CHAPTER VII.
OUR FRIEND KNOPF.
On the bright summer days people sail joyously up and down the river,everything sparkles and glitters in the sunlight, and is full ofgladness. Who there thinks how much sorrow, how much weariness,anguish, and care, dwell within the houses they pass by? Look yonder atthe high-perched village, that seems to rise so prettily out of theriver, and sends to us now the sound of bells; there goes a poorvillage schoolmaster, with depressed countenance, from the church tothe school-house. But to-day his face is lighted up, for a faithfulfriend stands in front of the schoolhouse, and extends to him his hand.
"Hey! you here, Herr Knopf?" cried the schoolmaster.
"The free Republic of the United States gives me a day's freedom. Yousee before you an independent man. Ah, dear Fassbender, I am speciallyborn to be a teacher of girls; I tell you that previous to the delugeof their first ball, girls are the choicest blossoms of our planet."
Knopf related to his fellow-teacher how happy he was to have for apupil a bright American girl, quick of apprehension; and his homelycountenance, as he spoke, assumed a wholly different expression.
Knopf had, in fact, an ugly face, it was so full of seams. His nose,mouth, brow, even his eyebrows, which projected somewhat over hislight-blue eyes whenever he wore no spectacles, as was now the case,all seemed kneaded out of dough. But now, as he spoke of his pupil, hiscountenance, was lighted up.
He made known that he had come hither, in order to give Roland'spresent instructor some hints concerning the character of his pupil,and the manner in which he could best be advanced. He had already beenwalking since before sunrise, and it was a refreshing walk. He felt nowthat it was not needful for him to go to the villa, he would make anappointment with the tutor to meet him here, and requested that a boymight carry a note from him to Captain Dournay.
The children came up one after another, and saluted Herr Knopf, whomthey already knew. A curly-headed boy was very happy to be the bearerof the note to Villa Eden, instead of being obliged to sit in school.
Knopf knew a beautiful spot back of the village, under a linden on thecrown of the hill, where there was a wide prospect on every side.Strolling thither, he laid himself down under the tree, and surveyedthe landscape with a joyful glance.
"In grass and flowers I love to lie, And hear afar the flute's sweet sigh,"
he said almost aloud to himself. And since in our steam-puffing timesthere is no flute to be heard, Knopf screwed his cane, which wasintended also for a flute, into the right shape, and played upon it thetune set by Conrad Kreuzer to Uhland's song. He was more pleased at thethought that others would hear this at a distance, than that he washearing it himself.
No boat went up or down the stream that he did not signalize it with awhite handkerchief. What matter if those on board were strangers? Hehas given them a sign that he on the height here is happy; they belowthere are to be happy too. The signal may tell them that.
Yes, Knopf deserves to be known more intimately.
The son of a poor schoolmaster, Knopf had gone through his universitycourse with great difficulty, and had passed his examination; but nowhe fell into great misfortune. On the very first day of his year ofprobation, the boys stamped and hissed, and the more he bade them bequiet, so much the more noisy were they; and the more enraged hebecame, so much the more insolent was their derision. The director cameto his assistance, but as soon as he went away from the schoolroom, thenoise and stamping began afresh. It was granted to Knopf to pass hisyear of probation in a distant city; but some invisible sprite musthave spread abroad his mishap, for very soon after he began teaching,the same thing happened here. And now he gave up entirely the office ofa public school teacher.
Knopf was abundantly liked at the capital as a teacher of girls.Inasmuch as he was so fabulously ugly, mothers could entrust theirhalf-grown daughters to his private instruction, without the leastanxiety lest they should fall in love with him. He was conscientiousand painstaking, but he did not succeed. He was liked in all thefamilies, but no one wished to employ him exclusively, or for anyconsiderable length of time; he was only a temporary teacher. No otherone had so many deceased scholars as he, for many were committed to hisinstruction only after they became ailing.
Knopf had been much at the watering-places, and when the parents couldnot go with their children to the baths, he was entrusted with thatservice; he was both tutor and attendant. He was also teacher for sometime in an asylum for idiots, and his conscience often reproved him,then and afterwards, for not remaining in that position; but heasserted that he was too much a devotee of the beautiful.
Yes, he wanted to explore what kind of humane institutions wereestablished among the Greeks and Romans. He found that they had veryfew children morally and physically diseased. Knopf had a plan, whichhe held on to for some time, of establishing an institution for thecare of sick children at some salt-spring; for iodine is the watch-wordof the cultivated, that is, the possessing world, whose humours areacrid: he hoped to find an associate for the sacred iodine. Meanwhilehe remained a make-shift teacher for girls.
Greek and Roman mythology was his strong point, and it is extremelyimportant that a maiden in cultivated society should make no mistake inthat. His favorite pursuit was, however, the interpretation of thepoets, especially the romantic. Of course, he was himself a poet, butmodestly, only to himself. There, were probably in the capital fewalbums, begun by very young girls and afterwards abandoned, which didnot contain a sonnet, or oftener a triolet, beautifully written by EmilKnopf for his dear pupil. He had also a musical knowledge sufficient todirect the private practising of pupils, and he was particularlystrict, yes, even unmerciful, in keeping time. He could also drawsufficiently well to give assistance in that respect, especially indrawing flowers. He was also handy and popular in wedding-games,whenever one of his pupils was married. He not only knew how to makethe maidens speak, in the language of flowers, as "I am the rose," "Iam the violet," but he could bring out jokes and sportive allusions;and while the players in their fine dresses were declaiming; andforming charming tableaux, he sat in the prompter's box, and breathedto them the words. How happy he was, too, at some public dinner, andhow assentingly he nodded, when this or the other speaker recited byheart, or read from a manuscript, the toast he had himself composed!
Emil Knopf was one of the most serviceable of men; he was proud ofnever having advertised in the newspapers; he was recommended frommouth to mouth, and for the most part from one fair mouth to another,one mother speaking in his commendation to another, and the fatherssmiling and saying, "Yes, Herr Knopf is a very conscientious teacher."
If he were in a house where smoking was disagreeable, he chewed roastedcoffee-berries, and he was just as contented with that. Knopf liked totake snuff, but he did it only when he was alone, and very quietly; hecarried a colored and a white pocket-handkerchief, so that thegentleman and the lady of the house might not notice that he tooksnuff. One very peculiar habit he could not break himself of, that ofhitching up the trousers on both legs, as if they were going suddenlyto drop down from his body.
But this is no sufficient reason for his appearing destined to be onlya temporary teacher, nothing but a pedagogical nurse for a few weeks.Knopf is taken into some family until the stress of sickness or need ofsome kind is over, and then he is dismissed with very courteous, veryfriendly words; but still always dismissed. Fourteen half-yearlyterms--Knopf always reckoned by the semester, and we must do the sameby him--Knopf lived at the capital; and, during this period, he alwaysintended to procure a wholesale quantity of a brand of cigars whichshould taste right, but he never made up his mind. Fourteen semestershe smoked, from week's end to week's end, different kinds of cigars ontrial, and was perpetually asking what was the price by the thousand,but he never succeeded in getting the thousand at one time.
Knopf was, naturally, one of the clumsiest of mortals, but he trainedhimself to
be one of the best swimmers and gymnastic performers, sothat he was, for a time, assistant teacher of gymnastics. Having beenemployed twice in the country, where it is so difficult to procurepiano-tuners, he had been led to learn how to tune pianos himself; buthe would never do it except in the house where he happened to betemporarily living. Several persons asserted that he could also knitand do plain sewing, but this was unmitigated slander. He could darnstockings in a most masterly style, but no one had ever seen him do it,he always did it secretly by himself.
Knopf had come to Herr Sonnenkamp likewise as a temporary candidate andtemporary teacher; here a longer tarrying seemed to be allotted to him,and a future free from anxiety. Knopf had an enthusiastic love forRoland, and although the boy learned nothing thoroughly with him, Knopfused to say to his crony, the teacher Fassbender,--
"The Gods never learned anything, they had it all in themselves. Whocan tell us the name of Apollo's teacher of music, or with whatchief-butler Ganymede served his apprenticeship? Fine natures have allin themselves, and do not require instruction. We are only crippleswith all our learning; we are tyrannized over by the four Faculties,but life is no four-sided figure."
This, then, is our friend Knopf; and he was called "our friend Knopf"in the best families of the land.
Knopf had just left off playing the flute, and was now sitting with hiswriting-tablets upon his knee, looking sometimes, round upon thelandscape, sometimes writing rapidly a few words; then he would put hispencil in his mouth, and seemed ruminating for some new turn ofexpression. One could see the road for a great distance, leading fromthe village, by the villa, to the neighboring hamlet. Now Knopf saw aman on horseback coming towards him. He transformed speedily his fluteinto a walking-stick again, concealed his tablets, and then hastenedacross the vineyard down to the highway.
"Yes, he who sits a horse so well, he is just the right teacher forhim," said Knopf. He took off his hat; while still at a distance, therider nodded to him.