Seed-time and Harvest Part 74

"You look at the cards, yourself!" cried a voice behind him,--he looked round, right into Brasig's face, but was not disconcerted, and went on: "For he can buy his indigo cheaper of me than even at Rostock. But, fellow-citizens, about poverty--if it goes on like this, we shall all become poor."

"He is right there, gossip," said shoemaker Deichert to Johann Bank.

"Fellow-citizens, I purchased myself an express wagon and a horse, to send home my goods, and also to make a little profit."

"We common people don't care about your little profits!" interrupted Fritz Siebert, the carrier.

"But," Kurz went on, "what happened? They laid an attachment on my wagon, last year, at Teterow----"

"Because you had not paid the tax," again interrupted Fritz Siebert.

Kurz did not mind such little interruptions as these, for he had been turned out once, and he was a persevering character, so he went on: "Our Herr Burgomeister sent for me, and asked me what sort of a wagon I sent my goods home in. 'In my own wagon,' I said. 'So, _per se_?' said he. 'No,' I said, 'not per sea, Rahnstadt is not a seaport; per land-carriage.' Then he laughed, and said he had expressed himself in Latin. Fellow-citizens, What are we coming to, when the magistrates express themselves in Latin, and attachments are levied on horses and wagons? That is the way to poverty. How shall we merchants live on the small profits we get on coffee and sugar, tobacco and snuff?"

"Don't talk about your cursed snuff!" cried shoemaker Deichert, "it has given me a nose like that!" and he held up his fist before his face; but he did not have a chance to say more, for everybody laughed, as they saw his natural nose peeping out on both sides of his fist.

"Fellow-citizens!" said Kurz, again, "I know, very well, there must be poverty, but it should be of a reasonable kind; I mean, so that every one may be able to take care of himself, and not be a burden to other people. But is that possible, under the sad state of things in our city? Fellow-citizens! for some years, I have been striving against the unjust privileges which certain people have obtained, and in which they have been protected."

"Gossip," said Thiel, the joiner, to Jurendt, "you see, he is coming to the stadtbullen. There he must stop, baker Wredow is my brother-in-law."

He was right. "Fellow-citizens!" cried Kurz, "I mean the stadtbullen, these----"

"Down with him!" cried Thiel, the joiner.

"Yes, down with him!" echoed through the hall.

"We will hear nothing of bulls and cattle!" cried several voices.

"He grudges everybody the least profit!" cried Fritz Siebert.

"He wants it all for himself, even the stadtbullen!"

The president struck his bell emphatically, Kurz drew himself up in the stand, and made one more attempt: "Fellow-citizens!"

"Eh, what, fellow-citizens?" cried Thiel the joiner and Deichert the shoemaker, and pulled the unlucky tradesman down backwards, by the skirts of his coat, out of the cooling-vat, so that he gradually disappeared, and only his two hands trembled for a moment on the rim of the cask, as if he were drowning, and smothered sounds arose, "Stadtbullen--bullen--bullen--bullen?" Then all was silent, and Kurz fell half fainting into Brasig's arms. Brasig and the carpenter carried him out.

"I wish you would hold your confounded tongue!" said Uncle Brasig, as he dragged Kurz into the next room, and got him into a corner, "do you want to be turned out again?" and the two old fellows planted themselves to the right and left of Kurz, and stood there like the two men in the "Wild Man's gulden," who keep watch over a springing lion, lest he should attack the people; only the two old boys went more sensibly to work than the wild men, and each had a pipe in his hand, instead of a club.

Meanwhile, Fritz Siebert was showing that poverty came from the turnpike toll; the turnpike tolls must be given up; and tailor Wimmersdorf made a very reasonable proposition; something must be done for the poor, and he could think of nothing better at the moment, than to write down the grand-duke's castle, at Rahnstadt, as "national property;" if that could be sold, a good bit of poverty might be remedied, this was carried, and seven men went off to the castle, with Grammelin's stable lantern, and a piece of chalk, to attend to the business.

"Krischan," said a voice behind Pomuchelskopp, "I like that. You can write,--you shall write, to-morrow evening, on the door of our master's house."

Pomuchelskopp looked round--the voice struck him as familiar--right into the face of one of his own Reform day-laborers, and the cursed rascal had the impudence to nod. He had very peculiar feelings; he had no idea what to do; whether to play his trump of master, or to try fraternity again. Something must be done, he must at least get the Reformverein on his side; and when Brasig and Schultz returned to the hall, after having frightened Kurz into going home, the president was saying:

"Herr Pomuchelskopp has the floor."

Pomuchelskopp pressed slowly through the crowd, shaking Thiel's hand by the way, clapping Wimmersdorf on the shoulder, and speaking a few friendly words to the roguish shoemaker's apprentice. When he had squeezed himself into the cask, he began: "Gentlemen!"

Well, that always makes a great impression, when a blue dress-coat with bright b.u.t.tons addresses a laborer's frock, and a mechanic's soiled coat, as "Gentlemen!" and a murmur went through the hall: "The man is right! He knows how to treat us!"

"Gentlemen!" said Pomuchelskopp, once more, when the murmurs ceased, "I am no orator, I am a simple farmer; I have heard better speakers here,"--and he bowed to the rector and Johann "Meinswegens," and tailor Wimmersdorf, Fritz Siebert also came in for a share, on account of the turnpike tolls,--"I have also heard worse,"--and he glanced at the door where Kurz had been carried out,--"but, gentlemen, I have not been drawn to you by the _speeches_, so much as by the _sentiments_ which I find here."

"Bravo, bravo!"

"Gentlemen! I am all for Liberty, all for Equality, all for Fraternity!

I thank you for admitting me into this n.o.ble union." Here he drew a white handkerchief from his pocket, and laid it down before him.

"Gentlemen, you have been talking about poverty. Many a silent hour have I spent in thinking upon this subject, through many a sleepless night have I wearied myself with the question how this evil could be averted,"--here he wiped the sweat from his face with the handkerchief, probably to show what a difficult matter ne had found it,--"that is to say, gentlemen, poverty in our small towns, for our day-laborers in the country know nothing of poverty."

"So?" cried a voice from the rear. "Krischan, it is time now, speak up!"

"Our day-laborers," continued Pomuchelskopp, not allowing himself to be disturbed, although he knew the voice well enough, "receive a free dwelling and garden, free pasturage for a cow, hay and straw for the same, wood and peat, and land for potatoes and flax, as much as they need; once a week, alternately, a bushel of barley, a bushel of rye, or a thaler, and all the chaff from the thres.h.i.+ng-floor, and the housewives can earn five s.h.i.+llings a day. Now, I ask you, gentlemen, is any day-laborer in the city as well off? Ought a day-laborer to require any more?"

"No, no!" cried the city laborers.

"Gentlemen," said Stosse Rutschow, "I am a journeyman carpenter, and I never get more than nine groschen a day, the summer through, and one groschen of that goes to the master; I would rather be a day-laborer with Herr Pomuchelskopp."

"Donkey!" cried Schultz the carpenter, "have you worked at all, this whole spring? You have been loafing about!"

"Quiet! quiet!" cried the people.

"Gentlemen!" Pomuchelskopp went on, "this is the way our day-laborers are situated, and look at their treatment! Any day-laborer can give notice at any time, and seek another place; isn't that honest? isn't that satisfactory?"

"Krischan, speak, it is time!" again cried the voice in the rear.

"Gentlemen!" said Pomuchelskopp, drawing to a close, "I am heartily agreed with this n.o.ble union in its sentiments, and on this subject of poverty in the small towns, and you shall see--I am not a rich man, but what I can do shall be done. And now, gentlemen, I ask your a.s.sistance and protection; if city and country are true to each other there will be order, and we can arrange and settle everything in a peaceable manner, in this n.o.ble Reformverein. Long live the Rahnstadt Reformverein!"

"Hurrah! Hurrah! Long live the Reformverein!" echoed from every corner of the hall.

"Long live Herr Pomuchelskopp!" cried several voices, and Muchel, with a bow and a very friendly demeanor, went back to his place.

As he turned round, the speaker's stand was already occupied, and Zachary Brasig's red face shone upon him, not like a peaceful sun or moon, but like a fiery meteor, which the Lord sends into the world as a sign of his righteous judgments.

"Fellow-citizens!" he cried, and made a grimace at his fellow-citizens, as if he had devoured two of them for breakfast that morning, and would now select a nice, fat one for his supper,--"Fellow-citizens! if the Herr Zamwell Pomuchelskopp had stayed quietly at home in Gurlitz, I would not have said a word; if he had not pretended to be friends with me, here in this very hall, and had not on this grand father-land platform," here he struck on the cooling-vat, "told such confounded lies, I would not say a word."

"You must not talk like that!" cried tailor Wimmersdorf, "that is all nonsense!"

"If tailor Wimmersdorf considers my speech nonsense," said Brasig, "he can stop his ears, for all I care; he is much too stupid for me to notice; and now he can go and complain of me if he likes, I am Inspector Brasig."

"You are right! Go on!" cried the people.

"Fellow-citizens, I should have said nothing at all, for I hold it for a very unsuitable thing, in an agriculturist or any other man, to stir up the laborers against their master; but when such a--" "Great Mogul,"

interposed Schultz,--"stands up on this altar of fraternity to deceive this Reform with lies, and glorify himself, and make false representations of the happiness of his laborers, then I will speak out. Fellow-citizens! my name is Inspector Zachary Brasig."

"Bravo! bravo!"

"The Herr Zamwell Pomuchelskopp has told you that there is no poverty to be found in the country, he has regulated all the conditions of the day-laborer so wisely--bonus! as our honored Herr President Rein says; but, fellow-citizens, these day-laborers' conditions are something like roast beef and plum pudding; they are very nice, but we can't get them.

For example, and merely _praeter propter_, take the houses! Close by Gurlitz is a sort of pig-pen, which pa.s.ses for a house, and Willgans lives there,--is Willgans here?"

Willgans was not there.