Part 5

She meant to leave the girl sitting at her work in the adjoining room; then she thought better of it. Werther was walking up and down the room; she went to the piano and began a minuet, but it would not flow. She composed herself and sat down calmly beside Werther, who had taken his usual place on the sofa.

"Have you nothing to read?" said she. -- He had nothing. -- "In there, in my drawer," she began, "lies your translation of some of Ossian's songs; I have not yet read them, for I always hoped to hear them from you; but of late it has not come about, would not be managed." -- He smiled, fetched the poems, a shudder came over him as he took them in his hands, and his eyes filled with tears as he looked into them. He sat down and read.

"Star of the dimming night, beautiful you sparkle in the west, you have put forth your radiant head from your cloud, you walk in stately wise down your hill. Why do you gaze upon the heath? The stormy winds have lulled; from afar comes the murmur of the torrent; roaring waves play at the distant rock; the humming of evening flies swarms over the field. Why do you look, fair light? But you smile and go, the waves joyfully surround you and bathe your lovely hair. Farewell, calm beam. Appear, you glorious light of Ossian's soul!

And it appears in its might. I see my parted friends, they gather on Lora, as in the days that are past. -- Fingal comes like a moist pillar of mist; around him are his heroes, and, behold! the bards of song: gray Ullin! stately Ryno! Alpin, lovely singer! and you, softly lamenting Minona! -- How changed are you, my friends, since the festive days on Selma, when we vied for the honor of song, like spring breezes alternately bending the faintly whispering grass upon the hill.

Then Minona stepped forth in her beauty, with downcast look and eye full of tears, heavily her hair flowed in the unsteady wind that blew from the hill. -- Gloomy grew the soul of the heroes, as she raised her lovely voice; for often had they seen the grave of Salgar, often the dark dwelling of white Colma. Colma, left alone upon the hill, with the harmonious voice; Salgar had promised to come; but night closed all around. Hear Colma's voice, as she sat alone upon the hill.

Colma. It is night! -- I am alone, lost upon the stormy hill. The wind whistles in the mountains. The stream howls down the rock. No hut shields me from the rain, me, the forsaken one, upon the stormy hill. Step forth, O moon, from your clouds, appear, stars of the night! Lead me by some beam to the place where my love rests from the toils of the hunt, his bow unstrung beside him, his dogs snuffing about him! But here must I sit alone upon the rock of the tangled stream. The stream and the storm whistle, I hear not the voice of my beloved.

Why lingers my Salgar? Has he forgotten his word? -- There is the rock and the tree and here the roaring stream! At nightfall you promised to be here; alas! where has my Salgar gone astray? With you would I flee, forsaking father and brother, the proud ones! Long have our races been foes, but we are no foes, O Salgar!

Be silent a while, O wind! Still a little while, O stream, that my voice may sound through the vale, that my wanderer may hear me. Salgar! It is I who call! Here is the tree and the rock! Salgar! My dear! Here am I; why do you linger to come?

See, the moon appears, the flood glitters in the valley, the rocks stand gray up the hill; but I see him not on the height, his dogs before him announce not his coming. Here must I sit alone.

But who are they, that lie yonder on the heath? -- My beloved? My brother? -- Speak, O my friends! They answer not. How anguished is my soul! -- Alas, they are dead! Their sister red from the fight! O my brother, my brother, why did you slay my Salgar? O my Salgar, why did you slay my brother? You were both so dear to me! O you were fair upon the hill among thousands! It was terrible in the battle. Answer me! Hear my voice, my beloveds! But alas, they are mute, mute forever! Cold as the earth is their breast!

O from the rock of the hill, from the summit of the stormy mountain, speak, spirits of the dead! Speak! I shall not be afraid! -- Whither have you gone to rest? In what grave of the mountains shall I find you? -- No faint voice do I hear in the wind, no wafted answer in the storm of the hill. I sit in my sorrow, I await the morning in my tears. Dig the grave, you friends of the dead, but close it not, till I come. My life vanishes like a dream; how should I remain behind! Here will I {...} of the rock -- when night falls on the hill, and wind comes over the heath, my spirit shall stand in the wind and mourn the death of my friends. The hunter shall hear me from his bower, shall fear my voice and love it; for sweet shall my voice be for my friends, they were both so dear to me!

That was your song, O Minona, Torman's softly blushing daughter. Our tears flowed for Colma, and our soul grew gloomy.

Ullin stepped forth with the harp and gave us Alpin's song -- Alpin's voice was friendly, Ryno's soul a spark of fire. But already they rested in the narrow house, and their voice had faded in Selma. Once Ullin returned from the hunt, ere yet the heroes had fallen. He heard their contest of song upon the hill. Their song was soft, but sad. They lamented the fall of Morar, the chief of heroes. His soul was like Fingal's soul, his sword like the sword of Oscar -- but he fell, and his father mourned, and his sister's eyes were full of tears, Minona's eyes were full of tears, the sister of glorious Morar. She drew back before Ullin's song, like the moon in the west, that foresees the storm-rain and hides her fair head in a cloud. -- I struck the harp with Ullin to the song of woe.

Ryno

Past are wind and rain, the noon is so clear, the clouds divide. Fleeing, the inconstant sun shines on the hill. Reddish flows the stream of the mountain down the vale. Sweet is your murmur, stream; yet sweeter the voice that I hear. It is Alpin's voice, he bewails the dead. His head is bowed with age and red his tearful eye. Alpin, excellent singer, why alone upon the silent hill? Why do you lament like a gust in the wood, like a wave on the distant shore?

Alpin

My tears, Ryno, are for the dead, my voice for the dwellers of the grave. Slender are you upon the hill, fair among the sons of the heath. But you shall fall like Morar, and upon your grave shall sit the mourner. The hills shall forget you, your bow shall lie unstrung in the hall.

You were swift, O Morar, like a roe upon the hill, terrible like the night-fires in the sky. Your wrath was a storm, your sword in battle like lightning over the heath. Your voice was like the forest-stream after rain, the thunder on distant hills. Many fell by your arm, the flame of your wrath consumed them. But when you returned from war, how peaceful was your brow! Your countenance was like the sun after the thunderstorm, like the moon in the silent night, calm your breast like the lake when the roaring of the wind has lulled.

Narrow is now your dwelling, dark your place! With three steps I measure your grave, O you who once were so great! Four stones with mossy heads are your only memorial; a leafless tree, long grass that whispers in the wind, points out to the hunter's eye the grave of mighty Morar. No mother have you to weep for you, no maiden with tears of love. Dead is she who bore you, fallen the daughter of Morglan.

Who is he on his staff? Who is it, whose head is white with age, whose eyes are red with tears? It is your father, O Morar, the father of no son but you. He heard of your fame in battle, he heard of scattered foes; he heard of Morar's glory! Alas! Nothing of his wound? Weep, father of Morar, weep! But your son hears you not. Deep is the sleep of the dead, low their pillow of dust. Never he heeds the voice, never wakes at your call. O when shall it be morning in the grave, to bid the slumberer: Awake!

Farewell, noblest of men, you conqueror in the field! But never shall the field see you, never the gloomy wood gleam with the brightness of your steel. You left no son, but song shall preserve your name, future times shall hear of you, hear of fallen Morar.

Loud was the sorrow of the heroes, loudest Armin's bursting sigh. It reminded him of the death of his son, who fell in the days of youth. Carmor sat near the hero, the prince of echoing Galmal. "Why does Armin's sigh sob?" said he, "what is there to weep here? Sounds not a lay and a song to melt and delight the soul? They are like soft mist that rising from the lake sprinkles the vale, and the blooming flowers are filled with the moisture; but the sun returns in its might, and the mist is gone. Why are you so full of woe, Armin, ruler of sea-girt Gorma?"

"Full of woe! Well that I am, and not small the cause of my pain. -- Carmor, you lost no son, lost no blooming daughter; Colgar the brave lives, and Annira the fairest of maidens. The branches of your house bloom, O Carmor; but Armin is the last of his race. Dark is your bed, O Daura! Dull is your sleep in the grave -- when will you wake with your songs, with your melodious voice? Up, you winds of autumn! Up, storm over the gloomy heath! Forest-streams, roar! Howl, streams, in the tops of the oaks! Wander through broken clouds, O moon, show changing your pale face! Remind me of the dreadful night, when my children perished, when Arindal the mighty fell, Daura the beloved passed away.

"Daura, my daughter, you were fair, fair as the moon on the hills of Fura, white as the fallen snow, sweet as the breathing air! Arindal, your bow was strong, your spear swift in the field, your glance like mist on the wave, your shield a fire-cloud in the storm!

"Armar, famed in war, came and wooed Daura's love; she resisted not long. Fair were the hopes of their friends."

Erath, son of Odgal, bore a grudge, for his brother lay slain by Armar. He came, disguised as a boatman. Fair was his skiff on the wave, white his locks with age, calm his earnest face. "Fairest maiden," said he, "lovely daughter of Armin, there at the rock, not far in the sea, where the red fruit glistens from the tree, there waits Armar for Daura: I come to lead his love across the rolling sea."

She followed him and called for Armar; nothing answered but the voice of the rock. "Armar! My dear! My dear! Why do you distress me so? Hear, son of Arnarth! Hear! It is Daura who calls you!"

Erath the traitor fled laughing to the land. She raised her voice, called to her father and brother: "Arindal! Armin! Is there none to save his Daura?"

Her voice came over the sea. Arindal my son descended from the hill, rough with the spoils of the hunt, his arrows rattled at his side, his bow he carried in his hand, five dark-gray hounds were about him. He saw bold Erath on the shore, seized and bound him to the oak, fast he wound him about the waist, the fettered one filled the winds with groaning.

Arindal steps upon the waves in his boat, to bring Daura across. Armar came in his wrath, drew the gray-feathered arrow, it sang, it sank into your heart, "O Arindal, my son! Instead of Erath the traitor, you came to perish, the boat reached the rock, he sank thereon and died. At your feet flowed your brother's blood, what was your anguish, O Daura! The waves dash the boat to pieces. Armar plunges into the sea, to save or die with his Daura. Swiftly a gust from the hill stormed into the waves, he sank and rose no more.

Alone on the sea-washed rock I heard the lament of my daughter. Great and loud was her crying, yet could her father not save her. The whole night I stood on the shore, I saw her in the faint beam of the moon, the whole night I heard her crying, loud was the wind, and the rain beat sharp on the mountain side. Her voice grew weak ere morning appeared, she died away like the evening air among the grass of the rocks. Laden with sorrow she died and left Armin alone! Gone is my strength in war, fallen my pride among maidens.

When the storms of the mountain come, when the north lifts the waves high, I sit on the sounding shore, gaze at the dreadful rock. Often in the sinking moon I see the spirits of my children, half-dusk they wander together in mournful concord."

A stream of tears, that broke from Lotte's eyes and gave air to her oppressed heart, checked Werther's singing. He threw down the paper, seized her hand and wept the bitterest tears. Lotte rested on the other and hid her eyes in her handkerchief. The emotion of both was terrible. They felt their own misery in the fate of the noble ones, felt it together, and their tears united. Werther's lips and eyes glowed upon Lotte's arm; a shudder came over her; she would have drawn away, and pain and sympathy lay benumbing like lead upon her. She breathed to recover, and begged him, sobbing, to continue, begged with the whole voice of heaven! Werther trembled, his heart would burst, he lifted the sheet and read, half broken:

"Why do you wake me, spring breeze? You woo and say: I bedew with drops of heaven! But the time of my fading is near, near the storm that shall strew my leaves to the ground! Tomorrow shall the wanderer come, come who saw me in my beauty, all around his eye shall seek me in the field and shall not find me. --"

The full force of these words fell upon the unhappy one.

He threw himself before Lotte in utter despair, seized her hands, pressed them to his eyes, against his brow, and it seemed to her that a presentiment of his dreadful purpose flew through her soul. Her senses were confused, she pressed his hands, pressed them against her breast, bent toward him with a melancholy movement, and their glowing cheeks touched. The world vanished for them. He wound his arms about her, pressed her to his breast and covered her trembling, stammering lips with furious kisses. -- "Werther!" she cried with stifled voice, turning away, "Werther!" and pressed with weak hand his breast from hers; "Werther!" she cried with the composed tone of the noblest feeling. -- He resisted not, let her free herself from his arms and threw himself senseless before her. -- She tore herself away, and in anxious confusion, trembling between love and anger, said: "This is the last time! Werther! You shall not see me again." And with the fullest glance of love upon the wretched one she hastened into the adjoining room and locked the door behind her. -- Werther stretched his arms after her, dared not hold her. He lay upon the ground, his head on the sofa, and in this posture he remained for over half an hour, until a noise called him to himself. It was the girl, who meant to set the table. He walked up and down the room, and when he found himself alone again, he went to the door of the cabinet and called with low voice: "Lotte! Lotte! Only one more word! A farewell!" -- She was silent. -- He waited and entreated and waited; then he tore himself away and cried: "Farewell, Lotte! Forever farewell!"

He came to the town gate. The watchmen, who were already used to him, let him out in silence. It drizzled between rain and snow, and not until near eleven did he knock again. His servant observed, when Werther came home, that his master lacked his hat. He dared not say anything, undressed him, all was wet. Afterwards the hat was found on a rock that looks down from the slope of the hill into the vale, and it is incomprehensible how he climbed it on a dark, damp night, without falling.

He lay down in bed and slept long. The servant found him writing, when next morning he brought him the coffee at his call. He wrote the following to the letter to Lotte:

"For the last time then, for the last time I open these eyes. They shall, alas, see the sun no more, a dull, misty day keeps it covered. Mourn then, Nature! Your son, your friend, your beloved approaches his end. Lotte, this is a feeling without equal, and yet it comes nearest to the dimming dream, to say to oneself: this is the last morning. The last! Lotte, I have no sense for the word: the last! Do I not stand here in my full strength, and tomorrow I lie outstretched and limp upon the ground. To die! What does that mean? See, we dream when we speak of death. I have seen many die; but so limited is mankind, that it has no sense for the beginning and end of its existence. Now still mine, yours! Yours, O beloved! And in one moment -- parted, severed -- perhaps forever? -- No, Lotte, no -- how can I perish? How can you perish? We are! -- perish! -- what does that mean? That is again a word, an empty sound, without feeling for my heart. -- Dead, Lotte! Interred in the cold earth, so narrow! So dark! -- I had a friend, who was my all in my helpless youth; she died, and I followed her corpse and stood at the grave, as they let down the coffin and the ropes whirred under it and snapped up again, then the first shovelful rattled down, and the anxious chest gave a hollow sound, and hollower and ever hollower, and at last was covered! -- I threw myself beside the grave -- seized, shaken, anguished, my innermost torn, but I knew not what befell me -- how it will befall me -- to die! Grave! I understand not the words!

O forgive me! Forgive me! Yesterday! It should have been the last moment of my life. O you angel! For the first time, for the first time quite without doubt through my inmost being glowed the blissful feeling: she loves me! She loves me! Still upon my lips burns the holy fire that streamed from yours, new, warm bliss is in my heart. Forgive me! Forgive me!

Alas, I knew you loved me, knew it from the first soulful glances, from the first hand-clasp, and yet, when I was away again, when I saw Albert at your side, I despaired again in feverish doubts.

Do you remember the flowers you sent me, when in that fatal company you could say no word to me, give no hand? O, I knelt half the night before them, and they sealed your love to me. But alas! These impressions passed, like the feeling of a believer's grace gradually withdraws again from his soul, which was offered him in holy, visible signs with full heavenly fullness.

All this is perishable, but no eternity shall extinguish the glowing life that I tasted yesterday upon your lips, that I feel within me! She loves me! This arm has embraced her, these lips have trembled upon hers, this mouth has stammered on hers. She is mine! You are mine! Yes, Lotte, forever.

And what is it, that Albert is your husband? Husband! That were then for this world -- and for this world sin, that I love you, that I would tear you from his arms into mine? Sin? Well, and I punish myself for it; I have tasted it in its full heavenly bliss, this sin, have drawn life-balm and strength into my heart. You are from this moment mine! Mine, O Lotte! I go before! I go to my father, to your father. To him will I complain, and he will comfort me, until you come, and I fly to meet you and clasp you and remain with you before the face of the Infinite in eternal embraces.

I dream not, I fancy not! Near the grave it grows clear to me. We shall be! We shall see each other again! Your mother see! I shall see her, shall find her, alas, and before her pour out my whole heart! Your mother, your very image."

Toward eleven Werther asked his servant whether Albert had perhaps returned. The servant said: yes, he had seen his horse led thither. Thereupon the master gave him an open note of this content: "Would you lend me your pistols for a journey I am about to make? Fare you very well!"

The dear lady had slept little the last night; what she had feared was decided, decided in a way she could neither suspect nor dread. Her otherwise so pure and freely flowing blood was in feverish revolt, a thousand feelings disordered her fair heart. Was it the fire of Werther's embraces that she felt in her bosom? Was it displeasure at his boldness? Was it a sullen comparison of her present state with those days of wholly unconstrained, free innocence and careless self-confidence? How should she go to meet her husband, how confess to him a scene that she might well acknowledge, and yet dared not acknowledge to herself? They had long been silent toward each other, and should she be the first to break the silence and just at the wrong time make her husband so unexpected a discovery? Already she feared that the mere news of Werther's visit would make an unpleasant impression on him, and now especially this unexpected catastrophe! Could she well hope that her husband would see it in the right light, receive it quite without prejudice? And could she wish that he might read in her soul? And yet again, could she dissemble toward the man before whom she had always stood like a crystal-clear glass, open and free, and to whom she had never concealed nor could conceal any of her feelings? The one and the other gave her care and embarrassed her; and ever her thoughts returned to Werther, who was lost to her, whom she could not let go, whom she -- alas! -- must leave to himself, and to whom, if he had lost her, nothing remained.

How heavily lay upon her now what she could not clearly make out in that moment, the stagnation that had established itself between them! Such sensible, such good people began, because of certain secret differences, to fall silent toward one another, each pondered his own right and the other's wrong, and the circumstances entangled and embittered themselves to such a degree that it became impossible to untie the knot precisely in the critical moment on which everything depended. Had a happy confidence brought them nearer to each other again earlier, had love and forbearance become alive between them by turns and opened their hearts, perhaps our friend might yet have been saved.

One more strange circumstance came in addition. Werther had, as we know from his letters, never made a secret of his longing to leave this world. Albert had often disputed it with him, and between Lotte and her husband the matter had sometimes been spoken of. The latter, as he felt a decided aversion to the deed, had also very often, with a kind of sensitiveness quite otherwise foreign to his character, given to understand that he had cause to doubt greatly the seriousness of such a resolution, and had even allowed himself some jest thereon and communicated his unbelief to Lotte. This indeed reassured her on one side, when her thoughts presented the sad picture to her, but on the other side she also felt herself thereby hindered from confiding to her husband the anxieties that tormented her in that moment.

“Stories of the world, in your language.”