, the latter did not refuse. ”Madame,” she said, ”this linen was made of the flax you used for your own wear. I have carefully picked it up, cleaned and spun it.”[18]
The arrangement made by the Levelings with their creditors gave to my father the pa.s.sage of the Muhlen-Stra.s.se. Inasmuch as the premises were tumbling to pieces, masons, carpenters, stonecutters and plasterers were soon set to work and began by expelling the rats, mice and doubtful human creatures that had taken up their quarters there. The best tenement adjoining the city wall with a beautiful look-out on the moats and the open country was occupied by the concubine of Zabel Lorbeer. She was one of the three Maries, and had presented him with either seven or eight b.a.s.t.a.r.ds. My father, finding the door locked one morning, ordered the workmen to knock down the wall which fell on the bed where the scamp and the girl were sleeping; the only thing they could do was to get out of the way as quickly as possible. Lorbeer brought up his progeny according to the principles that guided him; and finally had his son beheaded to save him the disgrace of the gallows.
A short digression is necessary in connexion with the three Maries.[19]
They were sisters, exceedingly good-looking, but the poet's ”_Et quidem serva.s.set, si non formosa fuisset_,” essentially applied to them. Many traps are laid for beauty, and they one after another fell into them.
They lived on their charms, being particularly careful about their appearance and dress in order to attract admirers. Their attempts to obtain such notice were seconded by an unspeakable old crone, Anna Stranck, who had been a downright Messalina in her time, and of whom it was said that she could reckon on the whole of the city among her parentage, although she had neither husband nor children, but that she had had illicit intercourse with every male, young, old and middle-aged, fathers, sons and brothers. Anna Stranck invented for the use of the three Maries a kind of loose coif, the fas.h.i.+on of which our womenkind have religiously preserved; even those who have discarded it wearing a velvet hood based upon that model. They brought their hair, black or grey about two inches down on the forehead. Then came as many inches of gold lace or embroidery, so that the real cap, intended to keep the head warm did not in the least cover the brain. I am purposely quoting the name of Anna Stranck, for it is well to remind people to whom the headgear was due in the first instance; and may it please our dames to preserve it for ever in memory of the woman, mother, grandmother and great-grandmother of their husbands.
I now resume my personal narrative. During the rebuilding of this new property, I was fetching and carrying all the while. One day my father sent me to our own house for the luncheon for himself and for the carpenters. The workmen were just knocking down a chimney; they were working higher than the chimney on a gangway made of boards which at each extremity overlapped the stays. A great number of large nails were strewn about the scaffolding. I climbed up, with my arms full of provisions, but scarcely did I set my foot on the gangway than the gangway toppled over and I was flung into s.p.a.ce, the nails descending in a shower on my head. I just happened to fall by the side of the open chimney; half an ell more or less and I should have been through its aperture on the ground floor. As it was, the accident proved sufficiently serious. I had dislocated my right elbow and horribly bruised my arm. They took me home, whence my mother took me to Master Joachim Gelhaar. He was absent, and inasmuch as the case seemed urgent, they had recourse to the barber in the Old Market, who dressed the bruises without noticing that the bone was dislocated. Next morning Master Gelhaar came. A simple glance was sufficient for him; he grasped my arm, pulled and twisted it and put the bones back into their sockets. But the limb was bruised and swollen and twisted. I shall never forget the pain I suffered. In a little while, though, I was enabled to go about the house as usual with one arm in a sling, and the other available for our childish pastimes.
The old beams and rafters of the premises under repair were stacked at our place. One day, while perched on one of the piles, I struck out with a hammer in my left hand; one of the beams rolled down and my leg was caught between it and the other wood. The pain made me cry out l.u.s.tily, but it was impossible to disengage my leg. My mother was not strong enough for the task, and making sure that my leg was crushed, she shouted and fetched the navvies and the brewery workmen; they delivered me. When she was certain that no harm had come to me, my mother, still excited, treated me to a good drubbing. On New Year's Day, 1533, my father was elected dean of the Corporation of Drapers.[20]
CHAPTER III
Showing the Ingrat.i.tude, Foolishness and Wickedness of the People, and how, when once infected with a bad Spirit, it returns with Difficulty to Common-Sense--Smiterlow, Lorbeer and the Duke of Mecklenburg--Fall of the seditious Regime of the Forty-Eight
The ecclesiastical affairs of Stralsund had a.s.sumed more or less regular conditions; the Gospel was preached in all the churches without opposition either on the part of the princes or of the council.
Smiterlow had sanctioned the return of Rolof Moller. Nevertheless, peace was not maintained for long, Lubeck, Rostock, Stralsund and Wismar having revolted against their magistrates. In fact, at the death of King Frederick of Denmark, George Wullenweber,[21] burgomaster of Lubeck, having for his acolyte Marx Meyer, decided to declare war upon Duke Christian of Holstein.
According to Wullenweber, the conquest of Denmark was a certainty; and inasmuch as the magistrates of Lubeck, belonging to the old families, looked with apprehension on the enterprise, they were deposed and sixty burghers added to their successors.
Marx Meyer was a working blacksmith with a handsome face and figure.
Being a skilful farrier he had accompanied the cavalry in several campaigns, and his conduct both with regard to his comrades and the enemy had been such as to gain for him the highest grades. He was created a Knight in England and ama.s.sed a considerable fortune. His rise in the world filled him, however, with inordinate pride and vanity. Nothing in the way of sumptuous garments and golden ornaments seemed good enough to emphasize his knightly dignity. He had a crowd of retainers and a stable full of horses, for like the majority of folk of low birth, he knew of no bounds in his prosperity. Odd to relate, he was courted by people of good condition; women both young, rich and well-born fell in love with this, and it would appear that he gave them no cause to regret their infatuation. I have read a letter written to him by one of the foremost ladies of quality of Hamburg: ”My dear Marx, after having visited all the chapels, you might for once in a way come to the cathedral.” May his death be accounted as an instance of everlasting justice.
In June 1534 the councillors of the Wendish cities,[22] apprehending a disaster and being moreover exceedingly grieved at this struggle against the excellent Duke of Holstein, foregathered at Hamburg to consider the state of affairs. Wullenweber, however, presumptuous as was his wont, became more obstinate than ever and rejected with scorn most acceptable terms of peace. Hence, the Stralsund delegate, Burgomaster Nicholas Smiterlow, addressed the following prophetic words to him: ”I have been present at many negotiations, but never have I seen matters treated like this, Signor George. You will knock your head against the wall and you shall fall on your beam end.” After that apostrophe, Wullenweber, furious with anger, left the council-chamber, made straight for his inn, had his and Meyer's horses saddled and both took the way back to Lubeck, where immediately after his arrival Wullenweber summoned his undignified council and the aforementioned sixty burghers, who between them decree in the twinkling of an eye a levy of troops; dispatching meanwhile to the council of Stralsund a blatant sedition-monger, Johannes Holm, with verbal instructions and a missive couched substantially as follows: ”Wullenweber is zealously working to bring princ.i.p.alities and kingdoms under the authority of the cities, but the opposition of Burgomaster Smiterlow has driven him from the diet. In spite of this, the struggle is bound to continue, so it lays with you to act.”
Nothing more than that was wanted to stir the whole of the citizens against Smiterlow. The Forty-Eight came to tender their condolence to Burgomaster Lorbeer who was secretly jealous of his colleague.
Pretending to be greatly concerned, he exclaimed: ”This is too much, impossible to defend him any longer.” His hearers took it for granted that Smiterlow was left to their discretion, while, according to Lorbeer himself, the ambiguous words merely signified: ”Smiterlow has so many enemies that I can no longer come to his aid.”
At Smiterlow's return, the fire so skilfully fed by Lorbeer broke into flame. People hailed each other with the cry, ”Nicholas the Pacific is here.” The delegate had to deliver an account of his mission to the burghers summoned to that effect at six in the morning, at the Town Hall, with the city-gates closed and the cannon taken out of the a.r.s.enal and placed in position in the Old Markets The crowd poured into the streets, and at the Town Hall itself people were crus.h.i.+ng the life out of each other. When Nicholas Smiterlow came to his statement that he had opposed Wullenweber's warlike motions, there was a hurricane of cries, curses and insults; it sounded as if they had all gone stark mad at once. It was proposed to fling the speaker out of the window; an axe was flung at the Councillors' bench and in endeavouring to intercept the weapon the wors.h.i.+pful Master Ka.s.skow was severely wounded. One individual placed himself straight in front of the burgomaster. ”You sc.u.m of the earth,” he yelled; ”did you not unjustly fine me twenty florins? Now it is my turn.” ”What's your name?” asked Smiterlow.
”That's right,” he said on its being given; ”it was a piece of injustice, he ought to have had the gallows. I was sheriff at the time and the council instructed me to fine you twenty florins. My register of fines can show you that I did not keep them for myself, but spent them for the good of the city.” His interlocutor wished to hear no more and disappeared in the crowd.
It should also be noted that the beggars who generally hung about the burgomaster's dwelling were all the while vociferating under the windows of the Town Hall. ”Fling Nicholas the Pacific down to us,” they shouted; ”we'll cut him up and play ball with the pieces.” One of the Forty-Eight having asked, ”What do you think of it, my worthy burghers?” the rabble yelled, ”Yes, yes,” without the faintest idea of the nature of the question. Somebody thereupon observed, ”Why are you shouting 'Yes'? Are you willing to hand over the public chest?”
Thereupon there was an equally unanimous and stentorian ”No.”
Unquestionably the devil had occasion on that day to laugh at the people in his sleeve.
This martyring of the first burgomaster, an eminent, virtuous man, who had, moreover, attained a certain age, was prolonged till seven o'clock at night. Finally, he received the order not to leave his quarters.
Similar injunctions were inflicted on my father in his capacity of nephew by marriage to the burgomaster, and to Joachim Rantzow for having exclaimed, ”Gently, gently; at least give people a chance to explain themselves.”
The soldiers and sailors were enjoined at the sound of the drum to man the galleys, and a strict watch was kept. At night a strong squad encamped in front of Smiterlow's dwelling; the soldiers, among other pastimes, amused themselves with firing at the front door; the bullets pa.s.sed out at the other side of the pa.s.sage through a circular glazed aperture. There were many hours of anguish for the burgomaster, his wife and children, who expected at every moment to have their home invaded by the mob.
On the Monday of St. John they elected two burgomasters, namely, Joachim Prutze, the erewhile town clerk, an honest and sensible man, and Johannes Klocke, the actual town clerk and syndicus. Seven burghers were elected councillors; with the exception of Secretary Johannes Senckestack, who had had no hand in the thing, they were all honest, uninteresting folk, as simple-minded as they were upright and virtuous.
Johannes Tamme, for instance, a worthy and straightforward man, replied to the artizans and others who came to complain of the bad state of business: ”Make your mind easy; it will change now that seven capable people form part of the council.” Antique simplicity indeed. Nicholas Baremann boasted of earning ten marks each time he left his home. One day he went into the cellar to look at a barrel of salt-fish, he was accompanied by a servant who was not altogether right in his head. In those days men wore round their necks a very narrow collar of pleated tulle. While the master was bending over the fish, the servant with one blow of his hatchet clean cut his head off. Instead of taking flight he quietly went back to his work. When interrogated about the motive of his crime, he replied that his master presented his neck so gently as to make the operation merely child's play. In spite of his unquestionable mental state, the murderer was broken alive on the wheel.
My father was practically imprisoned for fifteen months in his own house, whence resulted an enormous loss to his own business, for in view of the coming herring-fair at Falsterbo, in the province of Schonen,[23] his cellar and hall were packed with Luneburg salt; there was also a considerable quant.i.ty of dried cod, besides a big a.s.sortment of cloth, and amidst all this he was forbidden to cross the threshold of his house and no one was allowed to come and see him. My mother was, moreover, pregnant at the time, and as the date of her confinement drew near my father asked for leave to take up his quarters with a neighbour until it was over. His pet.i.tion was refused, and at the critical moment he found himself compelled to get into the adjoining house by the roof.