UC-NRLF II $B M57 77M i^M^'^^WW.^^'^W THE DE s^ELOPMENT OF THE Nattjre-Sense TM THE G MAN LYRIC .^JW' .J^.^^W.^^ BY ARTHUR B. COOKK PH, D. THE DEVELOPMENT THE NATURE-SENSE THE GERMAN LYRIC A COMPAKTSON OF THE TWO GREAT LYRIC PERIODS. SUBMITTED TO THE FACUI^TY OF THE UNIVERSITY OF VIRGINIA IN CANDIDACY FOR THE DEGREE OF DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY ARTHUR B. COOKE. UNIVERSITY OF VIR&INIA STUDIES IN TEUTuUIC LAN&UASES : NO, 3. BARNES. 19 MAONOLlA STREET »P»bTANBURG, S. C, TO THE MEMORY OF MY MOTHER. WHO TAUGHT ME TO LOVE BOOKB AND NATURE. p-rrs^^^ TABLE OF CONTENTS, Page 1. Introduction 5-13 [I. The Seasons 14-34 Til. Birds and Flowers 35-46 IV. The Heavens . . 47-55 V. Mountains, Sea and Storms 56-65 VI. Personification of Nature 66-78 VII. Man's Mood Reflected by Nature 79-94 VIII. Nature as Background 95-106 IX Landscape 107-116 X. Conclusion 117 XL Vita 118 XII. Books of Reference 119 817207 Digitized by tine Internet Arcinive in 2007 witii funding from IVIicrosoft Corporation littp://www.arcliive.org/details/developmentofnatOOcookricli I— INTRODUCTION. More servants wait on man Than he'll take note of: in ev'ry path He treads down that which doth befriend him, When sickness makes him pale and wan, O mighty love! Man is one world and hath Another to attend him . —G. Herbert. To the student of literature, interested in every force that operates upon it to color its pages, no theme should be more engaging than the influence of Nature. It may be doubted whether any other single influence is so important. Wars, revolutions, crusades, migrations, are national, or at most international, and are temporal in their direct influence; but the influence of Nature is confined to nation nor time. In the beginning of things man was laid in the lap of Nature, and with every breath he drew life from her bosom, and that influence deepened when the nurse had become a companion, and deepens as man's life grows deeper even to the present day. "Who can guess,'' says Emerson "how much firmness the sea-beaten rock has taught the fisherman? how much tranquility has been reflected to man from the azure sky, over whose unspotted deeps the winds forever drive flocks of clouds and leave no wrinkle nor stain? how much industry and providence and affection we have caught from the pan- tomine of brutes?" A glance at the proverbs and common words of any lang- uage will show how far beyond the confines of mere litera- ture this influence has penetrated, into life, of which litera- ture is but an imperfect reflection. In our own language, for example, those expressions which have taken such a hold upon the people as to become proverbs are drawn largely from Nature, e. g., "It is an ill wind that blows no one any good," "the darkest hour is just before dawn," "a bird in the hand is worth two in the bush," "still water runs deep,'' "the early bird catches the worm," "as the twig is bent, so the tree is inclined," "one swallow doesn't make a summer." 6 THE DEVBtOPMENT OF THE NATURE-SENSE Many of these proverbs are not peculiar to us, but are the common property of several peoples. Their authors are un- known; they seem always to have been accepted. Just as the myth of Tell is understood wherever the spirit of liberty is known, these proverbs are understood wherever man has ob- served Nature. The words of common speech are often re- flections from Nature. We speak of disposition as bright, gloomy, stormy, calm; of character as m;>W^A^ or crooked — all, borrowing from Nature. Our whole language is adorned with figures of speech drawn from the natural world. Not only was the infancy of the race cradled in the lap of Nature, but every people has also had its cradle there, and has grown up with an ever increasing recognition of the world in which it moved ; and as the people found in litera- ture an expression of their life, this recognition was echoed there in its varying degrees. It is such a growth in the sense of Nature among the Ger- man people that this essay attempts to consider. It does not claim to be exhaustive, but rather suggestive along the larger lines of tendency. It is not a chronological consideration of authors, but a comparison of periods: for by a comparison of periods it has seemed possible to bring out most clearly the development of the nature-sense. The lyric field is admira- ble for such a study, since we may hope to find there the clearest expression of this sense. The essay will be devoted, therefore, to the lyrists of the 12th and 13th and 14th centu- ries, comparing them with the lyrists of the i8th and 19th centuries. It must be recognized that in thus putting the two periods together in comparison, the later period would have a great advantage, due to the recent strides in natural science and the quickened interest in Nature and knowledge of it, inci- dent thereto. But a study of the periods shows a poverty of nature-sense in the early period which cannot be explained on this ground. A knowledge of the life which the Minnesingers led, and the peculiar opportunities which that life offered for intimate observation of Nature, invites us to look more closely into IN THE GERMAN LYRIC 7 the causes of this marked indifference towards the natural world which is evidenced by their writings. An age may have an aversion to the country, such as marked the i8th century in England, when "no person of sense would live six miles out of lyondon. ' ' From such an age of writers shut up in town one might expect the senti- ment that "the proper study of mankind is man." But such was not the case of the Minnesingers. They were wand- erers, spending a part of their time at court and a part on the country-ways, with every opportunity for their sense to be quickened by contrast, with every opportunity to learn Na- ture at first hand. Yet, with few exceptions, their references to Nature show no individual contact, have no more coloring than if the writers had made them sitting by the fireside. There is little individuality. All borrow^ from the common stereotyped stock of phrases, none add to it. Each succeed- ing singer harps upon the same chords. The stock in trade is the rose and lily and violet; the nightingcde and cuckoo, with an occasional eagle or lark,- sunshine or moonlight or star- light: joyous spring, dreary winter. The limitation of these poets is more striking when we consider the extent of their travel. They were not confined to a small district; many travelled to Svntzerland , Italy and Palestine. They saw the Alps, the Italian sky, and the Mediterranean. Yet all this evoked from them not one ref- erence to mountains or seas, nor one description of a land- scape. The Crusades widened the horizon of trade, science, thought, indeed opened a new era in history; but they did not open men's minds on the side of nature. Alfred Biese says in his book Naturge.fuehl (p. 88) — I translate here as elsewhere — "Although the actual and practical must chiefly engage the historian, it is nevertheless remarkable to the modern reader how little apparent impression the Nature of the Holy Land made upon the Crusader the references to Nature in the reports are always lacking." In the same connection he cites (p. 117) this from W. Grimm, "The question whether contact with Southern Italy, or through the Crusades with Asia Minor, Syria, and Palestine has not 8 THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE NATURE-SENSE enriched German poesy with new nature-pictures, can in general be answered only in the negative." So clear a critic as J. A. Symonds is yet misleading in this characterization of the Minnesongs: "The magic of May pervades them, the mystery of the woodland enfolds them. They are the utterances of generations for whom life has re- vived, who have escaped the winter of their discontent and bondage, to whom the world is once more full of wonder- breeding interest." If this is taken to mean merely that the Minnesong is a departure from the spirit of the preceding centuries; if the term "May,"' "woodland," &c., are used figuratively to indicate the blithe, free spirit that pervades the songs of this period, then the criticism is not far from cor- rect. But if we are led by it to expect a strong, fresh savor of May and tJie woodland themselves — an acute sense of Na- ture — then we are misled entirely. A careful examination of these lyrics fails to reveal "the magic of May" or "the mys- tery of the woodland. ' ' There is scarcely an ecstasy over Nature or even a delight in her for her own sake in the whole range of Minnesong. The spring-tide of nature-love was not advanced to the full tide of May; it was rather the early, weak and spasmodic Sowings before the chill of winter had been wholly cast off. Bayard Taylor, too, overshoots the mark when he says in /Studies in German Literature (p. 60), "It is a bright, ani- mated, eventful age which we find represented in the litera- ture of the Minnesingers original because reaped on fresh fields by fresh hands; and with a direct impress of Na- ture, which we find for the first time in any literature." And again (p. 31), "the latter (Minnesingers) sang of love and sorrow and the influence of Nature; (p. 39), He (Walter) was one of the very first, not merely to describe nature and rural life, but to express a sweet and artless delight in her manifold aspects- '' The facts do not justify such an assertion; for, firstly, the Greeks and Hebrews had a marked nature-sense; and, sec- ondly, Walter's appreciation cannot be called an "artless de- light in her manifold aspects;" it is immature and artificial. IN THE GERMAN I.YRIC 9 scarcely overstepping the very narrow scope of his contempo- raries. Biese, a more careful and conservative critic says (p. 118), "Indeed, even the greatest among the Minnesing- ers, the master of the lyric of the 13th century, Walter, does not overstep the narrow bounds of the nature-sense of his time." On the poverty of the nature-sense of this period another German critic of great authority speaks in no un- certain voice. Says W. Grimm, "The German poets of this epoch (Crusades) have nowhere given themselves to a spec- ial consideration of Nature a sense of Nature was not lacking, to be sure, in the old German masters: but they left us no other expression of this sense than that which a con- nection with historic events permitted." There is, in fact, with rare exception, no evidence of Na- ture for Nature's sake at this time. When the spring was welcomed, it was because the poet might then visit his mis- tress. The winter was hateful because it kept him from her. Flowers bloomed only when he walked with her, in fact or fancy, in the meadow, and then only lilies and roses, as if no other flowers grew there. (One is tempted to believe that the bard really never went there to see; that the flowers of the Minnisingers are, indeed, artificial, made in the shop, not gathered fresh from the field.) The nightingale sang only by his love's window, and for her delectation, and then in a very monotonous strain. Nature was, for the old poet, accessory to love, and those aspects of nature which could not be used in love-song were to him unknown. He is silent as to the larger, grander phases of Nature, storms, moun- tains, seas, broad expanse of sky or earth. "An individual conception of the landscape fails completely" says Biese, (p. i6) "a feeling for Nature that seeks her on her own account has not yet arisen the charm of Nature herself without reference to other things, joy in her for her sake, has not yet been revealed to the time. ' ' It may be doubted whether there was at this period any sense of Nature in her broad general aspect. The old poet had no conception of the tout ensemble in Nature. He saw individual things, but did not see them in their setting; he lO THE DSVKLOPMKNT OF THE NATURE-SENSE mentions flower, brook, birdsong; he saw minor things, things at hand. He gives no evidence of abihty to grasp Nature in "her manifold aspects." He hears one note at a time, not Nature's harmony. His landscape, if his vague outlines can be dignified as such, is quite colorless and mea- ger — a meadow and flowers being the usual scene, repro- duced with wearying monotony by the succeedings poets. This poverty in the early German song is worthy of con- sideration, and invites us to seek the underlying causes. In some respects these poets had better opportunities to feel the influence of Nature than had the later period, for the rap- idity of travel in later years tends to militate against a study of landscape. Mr. Gladstone has happily said, "Once the traveller was bathed in Italy, now he is dashed by her spray. ' ' One cause that has operated to produce in part this apathy towards Nature may be designated as geographic or climatic. The short summer of northern Germany, the long winter with its leaden sky, have wrought their effect upon the na- ture of the people, till they have become phlegmatic, philos- ophic, dreamers perhaps. The bright sky and warm climate ot Southern France are reflected in the quick, passionate dis- position of the people. These differences of disposition may be traced in the literatures of the Minnesingers and the Trou- badours. But this cause does not explain the discrepancies between different periods of the same place and people, such as are seen on a comparison of the Minnesingers with the earlier writers, in whom there is clearly a stronger sense of Nature. For one of the most potent causes we must look deeper into the times. The nature-sense of the Greeks, though essentially differ- ent from that of our own time, was scarcely second to the latter in freshness and force- They had so personified all the phenomena of the natural world that they looked upon these as persons. The flower was Narcissus gazing upon his reflection in the pool, or it was Hyacinthus. The winds were real spirits, each with his own character— fierce Boreas and the rest. The moon and the stars skimming behind the IN THE GERMAN I^YRIC II clouds were Diana and her nymphs on the hunt. The god- dess and her train were in the bath, when moon and stars were reflected in the fountain. The hollow sounding waves were Tritons, blowing their conch-shell horns. Nature was to the Greek a world of personalities, with passions and emo- tions like his own. And this feeling of affinity with Nature was handed down in modified form even into Roman litera- ture. But with the advent of the Christian era came a new atti- tude towards the natural world, an attitude of antipathy and hostility. To the early Christian the natural world was under the curse, an instrument in the hands of the devil, used once to work man's destruction, likely to prove a snare again; a thing to be shunned, a thing to be renounced along with the Spirit of evil. The attitude of these centuries is expressed in the Chancellor's reply to Mephisto in the second part of Faust, Nature and Mind --to Christians we don't speak so. Thence to burn Atheists we seek so, For such discourses very dangerous be. Nature is Sin, and Mind is Devil. — Taylor's Trans., II, U. This hostility towards Nature continued far down the cen- turies — its traces remaining even in our own day. Which is the more remarkable, seeing that the Founder of the new be- lief had taught men to "consider the lilies of the field" and "behold the fowls of the air.'' But the church had put the world under the ban, and what the mediaeval church de- nounced VMS denounced. Under such an influence it is not remarkable that the minds of men were slow to open on the side of Nature. Symonds says in Essays Sjyeculative and Sug(/e»tive (p. 297), "Under the prevalent conceptions of the universe no intelligent being could take either scientific or artistic interest in a world considered radically evil, and doomed to wrathful over- throw. Man's one business was to work out his own salva- tion, to disengage himself from the earth on which his first parents had yielded to sin, and to wean his heart from the 12 THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE NATURE-SENSE enjoyment of terrestrial delights The phenomena of Nature were vilipended as not worth a thought." "But" says the same author, ' 'the vacuum created by the demolition of mythological lumber was filled to some extent by another set of polytheistic deities, Christ, Mary, Saints, Martyrs, Angels, Devils. These, however, unlike the deities of pa- ganism had no relation to nature. So far as the material universe was concerned, that remained empty." The me- diaeval church is, therefore, a gap between the old and the new sense of Nature. It is the far swing of the pendulum against Nature. It was opposed to any step towards the physical world, whether in science or in art. The accession of the House of Hohenstauf en in 1 138 marks a resistance to the papal power, and consequent upon this resistance, a shaking off of the fetters which had bound the minds of men with such deadening effect — a renaissance in German literature. It is, as it were, the first breaking from these bonds, the first awakening of the senses, the dropping of the scales from the eyes, which we find manifested in the writings of the Minnesingers. It is the first movings of a new nature-sense in literature, movings weak and uncertain, in which there is yet scarcely a promise of the coming deep current of sym- pathy towards Nature which finds its perfect expression in Goethe and especially Wordsworth — the modern pantheism which replaces the many of the old Greeks by the One. The Minnesinger viewed Nature from outside. His attitude was objective, not subjective. He noted superficial analogies between man and Nature, but he did not moralise; he did not feel an affinity between himself and the world about him. He was far from feeling himself and that world one sympa- thetic whole. The early centuries had set Nature over against God. It . was a far call from this attitude to the one which finds God in all the world. It was not the conversion of a moment, but a tedious growth. Eight centuries have scarcely prepared the way for "natural law in the spiritual world." It was first Wordsworth whose voice echoed back the words of the IN THE GERMAN LYRIC 1 3 Hebrew singer, "How manifold are thy works ! in wisdom hast thou made them all; the earth is full of thy riches." For the first ten centuries of the Christian era man was alone on the world's stage of literature: then he began to be supported by Nature. The following pages may serve to show in some measure to what extent men came to realize that "Man is one world and hath Another to accompany him." The titles of the following divisions indicate approximately steps in the orderly development of the nature-sense. II— THE SEASONS. The succession of the seasons, with their contrasts, striking both to eye and feeling, would naturally be one of the first phases of Nature to force itself upon the observation of men. This is substantiated by the predominance of the seasons in early nature- poetry. And the season which appeals most strongly to the mind, both in individuals and in peoples, is SPRING. The number of references to spring in the early poets ex- ceeds that of any other season. Winter claims the second place, but is mentioned only for complaint, or to heighten spring by contrast. Summer is frequently noticed, autumn much more rarely. This predominance of spring tends to show that the old poet's mention of Nature was not due, perhaps, so much to a real appreciation of Nature for herself as it was to the phys- ical effect which Nature produced on him. And this is man- ifest not only in reference to the seasons, but elsewhere. The fact that in riper periods of literature it is proportion- ately smaller, and when found there belongs rather to the earlier years of the poet, tends to show that this "rapture of May" is largely due to /'Aysica/ exuberance. Tennyson suggests this in his lines (p. io8): In the Spring a fuller crimson comes upon the robin's breast; In the Spring the wanton lapwing gets himself another crest; In the Spring a livelier iris changes on the burnished dove; In the Spring a young man's fancy lightly turns to thoughts of love. The early poet sang of spring in his age, to be sure, but his attitude had always the simplicity of the childish mind. Even Walter, the most virile of all the singers, was no pioneer into the fields. His life added practically nothing to the small stock of nature-lore of that day. In youth it was birds, meadows, Jloicers; and in age it was the same refrain. The Minnesong, in its artless simplicity, savors of perpetual m THE GERMAN I.YRIC 1 5 youth — that is, perpetual immaturity. Take, for example, Walter's Memory of Spring, out of his later years, Der rife tet den kleinen vogelen we, daz sie niht ensungen, nu horte ich s'aber wiinnecliche als e: nu ist diu heide entsprungen. da sach ich bluomen striten wider den kle, weder ir lenger waere. miner frouwen seite ich disiu maere- (Page 142.) There is nothing here that shows more than would be re- vealed to a casual glance of the eye or turn of the ear. The references are quite colorless and have no individuality. There is no sign of friendly intimacy which alone unlocks the secrets of Natuie, and makes her every feature individual in the eyes of her lover. The lines are drawn in dead white and black. There is no atmosphere, to use an artist's term. It is such a flat picture as a child might draw upon its slate. Compare this tribute to May taken from Goethe's later years, Leichte Silberwolken schweben Durche die erst erwarmten Liifte, Mild, von Schimmer sanft ungeben, Blickt die Sonne durch die Diifte; Leise wallt und drangt die Welle, Sich am reichen Ufer hin, Und wie reingewachsen helle, Schwankend hin und her und hin Spiegelt sich das junge Griin. (I, page 394.) How rich and varied is the coloring of this picture. May is not mentioned; no need of it. You feel it in the very movement of the verse; you see it in the very atmosphere of the picture. No vague generalities here, but every feature stamped with an individuality which shows direct, sympa- thetic contact with nature. Spring for Goethe is sky and earth and dancing water, all smiling for very joy, and each in its own inimitable way. Deitmar von Eist's tribute consists of one stanza, whose 1 6 THE DKVBI IN THE GERMAN LYRIC 49 Heine, in the following stanza, beautifully pictures the paling stars and the white flitting mists of morning — Blasser schimmern schon die Sterne, Und die Morgennebel steigen Aus der Seeflut, wie Gespenster, Mit hinschleppend weissen Laken. (I, page 384.) And Lenau inspires the scene with life — Des Himmels f rohes Antlitz brannte Schon von des Tages erstem Kuss, Und durch das Morgensternlein sandte Die Nacht mir ihren Scheidegruss. (Page loi.) To the old poet the day sky was the sun alone. The blue vault, the changing colors, the procession of thecloudvS, never arrested his eye. The day star itself existed but for com- parison with woman — Treit ein reine wip uiht guoter kleider an, so kleidet doch ir tugent, als ich michs entstdn, daz si vil wol gebliiemet gat alsam der liehte sunne hat an einem tage sinen schin. {M. F., page 24.) Once clouds are mentioned incidentally by Toggenburc in speaking of birdsong, — da von sendes herzen muot M alsam diu wolken h6he swinget. (D. L., page 199.) Goethe thus describes the mounting of the white-fleeced Cirrus clouds; Doch immer hoher steigt der edle Drang Erlosung ist ein himmlisch leichter Zwang. Ein aufgehauftes, flockig lost sich auf , Wie Schaflein trippelnd leicht gelammt zu HaUf . (I. page 502.) And Burger paints the wind-driven clouds as sheep flee- ing before the wolf, — Der Tauwind kam vom Mittags Meer Und schnob durch Welschland triib und feucht. 50 THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE NATURE-SENSE Die Wolken flogen vor ihm her, Wie wann der Wolf die Herde scheucht. (Page 139.) Uhland gives us this picture of the retreating storm-cloud : Schwarze Wolken ziehn hinunter, Golden strahlt die Sonne wieder, Fern verhallen schon die Donner, Und die Vogelchore singen. (Page 171.) I have found no mention of the rainbow among the Minne- singers. Certainly Walter does not allude to it, though it is mentioned in the epic of this time. Goethe gives in four lines a summer thunder-storm, concluding with the bow: Grau und triib under immer trtiber Kommt ein Wetter angezogen; Blitz und Donner sind voriiber Euch erquickt ein Regenbogen. (I, page 479.) Even the gorgeous sunset evokes from the Minnesinger literally no admiration. He notices it just as he would a flower by the way. He never gets beyond the conventional ''dbentrot." When he has applied this epithet his description of sunset is finished, though why he does not see the gold and blue, and grey and green in the clouds as elsewhere is to me inexplicable. The sunset glow is to him like woman's blush. Doubtless, as these other colors do not appear in the maiden's cheek, they do not appear in the sky to the poet, for here as almost everywhere he recognizes only those elements in Nature which he can appropriate for love: si bran vor mir sch6ne sam der dbentrot. (D. L., page 187.) or, si roubet mich der sinne min, sist shoene alsam der sunnen schin. (M. F., page 40.) With this poverty of descriptive coloring compare the rich pen-pictures which everywhere illuminate the pages of the later poets. IN THE GERMAN LYRIC 5 1 Uhland thus depicts the breaking of the glow over clouds and sea — Welche Glut ist ausgegossen Ueber Wolken, Meer und Flur ! Blied der goldne Himmel offen Als empor die Heil'ge fuhr ? (Page 199.) Riickert gives this picture, beautiful in its simplicity: Ein Schein der ew'gen Jugend glanzt Ins Erdenthal, Die Hoh'n mit Offenbarung kranzt Der Abendstrahl. (Page 155.) As the Minnesinger makes no note of the gradual transi- tion from summer to winter, so he makes no mention of the hour when "the day is gone, and the night is not yet." There is no "twilight" in his day, and this is the more not- able that he is the avowed singer of love, which is supposed to flourish best in the gloaming. This omission may be taken in further evidence of his casual and superficial obser- vation of nat\ire. He passes immediately from sunset to starlight and moonshine. Not so with our later lover of nature. For him there is the intervening hour when Die Lerche singt der Sonne nach Von hohera Ort, Dann wird die Nachtviole wach, Und duftet fort: (Ruckert, page 155.) the change- full hour, when An dem Himmel herauf mit leisen Schritten Kommt die duftende Nacht. (Schiller I, 113) lyiining, in Die Natur (page 268), comments upon the use in Norse and Anglo-Saxon literature of morning twilight, "die uhte, die Vormorgendammerung," as the waker of gloomy thoughts, and cites Napoleon I as having said that he had found among his generals only two who had courage two hours before sunrise. But there seems to have been no 52 THE DBVEI^OPMENT OF THE NATURE-SENSE recognition among the old lyrists of either the morning or the evening twilight as a specific mood of the day. We should expect our singer-of-love to be in his element beneath the canopy of night. Surely if anywhere, here in the silence the manifold wonders of night will lure him from the thought of his mistress to dwell for a moment at least upon the beauties of the star-spangled sky, and he shall give us some evidence of love for the world of nature. We shall be disappointed. He is a veritable Romeo, too enamored to be betrayed for a moment into forgetfulness of his Juliet. If the heavens are bright, "Two of the fairest stars in all the heaven, Having some business do entreat her eyes To twinkle in their sphere till they return. ' ' (Romeo and Juliet Act II, Scene 2.) The moon and stars do but adorn his thoughts of her — Dirre tunkel Sterne, sich, der oirget sich. Als tuo du, frouwe schoene, so du sehest mich. (M. F., page 10.) When the full moon mounts the starry sky it is not Diana with her huntress-train of nymphs, ' 'swept in the storm of chase' ' , but his mistress among women — Wol ir, wie sie valsches ane in wiplichen ziihten lebet i Reht alsam der liehte mdne in den sternen dicke swebet; (D. L., page 138); or he lives in her smile, as the moon lives by the light of the sun — swenne si wil sd bin ich leides ane min lachen stat s6 bi sunnen der mane. (M. F., page 84); or, ich muoz iemer dem geliche spehen als der mane sinen schin von des sunnen shin enpfllt. (M. F., page 124.) This mingling of night and love appears in the moderns but secondarily. Goethe addresses the cloud-veiled moon as she rises — IN THE GERMAN LYRIC 53 Doch du fiihlst, wie ich betiirbt biu, Blickt dein Rand herauf als Stern ! Zeugest mir, dass ich geliebt bin, Sei das Liebchen noch so fern; (I, page 405.) and Heine makes the stars love's messengers, Schone, helle goldne Sterne, Griisst die Liebste in der Feme, Sagt, dass ich noch immer sei Herzekrank und bleich und treu. (II, page 7.) But the night-thoughts of the modern poets are more usually filled with admiration or wonder or awe in the pres- ence of the starry heavens and the mystery of night. The advance of astronomy and the opening of the stellar deeps by the telescope may account in part for the element of awe and wonder in the later poets, but it does not explain away the poverty of the Minnesingers. It was before Galileo that another lyrist, standing under the same vault of night, sang: "When I consider thy heavens, the work of thy fingers, the moon and the stars which thou hast ordained, what is man that thou art mindful of him ? — for thou hast made him a little lower than the angels." (Ps. 8.) More in keeping with this exaltation of man's spirit in the conscious presence of the sublime are Goethe's lines — Und wenn mich am Tag die Feme Blauer Berge sehnlich zieht, Nachts das tlbermass der Sterne Prachtig mir zu Haupten gliiht, Alle Tag und alle Nachte Riihm ich so des Menschen Los; Denkt er ewig sich ins Rechte, , 1st er ewig schon und gross. (I, 407-8.) There can scarcely be in literature a more beautiful ode to Night as the "Allmother of lyife," than that of Riickert, which begins: Nacht Allmutter des lycbens, ich preise dich herrliche Gottin, Konigin ! keine wie du kranzet mit Sternen ihr Haupt. 54 THK DEVELOPMENT OF THE NATURE-SENSE Deinen umfangeiiden Armen eutreisseu sich trotzige Sonnen, lyieblos loscheu sie aus deinen bescheidenden Glanz; Doch wehniiitig empfangst du am Abend jegliche wieder, Ihr hinsterbendes Haupt bergeud im duftigen Schoss. (Page 7.) We can say of these lines as Goethe said of these two of his own — How sadly rises, incomplete and ruddy, The moon's lone disc, with its belated glow; to say this "some previous observation of nature was neces- sary." (Taylor's Translation of '"Faust." Vol. I, 305.) Into the following lines Korner has wrought the very atmosphere of a still night; the metre even helps to convey the impression of pervading slumber — Tief schlummert die Natur in siissen Triiumen, Und still und diister wogt die kiihle Nacht; Die Sterne funkeln in des Himmels Raumen, Der Silbermond steigt auf in heil'ger Pracht. (Page 76.) Such close observation and interpretation of the phenomena of Nature, such minute description, such entering into the heart of Nature's mood, is foreign to the Minnesingers. It cannot accompany cold indifference. Nature does not brook any slight. However it may seem, the history of the nature-sense among these singers supports the words written by our American poet in another connection — The bard must be with good intent, No more his, but hers; Must throw away his pen and paint. Kneel with worshippers. — Emerson. The early poets did not see the spirit of the natural world, which makes it worthy consideration in and for itself. Neither did they appreciate nature in her sober and her august moods. They cotild not have said, with Korner, Wie die Nacht mit heil'gem Beben Auf der stillen Erde liegt ! (Page 85.) IN THE GERMAN LYRIC 55 The night brought no benediction to them. They never felt that "darkness, like a gentle spirit," was "brooding o'er a still and pulseless world' ' . They saw individual stars, the moon, or the sun; just as they saw single flowers and birds and trees. Nowhere were the individuals blended into an inspired whole. This brings us to the consideration just here of another step in the progress of the nature-sense; that is, the appre- ciation of the sublime in Nature. The treatment of the suhliyne might properly be deferred till a later chapter, since the sublime in Nature was practi- cally unknown until several centuries after the Minnesingers, but it is inserted here in connection with the treatment of Nature as inanimate. v.— MOUNTAINS, SEA AND STORMS. "The mountain kingdom of which I claim possession by the law ot love,'' says Ruskin. If this be the passport to the mountains, we need not expect any mention of them by the early writers. Men who found sufficiency in the first- come flower would scarcely go so far afield in Nature as to catch sight of the great hills, and, if they did, what would they have to say of them ? Green meadows and flowers, stars and nightingales, comport better with songs of love than do granite walls and leaping torrents and eternal snows. These singers of love could not follow Keats, who, when he had imagined the future a very "forest of Arden," sang, And can I bid these joys farewell? Yes, I must pass them for a nobler life. Where I may find the agonies, the strife of human hearts. (Page 55.) Not theirs to sing the "nobler life," not theirs to see in Nature's sublimer moods an echo of the "agonies, the strife of human hearts." We shall have to leave the field of the simple love-lyric before we may expect to find a feeling for the sublime in Nature. Men were slow in coming to an appreciation of the grandeur in Nature. As a matter of fact this appreciation does not appear until some five hundred years after the Minnesingers, in the eighteenth century, and when the Romantic movement has set in strongly. Rous- seau was the pioneer in this field. He was the first to reveal to men the beauties of mountain scenery; the first to find solace in the wildness of Nature. Biese says : "It was Rousseau who first struck the deepest note of inspiration for the beauty of the great mountains." This tardiness in the growth of the nature-sense is not peculiar to the French literature. Miss Reynolds, in Nature in English Poetry (p. 7) says, "Rarely in the long period between Waller and Wordsworth do we find any trace of the modern feeling towards mountains. If they are IN THE GERMAN LYRIC 57 Spoken of at all it is to indicate the difficulty in surmounting them or to express the general distaste for anything so sav- agely and untameably wild. In no case does a sense of the sublimity and beauty of mountains find or even apparently seek expression." Professor Palgrave, in Landscape in Poetry (p. 177) cites Wordsworth as saying that although, during the resi- dence of Burns at Mossgiel Farm, splendid mountain scenery must have been constantly before his eyes, he nowhere has noticed it. Biese (p. 94), speaking of the times of Crusades, says of the Alps, "The geographical knowledge of these mountains is very slow at first in appearing: of an aesthetic enjoyment of Alpine beauty there can be, therefore, no mention." And again (p. 393), "Goethe is the first German poet who feels most deeply the romantic grandeur of the snow covered, ice-crowned mountains, and pictures them with inimitable mastery. ' ' Various writers attribute this early hostility to mountains to personal discomfort and danger incurred by mountain travel. Professor Palgrave says (p. 180), "There was noth- ing of charm, no romance, in the painfulness with which mountain regions were traversed two hundred years since and later; nor could the discomforts of the road allure a traveller's mind to the contemplation of the Sublime." Miss Reynolds makes this significant remark (p. 7): "It is interesting to note that passages expressing the most act- ive dislike of mountains show really some close observation and a good deal of picturesque energy of phrase. They were evidently the outcome of personal experience. ' ' This might explain the "energy of phrase,'' but scarcely accounts for the absence of mountain-love in the writers. The "per- sonal experience" is the common experience of all mountain tourists even to our day. Heine says, with an emphasis b»rn of experience, Wenn du den steilen Berg ersteigst, Wirst du betrachtlich achzen; 58 THE DKVKI.OPMKNT OP THE NATURE-SENSE Doch wenn du den felsigen Gipfel erreichst, Horst du die Adler krachzen. (I, page 294.) The toil of ascent did not, however, prevent Heine, in contemplation of the mountains, from feeling himself an eagle. The conveniences of travel were not markedly different in the days of Walter and of Goethe: certainly not different in those of Rousseau and of Waller; nor were the dangers from elements or robbers materially different for these dif ferent men. Moreover — a fact not generally recognized by the commentators — mountain climbing is not essential to love of mountains. Schiller wrote '-'William Tell" without ever having seen the Alps. The Hartz mountains were not so wild nor so inaccessible as the Alps, and yet Mr. Biese informs us (p. 355) that "Zimmermann first broke the road to the Harz in 1775,'' that is, three years before Rousseau's death, and after the Alps had been opened; all which he attributes to easier travel over improved roads. We gather from Rousseau's "Confessions'' that it was not improved roads nor physical comfort, but something which had little to do with either, which enabled him to behold beauty in the great mountains. Ruskin comes near the truth when be says, "Your power of seeing mountains can- not be developed either by your vanity, your curiosity, or your love of muscular exercise. It depends on the cultiva- tion of the instrument of sight itself, and of the soul that uses it" (Porter, 180). That is the explanation of the mat- ter. The trouble with those poets was not inability to travel but inability to see. It is the same inability which we have noticed running through all the early literature. They did not see the flowers, nor the clouds, nor the autumn colors. They did not see the hills that rose against their own horizon. Naturally, then, when by force of necessity they go through the Alps, they do not see the mountains but only feel the discomfort. If Walter or Waller had been transported in a Pullman car to Interlaken he would still have been silent on mountain scenery, because having eyes he saw not. IN THE GERMAN LYRIC 59 When men begin reallj^ to open their eyes on the side of Nature, we shall soon find them interested in mountain scenery. This explanation based on discomfort would not apply, in accounting for the absence of seascapes from the literature, and mountains and sea go" hand in hand in literature as Ihey do in geography — the highest mountains always facing the deepest seas: ability to appreciate the one being sufficient evidence regarding the other. Biese (p. 320) speaking of F. Stolberg (cir. 1775), says "until this time mountain and sea had not played scarcely any role in Ger- man poetry;" and elsewhere speaking of these elements in Dutch art of the 17th and i8th centuries, he says, "moun- tain and sea do not find their inspired word- painters till one hundred years later." Miss Reynolds (p. 14) notes the lack of appreciation in the i8th century. "It was simply a waste of waters, dangerous at times, and always wearisome. Though more often mentioned than the mountains it (ocean) received an even more narrow and conventional treatment.'' Professor Palgrave (p. 118), confirms this statement. Speaking of the "Franklin's Tale'' in Chaucer, he says, "Dorigen goes on to speak of the hundred thousand whom she fancies have been dashed against rocks and slain. This is the general aspect of the sea in our poetry till modern days. ' ' L,{ining (p. 92), in treatment of the Epic, says: "The mid- dle high German poets sddom fail to apply to the sea the epithet vnld or some such." The inland position of Germany might seem to account for the absence of the sea from the writings of the Minne- singers, if we did not know that they travelled far, and that even Venice and Naples failed to elicit from them one word of admiration. Here is further evidence that easy access to the phenomena of Nature has little to do with an appreciation of them, for "Strange as it may seem, it is yet true that the poets of sea-girt England were very slow in making the dis- covery of the ocean." (Reynolds, p. 16). The power to see these things, call it Romanticism or what not, depends at last upon the long "cultivation of the instru- ment of sight itself, and of the soul that uses it." 6o THE DBVKLOPMKNT OF THE NATURE-SENSE We are then not surprised to find this appreciation wholly lacking in the poets of the 13th century. Toggenburc barely mentions moimtaiiis once along with flowers and clover, show- ing utter inappreciation by that very association, and at once waves all aside as not worthy of mention in comparison with the roses on her cheek — Bluomen loup kle berge und tal und des meien sumersiieziu wunne Diu sint gegen dem rosen val so min vrowe treit. (D. L,., page 200.) A few selections will serve to show the presence of moun- tain and sea in the i8th and 19th century poetry. Goethe speaks of the snow-crowned Alps in these beauti- ful words: War doch gestern dein Haupt noch so braun wie die Locke der Ivieben Deren holdes Gebild still aus der Feme mich winkt; Silbergrau bezeichnet dir friih der Schnee nun die Gipfel Der sich in stiirmender Nacht dir um den Scheitel ergross. (I, page i85.> And Schiller, in Bergleid, sings- Am Abgrund leitet der schwindlichte Steg. Er fiihrt zwischen Leben und Sterben; Es sperren die Riesen den einsamen Weg Und drohen dir ewig Verderben; Und willst du die schlafende lyOwin nicht wecken, So wandle still durch die Strasse der Schrecken. (I, page 121.) Koruer strikes another note in 'mountain song — that of delight, Hoch auf dem Gipfel Deiner Gebirge Steh' ich und staun' ich, Gliihend begeistert, Heilige Koppe Himmelanstiirmerin. (Page 89.) Chamisso gives us this picture of the snow- capped peaks towering into the blue sky of morning— IN THE GERMAN LYRIC 6l Und meine Berge erheben Die schneeigen Haupter zumal Und tausclien in dunkle Blaue Und gliihen im Morgenstrahl. Und lauschen iiber den Hochwald, Der schimmernd die Gletscher umspannt In unser Thai heriiber Und schauen mich an so bekannt. (Page 42.) Here is a sort of affectionate companionship with the mountain. Heine is notable among the lovers of the sea, portraying all its moods in his poems. In "Nordsee'' he gives this fine picture of sunset — over the troubled waters. Die Sonne neigte sich tiefer und warf Gliihrote Streifen auf das Wasser, Und die weissen, weiten Wellen, Von der Flut gedrangt, Schaumten und rauschten naher und naher, (I, page 164) with which may be contrasted his description of a calm — Meeresstille i Ihre Strahlen Wirft die Sonne auf das Wasser, Und im wogenden Geschmeide Zieht das SchifE die griinen Furchen. (I, page 174.) Lenau attributes to the calm more power over his spirit than to the storm ; Sturm mit seinen Donnerschliigen Kann mir niclit wie du So das tiefste Herz bewegen, Tiefe Meeresruh. (Page 123.) And Herder, in "Am Meer bei Neapel," gives us a glimpse of that scene which the Minnesinger on his visit to the same shore had entirely missed — Ermiidet von des Sommers schwerem Brande, Setzt ich danieder mich ans kiihle Meer Die Wellen wallten kiissend hin zum Strande 62 THE de;vei,opment of the nature-sense Des grauen Ufers, das rings um mich her In seinem frischen, blumichten Gewande Auffing der Schmetterlinge gaukelnd Heer. (I, pp. 253-4.) Riickert in "Sicilianen" acknowledges the charm which those Italian waters had for him — Ich schaukelte durch's Meer auf schwankem Kahne, Und macht' auf einem Bluteneilaud and Rast. Und wie dem Aug' die einz'len Farben starben Im Griin der See und in der I^uft Azur; Empfand mein Herz, vergessend alter Narben, Uneudlichkeit der Lieb' und Sehnsucht nur. (Page 64.) Another manifestation of the sublime in Nature which the poets were slow to discover is the storm. We associate in our minds, I think, storms with mountains or sea — certainly with some large phenomenon of the outer world; which is but to say that we preserve in thought — unconsciously, perhaps — the harmony of Nature. The cradle of the storm is on the deep or upon the great plains or about the mountain crags. It sweeps across the sky. There is no littleness associated with the tempest in our minds. It does not destroy the flow- ers, it "breaketh the cedars of Lebanon — and layeth the for- ests bear." To know the storm, that is, to stand before it without fear, demands some feeling of sublimity. Old Cali- ban fell down in mortal terror before the tempest. So long as men have not discovered the depth of the sky, nor the expanse of the landscape, nor the existence of the mountain, there is no place for the storm in their thought. There was no inconvenience of travel standing between the early poets and an appreciation of the storm, and it will, therefore, be interesting to notice in just how far they mentioned the storm, and in what way. As the Minnesinger has thus far noticed those phenomena of Nature which evoke more gentle and pleasant feelings, we should not be surprised to find him occupying the same attitude towards the winds. He does not, in fact, speak of the strong winds, the fierce storms, the IN the; GERMAN I.YRIC 63 lightning and thunder, and the angry clouds; but mentions only the gentle winds, the zephyrs, that bring him a message from his mistress — Sta bi la mich den wint an wejen der kumt von mines herzen kuninginne. (D. ly., page 126); Walter's usual epithet for a trifle is "eiu wint". Once he mentions the storm, but in a figurative connection represent- ing some threatening disaster — Owe! ez kumt ein wint, daz wizzet sicherliche, da von wir hoeren beide singen unde sagen; der sol mit grimme ervaren elliu kiinicriche, daz hoere ich waller unde pilgerine klagen, bourne, tiirne ligent vor im zerslagen. (Page 304.) Heinrich von Moruugeu mentions the wind in one line — Min staeter muot geltchet niht dem winde; (M. F.. page 136.) and Hohenvels gives an echo of a summer storm in these lines — Do der luft mit sunnen fiure wart getempert und gemischet, Dar gab wazzer sine stiure, da wart erde ir lip erfrischet. (D. h., page 151.) Not the slightest trace in any of these rare instances of an appreciation— only the barest mention, and that mostly in figures. These two lines from Walter's "Das Chamaleon" are a rare exception — in sime siiezen honege lit ein giftig nagel; sin wolkenlosez lachen bringet scharpfen hagel. (Page 255-6.) He compares the changeable character to the weather which sends a shower of sharp hail while it smiles upon you through the shower. Even this selection shows an apprecia- 64 THE DEVEI.OPMENT OF THE NATURE-SKNSB tion by Inference rather than directly. Another world has opened to men when they can say with Lenau — Der Himmel donnert seinen Hader; Auf seiner dunklen Stirne gliiht Der Blitz hervor, die Zornesader, Die Schrecken auf die Erde spriiht. Der Regen stiirzt in lauten Giissen; Mit Baumen, die der Sturm zerbrach, Erbraust der Strom zu meinen Fiissen; Doch schweigt der Donner allgemach. (Page 104.) The sea, the mountains, and the storm were known and appreciated in all their phases by the poets of the later period. The discovery of the sky and storm in literature marks a revelation scarcely less significant than Galileo's discovery by which the heavens ceased to be a low-hanging roof and became the fathomless, animate depths of the universe. The one opened a limitless field for thought, the other a boundless scope for imagination. Only in the great spaces is there room for the sublime — whether in the realm of mind or of matter. Only because the Hebrew lyrist had broken through the low sky- vault and sung "how excellent is thy name in all the earth ! who hast set thy glory above the heavens" — only because he saw the depths of sky could he also sing in the shadow of the tempest, "The voice of the L,ord is upon the waters: the God of glory thundereth." Only because men had learned the wonder of the boundless blue expanse could they sing, with Chamisso, unafraid, — Den stillen Schoss der dunklen Nacht durchdringen Des Donners Schmettertone; schwarz umzogen Wolbt unheilschwanger sich der hehre Bogen, — Die Sterne loschen — Elemente ringen, — Der Feuerengel schiittelt wild die Schwingen; Es stiirzen Feuer — stiirzen Wasserwogen; Des Windes Heulen stbhnet langgezogen Im Sturme ahn ich hohrer Wesen Ringen. (Page 388.) IN THS GERMAN LYRIC 65 The discovery of the depths of Nature in literature marks the opening of a corresponding depths in man — it is deep answering unto deep — a discovery which depends, let us repeat, "upon the cultivation of the soul," The absence of Mountain, Sky and Sea from the literature of the Minnesingers is a natural omission at this stage in the development of the nature-sense. TI.— PERSONIFICATION OF NATURE. Thus far we have treated Nature as set over against man — something outside him and separated from him — something to be seen, counted, catalogued, admired and enjoyed, with which, however, man had nothing in common, a foreign world — a soulless world. Henceforward we shall have to treat it as animate, having more and more in common with man, as he grows to see more and more unity in the world, until we come to that stage where men see the same spirit pervading the natural world and the human world, see the same moods in Nature which they feel in their own bosoms, find the outer world answering to them in all their experi- ences, glad when they are glad, sad, when they sorrow, passionate with them; till men shall say, with Wordsworth, "How exquisitely the individual Mind to the external World is fitted: and how exquisitely, too, the external World is fitted to the Mind". The first step towards bridging over this wide gulf between man and Nature would be in discovering analogies between the two worlds. This in itself is unimportant, but it leads immediately to a vital step. Men noted that the rose was red and woman's blush was red, therefore, "her cheek was like the rose" — a superficial analogy. But the next step was to attribute the same cause to the two effects, and make "the rose blush upon the thorn." The mistress was radiant above other women, so she was like the moon moving among the stars; and forthwith the moon took on all the attributes of woman — became personified. It is first through the medium of figures that life flows from man to fill the channels of Nature. It has always been analogies that have first led men to see themselves in Nature. Among the Greeks this analogy became mythology, wherein gods with human qualities lurked behind the visible phe- nomena of Nature. The pink dawn came to be Aurora ris- IN THE GERMAN LYRIC 67 ing from the couch of Tithonus; the sun became the ardent Apollo shooting golden arrows, and The nightly hunter, lifting a bright eye Up towards the crescent moon, with grateful heart Called on the lovely wanderer who bestowed That timely light, to share his joyous sport: And hence a beaming goddess, with her Nymphs Across the lawn and through the darksome grove Swept in the storm of chase; as moon and stars Glance rapidly along the clouded heaven. When winds are blowing strong. (Wordsworth, p. 517.) Among the moderns this movement finally developed into a "Higher Pantheism" where the poet asks — The sun, the moon, the stars, the seas, the hills and the plains — Are not these, O Soul, the Vision of Him who reigns ? (Tennysou, p. 188.) Step by step men drew nearer to Nature and found Nature drawing nearer to them. First she was a silence, then a murmur, then a voice, then a companion, and when finally men passed through Nature to Nature's God, she became a Gospel, and Arndt sang, Ihr siisse Blumen, griine Haine O seid ihr endlich wieder mein ? Ich euch geborgen gar alleine: Doch nie bin ich bei euch allein Ihr sprecht mit wmndersamer Stimme Die einz'ge Sprache ohneTrug, Der Vogel predigt hier, die Imme, Der Blutenzweig wie Gottes Buch. O Gottes Buch ! o heil'ge Machte ! Hier brecht ihr alle Siegel auf : Heheimnis stummer Mitternachte Und Sonnenlauf und Mondenlauf Und was von irren Wandelsternen Die tiefe Menschenbrust durchkreist, Kann heir der stille Lauscher lernen. Wo alles hoch nach oben weist. (Page 222.) 68 THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE NATURE-SENSE This first step analogy, with its consequent step personifi- cation, was of immense import to men, first adorning their language with the beautiful figures of speech, and opening up a field of illustration which becomes broader and more inexhaustible as men's lives are broadened, till today it is the chief means by which man passes thought to man. And secondly, it broadened the world to him, by making every tiniest flower or towering peak of interest, as being his fel- low-creatures, multiplying his loves and sympathies, making every hill-side and dell and flowing stream speak to him in the language of his own heart, swelling the brotherhood of man to universal brotherhood, wherein even the stars had part and influence. Henceforward man was not alone nor lone- some in the world, but from every object in Nature poured in upon him streams of influence, and from him went back to them streams of sympathy. How significant this step was may best be expressed in the words of our own Nature-prophet, Emerson: "These are not the dreams of a few poets, here and there, but man is an analogist, and studies relations in all objects. He is placed in the centre of things, and a ray of relation passes from every other being to him. And neither can man be under- stood without these objects, nor these objects without man. All the facts in natural history, taken by themselves, have no value, but are barren, like a single sex. But marry it to human history and it is full of life." (Nature, p. 28.) This bridge of figures led the old poets naturally only into the restricted field of Nature which they knew; but such passage as it was they made it, a passage as significant in principle as is the later appropriation of the manifold mod- ern world. We cannot expect from these early pioneers great innovation, seeing that they were notably conventional in their reference to Nature, but even here the stronger ones were at times strikingly original in their observation of analogy, and left the beaten track of the conventional to bring in a forceful new figure from Nature. A recital of the figures used will be largely a repetition of what has already been said, for it has been pointed out that IN THE GERMAN LYRIC 69 the old bard's use of Nature was almost always as accessory to love. His figures are, therefore, generally confined to such phenomena as are in harmony with the gentle mood of love. The coming of spring is like the flowering of his heart under love's sunshine; the falling leaves suggest fading love, Diu linde ist an dem ende nu jarlanc lieht unde bloz. mich vehet min geselle: nu engilte ich des ich nie genoz. (D. L., page 289.) Winter is but a figure of love's death. Spring triumphs over winter when he triumphs in love. The rose and wo- man's lips are a common figure, "ein rosenvarwer mund,'' "uz einem miindel rot sam die rosen," "so hat si einen roten rosen gezzen". Her cheek is like a rose "ir roselohez wange". An unusual comparison is Diirner's tribute to her cheek as "rosen rot gestroit uf wizen sne'', and Morungen's "doch wast ir varwe liljen wiz und rosen rot". Woman is like a rose in the dew, Waz gelichet sich der wunne da ein rose in touwe stat ? Nieman danne ein schoenez wip. (D. L., page 211.) She is like "the sun", "the sun at morning", "the cloud- less sun", "the sun in dark clouds". Her blush is "sam der abentrot". Her eyes are "like the stars", "W^ ist nu hin min liehter morgensterne?" A frequent figure for woman is the moon, Reht alsam der lichte mane in den sternen dicke swebet Dem stat wol gelich diu reine; (D. L., page 183) or, und saz vor mir diu Hebe wolgetane geblecket rehte alsam ein voller mane. (M. F., page 136.) Her smile is like sunlight on the moon — swenne si wil, so bin ich leides ane. min lachen stat so bi sunnen der mane. (M. F., page 84.) 70 THK db;vblopmknt of the naturk-sense Such references occur frequently in the writings of these poets. But not all their figures are stereotyped. Some of them show an originality and an observation of the things mentioned, and occur rarely. For instance, Trostberc says: Ob in einem waldc ein linde triiege rosen liehtgevar, Reht alsame diu frowe min hat die tugent, (D. L., page 238) and Dietmar, using the figure of a ship, says: der bin ich worden undertan als das schif dem .stiure man. (M. F., page 38.) Otte zem Turne compares his mistress to the eagle: So froit sich mtn sender muot saz mins herzen spilndiu sunne, hoehet als der adelar. (D. L., page 286.) He is fond of the figure of the eagle. The swallow is a symbol both of constancy and inconstancy; dur daz volge ich der swal dim liez durch Hebe noch dur leide ir singen nie, (M. F., page 127) and elsewhere, Ein swal klent von leime ein hiuselin, Das inn ist des sumers ein vil kurze vrist. got viiege mir ein hus mit obedache. (D. L., page iii.) Still other original figures are "tears like the dew", "heart like adamant", and Morungen's lines, Mich enziindet ir vil liehter ougen schin same daz fiur den diirren zunder tuot. (M. F., page 126.) Walter is by far the most original of all the early poets in the selection of figures, as he is elsewhere. In his "Klage IN THE GERMAN LYRIC 7 1 tjber den Verfall der Kuust," he speaks of certain poor, self-satisfied singers,— die tuont sam die frosche in eime se, den ir schrien also wol behaget, daz diu nahtegal da von verzaget, so si gerne sunge me — (Page 141) the nightingale being himself doubtless. His prince's kind- ness is like rain, and the prince, a fair meadow where one may gather many flowers, des fiirsten milte uz Osterriche freut dem siiezen regen geliche beidiu liute und ouch daz lant er ist ein schoene wol gezieret heide, dar abe man bluomen brichet wunder. (Page 185.) A similar reference to the benefaction of the gentle rain is found in a parallel figure from Uolrich von Guotenburc, Ir schoener gruoz ir milter segen, mit eime senften nigen, daz tuot mir eimen meien regen reht an daz herze sigen. (M. F., page 69.) And Walter compares inconstancy to the clover that fades, swer hiure schallet unde ist hin ze jare boese als e, des lop gruonet unde valwet so der kle. der Diirnge bluome schinet durch den sne. (Page 215.) The Minnesinger speaks of the closer, as he would of the rose or the lily; but in the later times the flower seems to have lost caste with the poets. Walter speaks of the court under the figure of a garden full of weeds and good plants. He arraigns the Pope for his corruption, ending with this line — "sin hirte ist z'einem wolve im worden under sinen schafen." (Page 216.) He compares the improvident and the provident under the 72 THE DEVELOPMENT OP THE NATURE-SENSE figure of crickets and ants — a slight variation of our time- honored fable. Of figures from the sterner phases of Nature, representing the deeper or more serious moods of man, there are none, as there was no recognition of this side of Nature for its own sake. The songs of the modern poets are too full of strong, orig- inal figures to call for any exhaustive consideration of this element in their writings. The following general allusions and a few selections will amply suffice for a comparison of the two periods. In evidence of the more varied use of figures, and the broader field of analogy, Goethe speaks of life as tree and fruit; love is water; his dead friend is a transplanted tree; the soul is like rain that comes from heaven and returns. Of his song he says: Dem Geier gleich, Der auf schweren Morgenwolken Mit sauftem Fittich ruhend Nach Beute schaut, Schwebe mein I,ied. (I, page 364,) To Biirger the friend is a young eagle in full flight; love, sunshine through rifted clouds; modesty, a flower; "sinnen- liebe," a butterfly. And life — Dein I,eben, Beste gleich' in Bilde Dem Bach, der stets heiter fliesst Und durch ein schones Lenzgefilde Sich ruhig in das Meer ergiesst, (Page 135) and death, Herrlich und hehr war deines Scheidens Gang, Wie der Mond auf blauer zitternder Woge. Nur liesst du uns im Dunkel, O erstes der Madchen, zuriick. (Page 206. Herder sees life fade like the rose; songs are butterflies, or flying leaves; love, a rosebud; time is like wind or wave; life, a stream; I^uther is an oak tree; and passion— IN THE GERMAN LYRIC 73 Diinste steigen auf und werdeu In den Wolken Blitz und Douner Oder Regentropfen. Diinste steigen auf und werden In dem Haupte Zorn und Unmut, Oder werden Thranen. (I, page 199.) I cannot forbear giving one other quotation from Herder — his beautiful interpretation of the rainbow in his ode, "Der Regenbogen," Schones kind der Sonne, Bunter Regenbogen, Ueber schwarzen Wolken Mir ein Bild der Hoffnung. Hoffuungen sind Farben, Sind gebrochner Strahlen Und der Thranen Kinder, Wahrheit ist die Sonne. (I, page 193-4.) In Lenau life is a stream, a desert, a strand; song is the zephyr on flowers; winds are dying sighs; night is a black eagle with fiery wings. The flight of fancy is evidently extended to further fields in the later poets than it is in the earlier singers. From mere simile it was an easy step to personification, a step which the old poets were not slow to take. We find them often apostrophizing May or Summer, or representing the meadow und wood as donning their gala dress; but there is a marked sameness in their personification, both of subject and of manner. Walter makes the meadow blush before the forest — wan daz ich mich rihte nach der heide, diu sich schamt ir leide: so si den wait siht gruon«i, so wirt s'iemer rot. (Page 41.) Nithart represents May as dressing the forest with new leaves, — Der meie der ist riche, er fiieret sicherliche 74 THE DKVELOPMKNT OF THE NATURE-SENSE den wait an siner hende. der ist nu niuwes loubes vol. (D. Iv-, page 104.) And again, the forest has opened his treasure-house to Maj^: Der wait hat sine krame geiu dera meien uf geslagen; (M. P., p. 99; D. L.,p- 106) and elsewhere, Der wait hat siner grise gar vergezzen ; der meie ist iif ein griienez zwi gesezzeu. (M. P., p. 106.; D. L., p. 109.) Liutolt von Savene personifies May and the wood in almost the same words, adding, however, a pretty touch in the vieing of the meadow flowers, Wol dir meie wie du scheidest allez ane haz! Wie wol du die boume kleidest und die heide baz ! Diu hat varwe me. du bist kurzer ich bin langer' also stritents M dem anger, bluomen unde kle. (D. L., page 128.) Kristan von Hamle addresses to the meadow this quite original apostrophe, in which he attributes to it human sen- timent — Her Anger, waz ir froide inch muostet nieten do min frowe kom gegan Und ir wizen hende begunde bieten nach iuwern bluomen wolgetan. (M. P., p. 132; D. L., p. 137.) Ezzelingen makes the wood adorn itself and put on its gar- land, while the meadow reflects the splendor, Walt hat sich mit kleiden schdne gegestet, er hat uf gesetzet maugen stolzen kranz Hi wie dem diu heide widerglestet ! diu hat an geleit ir schoene wunderswanz. (D. Iv., page 236.) Beyond this very limited field of the meadow and forest, spring and summer and flowers, the Minnesinger does not seem IN the; GERMAN I,YRIC 75 to have ventured in his personification of Nature; he does not reach even to the limits of his field of analogy; does not extend his figures to the phenomena of the sky. We do not find him addressi-ng odes to "the cloud," "the sunset," nor apostrophizing the sun, moon or stars. Personification is the first step in the contemplaticn of Nature for itself, and there- fore it is not unnatural that this element should find a very restricted expression in the early period of the literature. The later poets often touch the same chord in their per- sonifications, but with the greater depth of feeling and breadth of application in their figures which we have everywhere found characteristic of their nature-reference compared with that of the early poets. Schiller refers to spring under the beautiful figure of a youth bearing a basket of flowers — a touch so fresh that it reminds one of the young spring of Greek mythology — Willkommen, schoener Jiingling ! Du Wonne der Natur ! Mit deinem Blumenkorbchen Willkommen auf der Flur ! (I. page 35.) And, elsewhere, changing the figure to that of a maiden bearing fruits and flowers, a modern Proserpine, he says— In einem Thai bei einem Hirten Erschien mit jedem jungen Jahr Sobald die ersten Lerchen schwirrten Ein Madchen schon und wunderbar. (I, page 210) Especially like the note of the early poets, however, are these lines from Arndt's "Friihliugslied" , Sei Willkommen, Friihling, du siisser Gast Sei Willkommen, du frohlicher Mai ! Der die Freude briugt und die Sorge has.st. (Page 16.) The same simple note of the old bards, the flower-bedecked spring, is heard in these lines from his ode to "Blumen", Die seinen Busen zu schmiicken Der Lenz sicli machen kann. 76 THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE NATURE-SENSE Sie sehn mit liebenden Blicken Mich jung und lustig an. (Page i8.) Compare the same view of May, as seen in Platen's lines, Enthiillt sich jahrlich weit und weit Die Maienzeit Mit lust' gem Vogelschalle. (Page 24.) Goethe's ode to the moon is in quite another spirit than that which appeared in the early poets — no reference here to woman's beauty; the cloud-veiled mocn is a veiled woman, Schwester von dem ersten Licht Bild der Zartlichkeit in Trauer ! Nebel schwimmt mit Silberschauer Um dein reizendes Gesicht. (I, page 32.) A far more extended animation of the natural world than we have thus far found, occurs in the deeper moods of the modern singers, as illustrated below — a growth of the nature- sense which oversteps all the conventional past, leaves those phenomena which have been the time-honored stock of the bard, goes out into new fields, finds in a rich variety of new objects a likeness to the new life, and gives to literature the manifold fresh figures of personification, which add such delightful flavor to the new running of the wine-press of poetic thought. To Herder the birch tree shedding its leaves over his sis- ter's grave is a mourner weeping at the tomb — Friihlingsbirke, du stehst hier iiber dem Grabe der Schwester Herbstlich einsam, und streust Blatter und Thranen darauf. (I, page 205.) Lenau sees the moonlit clouds of evening as a company of mourners weaving of pale roses a garland for the dead day: I^eichte Abendwolkchen schweben Hin im sanften Mondenglanz, Und aus bleichen Rosen weben Sie dem toten Tag den Kranz. (Page 57.) IN THE GERMAN I^YRIC 77 It is a long way from the old singer's simple tribute to woman's cheek as "sam der abentrot" to this inspiration of soul into the evening sky. The old singer had scarcely got- ten beyond the simile, had not ventured to address a thought to the sunset as personified. An even broader application of this figure, one common to our literature of today, is where he speaks of Nature as asleep, while the veil of twilight is drawn gently over her features, Friedlicher Abend senkt sich aufs Gefilde; Sanft entschlummert Natur, um ihre Ziige Schwebt der Dammerung zarte Verhiillung und sie L'achelt, die holde, (Page 97.) Goethe addresses the brook in light, laughing lines, whose very movement reflects the rippling stream. Wo willst du klares Bachlein hin So munter ? Du eilst mit frohem leichtem Sinn Hinunter. (I, page 127.) And Korner, in equally appropriate measure, addresses the silent stepping of the morning light through the gates of darkness, Siisses lyicht ! Aus goldnen Pforten Brichst du siegend durch die Nacht. Schoner Tag ! Du bist erwacht. (Page 83.) Platen, in his ode to the Rhine, addresses it as a friend, Lebe wohl, alter Rhein, wohl, Wie oft erquicktest du mich ! (Page 8.) And also to the wind — Schwelle die Segel, giinstiger Wind ! Trage mein Schiff an das Ufer der Feme. (Page 12) while Schiller, with more stately stepping of the muse, gives greeting to the sun and the light-crowned mountain, Sei mir gegriisst, mein Berg mit dem rotlich strahlenden Gipfel, 78 THS DBVEI.OPMSNT OF THE NATURB-SBNSB Sei mir Sonne gegriisst die ihn so lieblich bescheint. (I, page 24.) Other unusual figures are "the murderer ocean," "the mountain stretching its stone arms towards the clouds," "nature distilling wine from the hills," "nature walling in the land with Alps," "the rainbow the child of the sun," and the most strikingly original perhaps of all, the beautiful lines which stand at the close of Lenau's "Himmelstrauer:" Nun schleichen aus dem Moore kiihle Schauer Und leise Nebel iiber's Heideland; Der Himmel Hess, nachsinnend seiner Trauer, Die Sonne lassig fallen aus der Hand. (Page 79.) These examples serve to show the field, as broad as Nature herself, where the imagination and the discerning eye of the 19th century poets moved and found the world breathing with a life like their own. Or did they merely read them- selves into a lifeless world ? Just here it matters not for our purposes. Suffice it that, through Nature, their thoughts and sympathies were multiplied, and their literature en- riched. VIL-MAN^S MOOD REFLECTED BY NATURE, In Wuudereiuklang ist das L,eben Der Menschenbrust mit der Natur; Was jener als Gefiihl gegeben, Geht hier in lichter Farbenspur. (Korner, page 170.) "Nature always wears the colors of the spirit," says Emer- son; and elsewhere, "The greatest delight which the fields and the woods minister is the suggestion of an occult rela- tion between man and the vegetable. I am not alone and unacknowledged. They nod to me, and I to them." The next step in the orderly development of the nature- sense, after personification, the giving of life to the outer world, would be the discovery of occasional harmonies be- tween the life in man and the life in Nature; that is, a sym- pathy springing up on occasion between the observer's mood and that of Nature. Men had come to see the raging storm, the frovrning precipice, the weeping willow, the melancholy day, the smiling sun, the laughing meadow, i)i& blithe hrodk. How they came to apply these personifying epithets to these particular phenomena may be subject to discussion. It involves a principle which in its operations goes back to the very origins of language. Professor Max Miiller, in his Science of Language (Vol. I, p. 512), cites two such authorities as Adam Smith and I^eibnitz as holding diamet- rically opposite views as to whether in the early period of the language the word cave represented to the savage mind first the abstract idea of hollowtiess, and was afterwards applied to the individual object which possessed that quality, or vice versa; that is, whether the mind moves from the generic to the individual, or from th&individical to the ge/ieric. So far reaching a consideration of the subject as that is be- yond the scope of this essay. As to the question under con- sideration, we may presume that the earlier writers saw in the individual storm those ideas which they attributed in the 8o THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE NATURE-SENSE epithet angry ^ melancholy, laughing, etc., applied generally to man. This application of qualities to the phenomena of Nature we have treated under Personification. It is scarcely more than an individual application of this when man, in any one of these moods, should find the same mood reflected to him from Nature; when in high spirits he should see glad- ness expressed in the bright morning; or in gloominess, should feel that the dreary day was but in sympathy with him; or when exhalted with pride, should see the same spirit in the towering rock, and name it "Stozenfels''; or when bent under the burden of sorrow, should feel a kinship with the bending willow, and plant it by the grave of the loved one in perpetual memory; when with soul wrought up he should cry, "Brauset, Winde ! schaume, Meer ! Mir im Herzen braust es mehr." Biese, commenting (p. 7) upon this sentence from Vischer, "the act by which we believe to find in the soulless our own souUife rests simply upon a comparison. The physical brightness is like the spiritual brightness," etc., says, "The rock seems to rise full of scorn into the air, we think and feel ourselves into it ... . and so it not only appears to rise scornful into the air, but does so, . . . so the tree stretches its arms longingly towards heaven or drops them in melan- choly towards the earth; the rain runs with heavy weeping through the leaves; tlie mountain-world, with its heaven- kissing snows, its blinding glaciers, its rushing torrents, is exalted and sublime, free and proud, etc. But the outer Nature would not become the symbol of the heart, if there did not exist an inner relation between the human heart within and the physical world without, if there did not meet us and speak to us intelligently a pervading spirit in all Nature." It is this "pervading spirit" in man and Nature which we find dominating the poetry of the 19th century, of which Wordsworth is the incarnation — a spirit which was well-nigh unknown even to the i8th century poets, to say nothing of those of the 13th. The nature-sense has at this stage developeti into a direct IN THE GERMAN LYRIC 8 1 sympathy between the individual man and the individual phenomenon of Nature which stands over against him. It is no longer vague and general; but has become clear and specific. Another new element which deserves our notice in this stage is that it depends on occasion. Man in an tmde- fined state of mind cannot find sympathy in a vague land- scape, nor feel any sympathy towards it. He must be in some definite mood and before some specific phenomenon. No attitude could be more conducive than this to the production of lyric poetry, which is essentially the outpouring of a wrought-up soul towards some exterior object. This is the situation — a world of human hearts in touch with a world of sympathetic Nature. Does not this alone suffice to account for an epoch of lyric poetry unsurpassed, perhaps unequalled, in the world's literature — an epoch which includes Goethe and Schiller and Heine, Burns and Shelley and Wordsworth, Longfellow and Lanier and Lowell, and Victor Hugo ? With a striking consistency we find that as the nature- sense in its development, proceeding from step to step, grows deeper and more complex, the part which the Minnesingers play decreases by inverse proportion till now, with the ap- pearance of this individual sympathy, we find that they have, from the very nature of the subject, well-nigh passed beyond our consideration. In the succeeding pages we shall have to devote our atten- tention most largely to the modern period, these later phases of the nature-sense appearing but faintly in the early lyrists. When men could say with Goethe, in "Werther" (VI, p. 7), — to translate — "when I lie in the tall grass by the babbling brook, and see nearer to the earth a thousand manifold little sprigs of grass; when I feel nearer to my heart the swarms of the little world among the reeds; the countless forms of worms and gnats, and feel the presence of the Almighty who created us in his own image — when then in the gloaming the world round about me and the sky rests in my soul like the form of my beloved" — . When men could speak thus of the world round about them, they had made a great stride beyond the Minnesinger and his distant attitude towards the 82 THB DEVBI,OPMENT OF THK NATURE-SENSE world about him. However, we may find already here and there in the earlier bards the first begimiings of sympathy between man and Nature on occasion. Dietmar, speaking of the effect which winter has upon him, says — sit ich bluomen niht ensach noch erhdrte der vogel sane, sit was mir min froide kurz und ouch der jamer alze lane. (M. F., page 34.) And Reinmar, speaking of the coming of "May, says: kilme ich des erbeiten mac. sit ich froude niht enpflac sit der kalte rife lac. (M. F., page 203.) It must be noted of these examples, however, that they do not contain that clear, distinct sympathy between man and some particular phenomenon of Nature at some particular time, which we find in the later poets, but are the vague influence of a season. The old lyrist had not drawn near enough to Nature for her utterances to be very distinct in his poetic ear. Goethe's nature-creed — and in large measure the creed of the later epoch— is couched in these lines of Faust, Erhabner Geist, du gabst mir, gabst mir alles, Warum ich bat- .... Gabst mir die herrliche Natur zum Konigreich Kraft, sie zu fiihlen, zu geniessen. Nicht Kalt stauenden Besuch erlaubst du nur, Vergonnest mir in ihre tiefe Brust Wie in den Busen eines Freundes zu schauen. Du fiihrst die Reihe der I^ebendigen Vor mir vorbei, und lehrst mich meine Briider Im stillen Busch, in lyuft und Wasser kennen. (Ill, page 143.) The last lines contain the strongest expression of sym- pathy — not only birds and animals, sentient things, are akin to him; but even the bush and air and water are his brethren in the cosmic family. For such a man there is, therefore, no strainedness, nor IN THE GERMAN LYRIC 83 affectation, when he attributes even the deepest feelings of man to the inanimate world. When, for instance, on the occasion of his wife's death, he addresses the sun vainly- striving to shine through the clouds, Du versuchst, o' Sonne vergebens Durch die diistern Wolken zu scheinen ! Der ganze Gewinn meines Lebens 1st, ihren Verlust zu beweinen, (I, page 686) we feel that he is speaking in all the sincerity of his grief. I^iterature scarce affords a more exquisite lyric gem than his "Wanderers Nachtlied," Ueber alien Gipfeln 1st Ruh, In alien Wipfeln Spiirest du Kaum einen Hauch; Die Vogelein schweigen in Walde. Warte nur. balde Ruhest du auch. (I, page 66.) Here the poet is one with the landscape. The calm and peace and hush of the evening are over all. They are the very atmosphere. Life's striving ended, desire stilled, sub- missive waiting — the hush of eventide. Such the soul, and such the setting. A perfect harmony. Heine, in his "Der Traurige," gives a fine example of the sympathetic response of Nature to the mood of man, Aus dem wilden Larm der Stadter Fliichtet er sich nach dem Wald. lyustig rauschen dort die Blatter, Lust'ger Vogelsang erschallt. Doch der sang verstummet balde Traurig rauschet Baum und Blatt, Wenn der Traurige dem Walde Langsam sich genahert hat. (I, page 35.) This is an unusually strong example. Here the mood of the man drives away the joyousness of the wood, till his sor- 84 THE DBVELOPMENT OF THE NATURE-SENSE row comes to pervade the whole scene. Usually man simply finds Nature in sympathy with him. Here the attuning takes place before his eyes. The reverse of this response from the side of Nature is given in another of his poems, where he makes two happy lovers gradually succumb to the influence of their surround- ings, till at last they are silent and fall to weeping, they know not why. A kind of telepathy, as it were, by which one mind is brought into accord with another; Auf einem Grab, da steht eine lyinde, Drin pfeifen die Vogel und Abendwinde, Und drunter sitzt auf dem griinen Platz Der Mtillersknecht mit seinem Schatz. Die Winde die wehen so lind und so schaurig Die Vogel die singen so siiss und so traurig. Die schwatzenden Buhlen, die werden stumm Sie weinen und wissen selbst nicht warum. (I, page 264.) Another example of this silent compelling of man from the side of Nature is given in Herders "Andenken an Neapel," where, watching the evening glow fade away in the still sea, he is overcome to tears with yearning which the passing of this beauty breathes into his soul, Wenn die Abendrot' im stillen Meere Sanft verschwebte, und mit seinem Heere Glanzender der Mond zum Himmel stieg, Ach ! da fiossen mit so neuem Sehnen Unschuldvolle, jugendliche Thranen, Nur ein Seufzer sprach, und alles schwieg. (I, page 257.) I,enau, with fine poetic touch, takes us with him on his walk into the "winter night," till we can see the ghostly fir trees bending under their burden of snow, and feel the oppressive cold which compels the I,andscape to silence, Wie feierlich die Gegend schweigt ! Der Mond bescheint die alten Fichten, Die sehnsuchtsvoU zum Tod geneigt. Den Zweig zuriick zur Erde richten — (Page 46) IN THE GERMAN LYRIC 85 and the feverish heart finds a voice in the poet's following appeal, Frost ! friere mir ins Herz hinein, Tief in das heissbewegte, wilde ! Dass einmal Ruh mag drinnen sein, Wie hier im nachtlichen Gefilde. In "Friihliug's Tod" he presents to us another phase of Nature's sympathy. It is not a sympathy from Nature to man: rather man and Nature, standing side by side, pour out their common sympathy over the death of spring — Warum, o Liifte, fliistert ihr so bang? Durch alle Haine weht die Trauerkunde, Und storrisch klagt der triiben Welle Gang: Das ist des holden Friihlings Todesstunde. (Page 67.) L,enau, too, has felt that mystery mentioned by Heine above, that spirit of sadness which creeps unannounced into the heart, coming from nowhere; so unaccountable that in the midst of a pleasant scene, suddenly the tears well up into the eyes — Wie mich oft in griiuen Hainen tjberrascht ein dunkles Weh, Muss ich nun auch plotzlich weinen, Weiss nicht wie ? — hier auf der See. (Page 130.) In the second stanza he suggests an explanation: Tragt Natur auf alien Wegen Einen grossen, ewgen Schmerz, Den sie mir als Muttersegen Heimlich stromet in das Herz ? The brooding sadness which steals into his heart unawares is, then, the voice of the mother whispering into his secret heart of the "eternal suffering" which she bears. Korner, watching the red morning of the day of battle, reads his own feeling into the sky, and "the sanguine sun- rise' ' becomes prophetic of the bloody battle that is to come — Ahuungsgrauend, todesmutig, Bricht der grosse Morgen an 86 THE DEVKLOPMKNT OF THE NATURE-SENSE Und die Sonne kalt und blutig I^euchtet iinsrer blut'gen Balm. (Page 27.) A frequent turn of this phase of the sense is to represent Nature in contrast with man's mood— which is the obverse of the same element. For instance, Heine complains of the gladness of the world when he is sad — Die Welt ist so schon und der Himmel so blau, Und de Liifte, die wehen so lind und so lau, Und die Blumen winken auf bliihender Au, Und funkeln und glitzern im Morgentau, Und die Menschen jubeln, wohin ich shau' — Und doch mocht' ich im Grabe liegen, Und mich an ein todes Madchen schmiegen. (I, page 77.) And Arndt, in "Friihling undLiebe," furnishes a picture of contrast, where the joyousness of Nature is opposed to the sorrow of the singer — Gott griiss' euch Bliimchen fromm und schon Euch Voglein hold und feine ! Ich muss im Friihling einsam gehn, Muss traurig sehn Die griine Lust der Haine. (Page 68.) Similar examples of contrast between Nature and man's mood are found, too, in some of the old singers; for instance, Reinmar says, jo enmac mir niht der bluomen schin gehelfen fiir die sorge min, und och "der vogelline sane, ez muoz mir staete winter sin: so rehte swaer ist min gedanc. (M. F., pages 188-9.) And Kuonrat, der junge, strikes tli^ same note, — Waz hilfet mich diu sumerzit und die vil liehten langen tage ? Min tr6st an einer frowen lit von der ich grozen kumber trage. (D. L., page 220.) IN THE GERMAN LYRIC 87 On the other hand, Anehalt, speaking of winter, says, Ichn wart uoch nie so von sime getwange daz ich durch in lieze die niin vroude sin. Des danke ich doch der vil lieben frowen min. (D. L., page 125.) Kuonrat, der Schenke, says, in like manner of winter, Swie der winter uns wil twingen, doch wil ich der lieben singen. (D. L,., page 232.) Beyond these simple, general contrasts between the seasons and his mood, and the dimly reflected mood which, to be sure, may be found in all his allusions to spring and gladness, winter and sorrow — beyond these there seems to be no affin- ity between man's mood and Nature in the Minnesingers. Iviining in his treatment of Nature in the old and middle German Epic, cites from "Parzival" a more striking exam- ple of reflected mood, which is given here by the way, "elliu griiene in duhte val, sin herze d'ougen des betwanc." (Parz. IV 8); i. e. his heart compelled his eyes to see as the heart was, and the green seemed faded. The attitude of man towards the outer world is changed now. It is no longer an admiration of her beauties, a simple enjoyment of her ravishing forms and colors, a delight in the music of her voices, an awe in the presence of her sub- limities. It passes now beyond a mere aesthetic apprecia- tion, — beyond mere ecstasy over pictures, beyond rapture before some entrancing scene. It ceases to be a thrill as when some electric shock is felt. It is now the warm, con- tinuous heart to heart communion, such as exists between two individuals in whom there is a mutual understanding. It is not such a knowledge as comes from cold investigation, for "Never can any advantage be taken of nature by a trick." Faust tried in vain by incantations to catch the secret of the old Erdgeist. The spirit departed with these ominous words: "Du gleichst dem Geist den du begreifst,nicht mir." But afterwards when Faust, alone in the forest, flung himself upon the bosom of Nature, he had come to know more: — 88 THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE NATURE-SENSE Du hast mir nicht umsonst Dein Angesicht im Feuer zugewendet. Vergonnest mir in ihre tiefe Brust Wie in den Busen eines Freilnds zu schauen. It is friend with friend; "man imprisoned, man crystal- h'zed, man vegetative speaks to man," says the poet-seer. Such is, in a measure, the later development of the nature- sense. Its fundamental element, a spirtual understanding rather than an intellectual insight. I,enau expresses this essential in these lines: — Willst du im Walde weilen, Um deine Brust zu heilen. So muss dein Herz verstehen Die Stimmen die dort wehen. (Page 296.) The more men felt the responsiveness of Nature to them- selves, the more they were impelled towards Nature. Thus far we have found scarcely more than a passive responsive- ness. This rapidly develops into an active seeking of Na- ture by man. We find him yearning for the solace of Na- ture, fleeing to her, seeking a sympathy in joy or sorrow. Rousseau fled away from the distracting society of his fel- lows to calm his heart in the soothing lap of Nature. One of our own poets indicates this potency of Nature upon him- self: "I fled in tears to the woodland and laid me down on the earth. There somewhat like the beating of many hearts came up to me out of the ground, and I looked and my cheek lay close to a violet. Then my heart took courage." — (L,a- nier.) Among the old poets we find the very scantiest evidence of any tendency to seek Nature for inward benefit, whether of encouragement or solace or instruction. Liutolt von Savene speaks of the joy which bird-song brings — Wol in den der kleineu vogele singen troestet und der bluomen schin ! Wie mac dem an vrouden misselingen ? (D. L., page 127.) IN THE GKKMAN I^YKIC 89 Aud Toggeiiburc more explicitly urges those who would find joy to turn to "the green linden," Hat ie man ze froiden muot, der sol keren ze der griienen linden: Ir wol bliienden sumerbluot mac man da bi loubeschateu vinden. (D. Iv., page 199.) The last couplet strongly suggests that the joy which he finds in the linden is no higher delight than that which we have found elsewhere in the Minnesinger's writings — a joy based on physical comfort under the shade of the trees. These two selections represent the whole range of the early poet's longing towards Nature as comforter. Compare this with Goethe's address to a similar phenome- non of Nature — Anmutig Thai ! du immergriiner Hain ! Mein Herz begriisst euch wieder auf das Beste Bntfaltet mir die schwerbehangnen Aste, Nehmt freundlich mich in cure Schatten ein, Erquickt von euern Hohn am Tag der I^ieb und L,ust Mit frischer L,uft und Balsam meine Brust ! (I, page 421) This flight from humanity to Nature is one of the domi- nant elements in the latter lyric, manifesting itself in all the varying moods of the mind from the most unrestrained light- heartedness to the deepest emotions of awe and sorrow. Goethe's overflow of youthful spirits is clearly seen in these lines taken from his earliest productions — Durcli Feld und Wald ze schweifen, Mein lyiedchen wegzupfeifen, So gehts von Ort zu Ort. Ich kann sie kaum erwarten, Die erste Blum im Garten, Die erste Bliit am Baum. (I, page 15.) The same exuberant spirit flows through many of Korner's poems, an irresistible charm of the wide, wide world, which made him forsake everything and rush out into the free air 90 THK DEVELOPMENT OF THE NATURE-SENSE under the broad sky; a spirit that could not endure the op- pressive house; Schweigend liegt die Friedensnacht Auf dem stillen Thale, Und es bleicht der Sterne Pracht In des Mondes Strahle. Wie die dunkleu Schatten dort Sinn und Herz ergreifen ! Aus dem Zimmer muss ich fort, Muss den Wald durchstreifen. (Page 159.) Heine, too, loved to lose himself in the broad freedom of virgin Nature: Durch die Tannen will ich schweifen, Wo die muntre Quelle springt Wo die stolzen Hirsclie wandeln. Wo die Hebe Drossel singt Auf die Berge will ich steigen, Auf die schroffen Felsenhohn, Wo die grauen Schlossruinen In dem Morgenlichte stehn. (II Page 69.) This is a representative example of one phase of the mod- ern movement in the nature-sense— an illustration of the gen- tler side of the sense. Before Heine it had found a voice not only in the lyric but also in prose. It is the spirit of "Wer- ther" of "Wilhelm Meister," of "Paul and Virginia." It is the basis of the romantic novel, — this setting of human life into natural scenery. Not only is there an attraction towards the gentler aspects of Nature, but a real charm in the sterner features. That mood in which a man finds delight in climb- ing the wild mountains of a stormy night is something dif- ferent from the mood which enables him to be soothed by the gentle murmuring of a brook beneath green boughs. In Chamisso we read these notable lines: Ich hab' in den Kliiften des Berges gehaust Gar manche schaurige Nacht, Und, wann in den Fohren der Sturm gesaust, Recht wild in den Sturm gelacht. IN THE GERMAN LYRIC 91 Da, wo die Spur sich des Menscheu verlor, Ward's erst niir im Busen leicht; Ich bin geklommen aiif Gipfel empor, Die sonst nur der Adler erreicht. (Page 21.) But the lyric of the modern singer has its softer notes as well as its deep bass, and often while we are listening to the vibrations of these chords suddenly the lyrist touches the minor chords into music. Such a singer is Chamisso, when he turns from the music of the mountain storm to the melo- dy of the azure sky, Heiter blick' ich, ohne Rene In des Himmels reine Blaue, Zu der Sterne lichtem Gold, 1st der Himmel, ist die Freundschaft, 1st die Iviebe mir doch hold. Laure, mein Schicksal, laure! (Page 52.) The later poets show not only a recognition and apprecia- tion of the sublime in Nature as already indicated, — in mountains and storms — not only a distant admiration, but a longing to lose themselves in the great hills; to throw them- selves into the storm, to press it to their bosom, as it were, to be rapt away by the mighty wind for love of its moving spirit. So Riickert in "An den Sturmwind" appeals to the storm : Machtiger der du die Wipfel dir beugst Brausend von Krone ?Ai Krone entsteigst Wandle du sliirmender, wandie nur fort, Reiss' mir den stiirmenden Busen mit fort. Wie das Gewolke, das donnernd entfliegt, Dir auf der brausenden Schwinge sich wiegt, Fiihre den Geist aus dem irdischen Haus In die Unendlichkeit stiirmend hinaus. (Page 9.) The first lines of Korner's ode, "Beim Gewitter." furnish a fine example of the reponsiveness of the poet to the storm; his bosom heaves, his heart swells, his whole nature is wrought up, as the lightnings play and the thunders roll with majesty across the stormy sky, till he would fain rush 92 THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE NATURE-SENSE out from his narrow "cell" to where the might of the storm finds play: Der Donner rollt in wilden Regenschauern, Die Blitze leuchten majestatisch drein. Mich treibt die Sehnsucht aiis den dumpfen Mauern : Wie gross ist's dort in Blitz und Regenschauern Wie in der engen Zelle hier so klein! (Page 238.) Heine finds that the climbing of the mountains has an en- nobling influence, despite the labor of the ascent. The largeness and freedom of the surroundings seems to enter into the observer, till he feels himself newborn, and free like the eagle: — Wenn du den steilen Berg ersteigst Wirst du betrachtlich achzen: Doch wenn du den felsigen Gipfel erreichst, Horst du die Adler Krachzen. Dort wirst du selbst ein Adler fast, Du bist wie neu geboren, Du fiihlst dich frei, du fiihlst du hast Dort unten nicht viel verloren. (I, page 294.) This seems to be the reverse of the more usual reading of self into Nature. Here it is the appropriation of Nature to self. In the presence of the great he becomes for the mo- ment great. ' On the mountain-top he feels himself trans- formed into an eagle. This transfer of qualities has long been known in some of its manifestations. A rider seeing and feeling the motions of his horse feels the transfer of all the horse's energy to himself, feels powerful like his steed. But this transfer depends upon a recognition of these qual- ities in the circumstances. The engineer with his hand on the throttle feels the power of his engine pass to him; the passenger looking from the window feels no thrill. The old poets were in the presence of as sublime aspects of Nature as those which the moderns saw, but they felt no thrill of transferred qualities, because they did not see them first in Nature. But L,enau can sing, IN the; GERMAN LYRIC 93 Des Berges Gipfel war erscliwmigeli, Der trotzig in die Tiefe schaut; Natur, von deinem Reiz durchdrungen, Wie selling mein Herz so frei, so laut!, (Page 103.) Although the contribution which Nature had thus far made to men was very great; although it was a spiritual in- fluence, rather than an intellectual quickening, (which later came in the advance of natural science) , still our poets of this later period had not found in Nature that which Cowper saw vaguely, and Wordsworth clearly. Palgrave after quo- ting these lines from Wordsworth, The Being, that is in the clouds and air. That is in the green leaves among the groves, Maintains a deep and reverential care For the unoffending creatures whom he loves, says, "But this peculiar sentiment seems to have been un- known to mediaeval feelmg about Nature." But rarely do we hear even from these modern poets a word of the moral contribution which Nature makes. They did not feel with Emerson, that "the happiest man is he who learns from Nature the lesson *of worship." Klopstock, who is the spirtual brother of the hymnist Cowper, finds in Na- ture more moral teaching than does any other poet of the group; indeed this is his chief use of Nature, to praise the wisdom and majesty of the Creator. Again and again he makes Nature testify to the existence of the Invisible. Take these lines from "Friihlingfeier:" Nun schweben sie, rauschen sie, wirbeln die Winde. Wie beugt sich der Wald, wie hebt sich der Strom! Sichtbar, wie du es Sterblichen sein kannst, Ja, Das bist du, sichtbar, Unendlicher! Der Wald neigt sich der Strom fiiehet, und ich Falle.nicht auf mein Angesicht? Herr, Herr, Gott, barmherzig und gnadig! Du Naher, erbarme dich meiner! (Page 119.) Compare this with the storm song of the Hebrew lyrist in the 29th Psalm; 94 THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE NATURE-SENSE The voice of the Lord is full of majest3^ The voice of the lyord breaketh the cedars; Yea, the Lord breaketh in pieces the cedars of Lebanon. The Lord sat as king at the flood; Yea, the Lord sitteth as king forever. The Lord will give strength unto his people; The Lord will bless his people with peace. There is between these two lyrics a striking resemblance, both in substance and in form. They both refer to the storm, one as the voice, the other as the manifestation of the Crea- tor. In both the retreat of the .storm is heard, and the mercy of the Creator acknowledged. Both end, as it were, with peace — the bow after the tempest. This is not a common element in the German lyric, however. Even to the pastor Herder Nature is but dimly moral in its teachings, his use of it being not different from that of the other poets. These lines from Lenau's "Waldlieder," which strongly suggest those quoted above, and at the last lead us to anticipate a like ending, fail to bring in a moral reference; Der Donner bricht herein PvS kracht die Welt in Wettern, Als wollt am Felsgestein Der Himmel sich zerschmetteru. Doch mir im Herzensgrund 1st Heiterkeit und Stille; Mir wachst in solcher Stuud' Und hartet sich der Wille. (Page 295.) The peace of the conclusion is not here that of trust, but that of the unll. VIII— NATURE AS BACKGROUND. "It is a psjxhological fact," says Iviining (p. 278), "that the spirit when aroused seeks by unconscious inclinations to bring itself into accord with the surrounding Nature, that is, is accustomed to seek out that surrounding which harmonizes with i:s mood." The writer can scarcely mean that this psychological fact is universal and true of all times, for in order to seek a harmonious and natural surrounding there is necessary the pre-recognition of expression in Nature, of different moods in different phases; a recognition of that in Nature which is in harmony with that in self; and the ability thus to see moods in Nature has not existed at all t'mes in men. To put it differently men have not always conceded a personality to the inanimate world. Granted this concession on the part of man, however, we may expect him to seek in Nature that surrounding which is in accord with his mood. In proportion as men recognize this personal element in Na- ture will they seek it, and in proportion as they seek it will they come to use it in the art of expression, whether of pen or paint, to heighten and set off that element of human life which, at the time, they are seeking to present. It may not be a conscious art, but it must 07ice have been so. The "un- conscious inclination" springs from conscious effort. Shake- spere's use of Nature in Macbeth is so natural that we can- not think of it as conscious art, but the poet must long have studied the expression in Nature's various phenomena. The use of Nature as background in literature can scarcely precede a recognion of affinity betwen man and Nature. It is subsequent in genesis, though it may be contemporary in use. Commentators upon the early Epic seem not to be quite agreed as to the strength of the nature-sense in the German Epic; which disagreement can perhaps be explained by exam- ination into the influences operating on the literature at dif- ferent periods. Biese says, (p. 99), "there is scarcely in 96 THE DBVELOPMKNT OF THE NATURE-SENSE world-literature an Epic so poor in painting of time and place as the 'Nibelungenlied' — Elementary nature plays no role not even as frame — the portraying of the time (of day) is as insipid as possible — Even the picturing of places is not more individual. — Even the description of the hunt and Siegfried's murder is sober and wanting with reference to landscape. — No trace of any sympathetic" Naturanschauung," which lends to flowers, trees and mountain a sensitive, sym- pathetic heart — as even the old Norse Sage does so touchingly at Balder's death!" Eiining says, (p. 276), "That poet will have to reckon upon the greatest effect who keenly feels this secret connection between place and action, who knows how to catch that hidden soul of a certain landscape, and bring it into concert with his action, in short knows how to find the right stage for his play. The Germanic poets have not let escape them such a means of preparing themselves a ground in the minds of men, and especially in the Anglo Saxon po- etry do we find very impressive examples of the harmony be- tween place and action." These two German authors agree in granting a background use of Nature in the -very early poetry, — Norse and Anglo Saxon. But Eiining says further (p.278), "On German ground we have likewise a number of such cases of agreement in set- ting and action," citing in evidence from Tristan and Isolde and other middle German Epics. Upon the whole, however, it seems that a nature- background is not common even in the middle German Epic. Why, it may be asked, does the use of Nature as a sym- pathetic background to human action or emotion appear in this early literature, and fail from a later period in the same fields ? Is it not evidence against an orderly development in the nature-sense? This explanation is suggested in answer. The Norse and Saxon mythology is very like that of the Greeks in its richness and scope, especially in its pantheistic interpretation of Nature. Behind the phenomena of Nature were the gods. Odin was in every movement of the air. When it thundered it was Thor with his hammer. To these old singers it was not so much Nature, as we accept her IN THB GERMAN LYRIC 97 today, as it was the manifestation of gods with human qual- ities. They had, therefore, in their mythology lifted Nature from the inanimate, and given her a manifold human per- sonality. Their treatment of Nature was the classic treat- ment at bottom. With the conquests of Charlemagne about 800 A. D. began the wane of mythology and the w^axing of Christianity. The early writings came under the influence of mythology, the later writing in the new order of things, when Nature had, in the minds of men, been robbed of her mythical personality, and had lain for a long while voiceless. The difference between the Saxon poem and the middle Ger- man poem is due to the same causes which, operating through longer time, replaced in literature the Greek interpretation of Nature by the modern. The middle German nature-sense was not a continuation of the Norse and Saxon. It was a new growth in new fields, and had to have its slow begin- nings. It would be an anachronism, if we found in the Minnesingers a prominent nature- background. We find, in fact, a great poverty. The old singer rarely gives a nature-setting to his persons. His very use of Nature precludes such. He rarely brings Nature and man together in a picture. It is either a comparison of Nature and woman by figures, or, rarely an ode to some phase of Nature. He rarely blends human ac- tion and nature-effect. When he does so, it is a simple, idyllic picture as for instance when Steimar describes his mis- tress as going out into the meadow to gather flowers, Nu nimt si uf die heide ir ganc in des meien kleider, Da si bluomen zeinem kranze brichet den si zuo dem tanze tragen wil. (D. Iv. page 241.) or in Tanhtiser's really roniintic description of his sweet- heart sitting by a fountain in the wood, which reminds us ^her of St. Pierre, Ein riviere icli da gesach, durch den fores gienc ein bach 98 THB db;vki.opmknt of the; nature-sense zetal iiber ein planiure. ich sleich ir nach unz ich si fant die schoenen creatiure. bi dem fontane saz diu klare siieze von faitiure. (D. L., page 193); Walter gives us a pleasant picture — a summer idyl — in his ' 'Traumbedeutuug, ' ' where on a hot day he comes to a spring by the wood and falls to sleep under a tree by the spring, while the birds are singing near by, and the meadow-flowers blooming; Do der sumer komen was und die bluomeu durch daz gras wiinnecliche entsprungen, alda die vogele suugen, dar kom ich gegangen an einen anger langen; da ein luter brunne enspranc; vor dem walde was sin ganc, da diu nahtegale sane Bi dem brunnen stuont ein boum, da gesach ich einen troum. (Page 14.^ Such examples as the following from Kristan are not uncommon, Wunneclichen sol man schouwen, meien schiu iiber elliu lant, Vogele singent in den ouwen die man dicke truric vant. Swa e lac vil toup diu heide, d^ siht man schoen ougen weide; nust miu liehter meigen tac ; (D. L, page 138.) But this is not background use of Nature, since no person really appears upon the scene. It is contemplation of the landscape from without, not a mingling of Nature and hu- man action. The human element is thus usually held aloof from Nature by these poets. Let us consider this element as found in the later poets. Heine approaches nearer to the simple love idyl of the.Qld singers than perhaps any other of the later period. Tliis might well be a translation of some minnesong, IN THE GERMAN LYRIC 99 Der Mond ist aufgegangen Und iiberstrahlt die Well'ii; Ich halte mein lyiebchen umfaiigen. Und nnsre Herzen schweH'n, (I. page loo.) This stanza from Uland's "Die Nonne," maybe taken as a companion picture; Im stilleu Klostergarten Eine bleiche Jungfrau ging; Der Mond bescliien sie triibe, An ihrer Wimper hing Die Thrane zarter Liebe. (Page 1 20.) The same nature-setting in part is used in both pictures, and yet the tones in the two pictures are diametrically opposite. Each poet has shown a mastery in the use of Nature. In both cases it is moonlight, but notice how a few touches change the tone. The first is by the shore and the waves are touched by the gentle moon — the setting for happy love. The second is in the still cloister garden and the feeble moon- beams touch a pale face — the setting for blighted love. Biirger paints a pastoral in seven words, Ein niedlich Schafermadchen stand Am klaren Wiesenbache. (Page 24.) Heine in ''Erklarung" catches admirably the spirit of the place when he blends "Heimweh" and twilight falling over the rippling sea; Herangedammert kam der Abend, Wilder toste die Flut. Und ich sass am Strande, und schaute zu Dem weissen Tanz der Wellen, Und meine Brust schwoll auf wie das Meer, Und sehnend ergriff mich ein tiefes Heimweh, (I. page 170.) Eiining cites a parallel passage in "Cynewulf," where An- drean, sorrow laden, goes at twilight over the sanddunes along the breakers; and refers to the passage in Homer where Odysseus sits by the waving sea and longs for home. lOO THE DKVfiLOPMKNT OF THE NATURE-SENSE For the same in painting see Bocklin's (b. 1827) "Villa am Meer." The moderns are more versatile than the old poets in their use of Nature, finding a background for other moods than love aud longing. Here is a setting for death-lament, taken from Chamisso's "Todesklage"; Windsbraut tobet unverdrossen Eule schreiet in den Klippen — Weh! Euch hat der Tod geschlossen Blaue Augen, ros'ge Eippen! (Page So) This background which Korner paints for the funeral pro- cession needs no comment , ■ Die Erde schweigt mit tiefem, tiefem Trauern, Vom leisen Geisterhauch der Nacht umfliistert; Horch wie der Sturm in alter Eichen knistert Und heuleud braust durch die verfall'nen Mauern. Auf Grabern liegt, als wollt'er ewig dauern, Ein tiefer Schnee, der Erde still verschwistert, Und finst'rer Nebel, der die Nacht umdustert, Umarmt die Welt mit kalten Todesschauern. Es blickt der Silbermond in bleichem Zittern Mit stiller Wehmut durch die oden Fenster: — Auch' seiner Strahlen sanftes Eicht vergliiht! — Und leicht und langsam zu des Kirchthors Gittern Still wie das Wandern nachtlicher Gespenster, Ein Leichenzug mit Geisterschritten zieht. (Page 99.) Quite a different mood is seen in Eenau's "Abendbilder," where the background is made to accord with the spirit of prayer in the foreground. It is evening in the picture: the sun is sinking over the forest: the meadow is hushed; scarce is the low twinkling of- the bells audible as the herd slowly crop the grass: the simple shepherd, turning towards the set- ting sun, lets fall his flute and his staff, while he folds his hands in silent prayer, — an Angelus in words, — IN THE GERMAN I,YRIC lOI Schon verstummt die Matte: den satten Rindern Selten nur enthallt das Geglock am Halse, Und es pfliickt der wahlende Zahn nurjassig Dunklere Graser. Und dort blickt der schuldlose Hirt der Sonne Sinnend nacli; dem Sinnenden jetzt entf alien Flot'und Stab, es falten die Hande sich zum Stillen Gebete. (Page 97.) The following selections from lycnau are unusual, because they show the use of nature-background not to heighten the effect of human foreground, but to give a fitting frame for some individual aspect in the landscape itself. In the first the "forsaken, silent forest-chapel" is almost human, so strongly does it suggest a melancholy mood, there under the shadow of the mountain at sunset of a bleak November day, the dead leaves of autumn driven past it in the wind; Der dunkle Wald umrauscht den Wiesengrund, Gar diister liegt der graue Berg dahinter; Das diirre lyaub, der Windhauch giebt es kund, Geschritten kommt allmhalich schon der Winter. Dort wo die Eiche rauscht am Bergesfuss, Wo bang voriiberklagt des Baches Welle, Dort winket wie aus alter Zeit ein Gruss, Die langst verlassne, stille Waldkapelle. (Page 142. The foreground of the second is likewise taken from the landscape itself, but here it is a castle-ndn. How admirably does the poet, by his choice of setting, distinguish between the neglected chapel and the ruined castle. The one is of the present, the other is of the past. Therefore the bleak day is the setting of the first; the still moonlit summer night and the sighing in the fir trees — the spirits' hour — is the setting of the second. — Vom Berge schaut hinaus ins tiefe Schweigen Der Mond beseelten schonen Sommernacht Die Burgruine: und in Tannenzweigen Hinseufzt ein Liiftchen, das allein bewacht I02 THE de;vei,opment of the nature-sense Die triimmervolle Einsamkeit, Den bangen I^aut: "Verganglichkeit!" (Page 152) A not infrequent treatment of nature-background is con- trast, where the foreground is brought out in greater relief by contrasted setting— the obverse of the above cited treat- ment. The old poets' use of contrast leaves us in doubt as to whether they intended a landscape effect, or merely a con- trast between moods not brought really upon the same can- vass: as when Wintersteten says, Berc und tal in alien landen sint erlost uz winters banden heide rote rosen treit. sich froit al diu welt gemeine, niemen truret wan ich eine. (D. L., page 163.) Or when Walter von Klingen says, Heide ist aber worden schoene, si hat manger hande varwe kleit; Vogele singent siieze doene. swie diu sumerwunne ist vil gemeit, Da bi dulde ich sendiu leit. (D. L., page 219.) The landscape is there but instead of the individual clearly drawn in the foreground, we have a shadowy suggestion of his presence there. A like example from Kuonrat der junge will be sufficient to show the very doubtful use of background by these singers ; Der mei wil uns ergetzen wol mit manigem wiinneclichen tage: des ist diu welt gar froiden vol. Was hilfet mich diu sumerzit ? (D. Iv., page 220.) These selections might almost as fittingly have been given under "Contrasted mood," so separately are the personal and natural features treated. Drummond says in his Addresses (p. 113) "Two painters each painted a picture to illustrate his conception of IN THB GERMAN I,YRIC 103 rest. The first chose for his scene a still, lone lake among the far off mountains. The second threw on his canvas a thundering waterfall with a fragile birch tree bending over the foam ; at the fork of a branch almost wet with the cata- ract's spray, a robin sat on its nest." Both these conceptions appear in the literary art of the i8th and 19th centuries — effect by harmony ; effect by contrast. Of the latter I^enau gives an illustration in these lines, in which he represents a man in reverie beneath the beetling cliff where wild the brook is leaping down ; Dort am steilen Klippenhange, Wo der Wildbach niederschaumt, lychnt beim Sonnenuntergange Einsam still ein Mann — und traumt. (Page 54.) and again when he makes the traveller drink in rest, lying beneath the towering, ice-harnessed giants of the Alps ; Alpen, o wie starkte mich die Rast, lyagernd auf dem weichen Griin der Wiesen, Krauterdiifte fachelten den Gast, Eisgeharnischt ragten eure Riesen. (Page 272.) Korner paints a like contrast in the village nestling in the still valley, while behind are the mountain, the dark fii -for- est, and the rushing stream ; Freundlich an dem Berggehange In des Thales stiller Enge, Freundlich, wie ich keines sah, Liegt das liebe Dorfchen da. Oben auf des Berges Hohen, Alte, dunkle Fichten stehen, Unten rauscht der Strom vorbei, Und die I^uft ist mild und frei. (Page 133.) A highly dramatic blending of Nature and human action would fall rather into the field of the play writer than of the lyrist. Instance the weird witch-scene, the thunder and lightning, with which Shakspere ushers us into "Macbeth." I04 the; DEVEI.OPMENT OF THE NATURE-SENSE Hear the mad old King I^ear in his ravings provoke the bursting storm. Blow, winds, and crack your cheeks ! rage ! blow ! You cataracts and hurricanes, shout Till you have drench' d our steeples, drowned the cocks ! This dramatic use of Nature is seen in Schiller's "Tell," where the brewing storm prepares the way for the precipi- tate appearance of Baumgarten pursued by the tyrant's horsemen; and again when the calm sunrise on the Riitli foretells the happy outcome of the confederacy. Goethe's masterly use of background is shown nowhere better than in "Faust ;" first, on the occasion of Valentine's murder, when Faust says as if in premonition of the crime, Wie von dem Fenster dort der Sakristei Aufwarts der Schein des ewgen Lampchens fiammert Und schwach und schwacher seitwarts dammert, Und Finsternis drangt ringsum bei, So siehts in meinem Busen nachtig ! (Ill, page 164.) and again in the weird brocken-scene, and lastly at the Rab- enstein, which in its uncanniness and omen, suggests the witch-scene of "Macbeth," — F. Was weben die dort um den Rabenstein ? M. Weiss nicht, was sie kochen und schaffen. F. Schweben auf, schweben ab, neigen sich, beugen sich. M. Eine Hexenzunft. (Ill, page 200.) Among the lyrists we find, however, examples almost as strongly dramatic as these. Chamisso prepares the way for a suicide scene by depicting the background in these lines, Zu des Meeres dunkleu Schosse Senkte trauernd blut'gen Scheines, Sturmverkundend sich die Sonne. Nachtlich hebet dumpf herbrausend Sich des Sturmes wilder Fittich. In dem Streifen roher Winde Ziehn die Wolken, oft des Mondes Silberstrahleu nachtlich hemmend. (Page 389.) I IN THE GERMAN I^YRIC I05 Lenau prepares the reader's mind for the self-destruction of the Indian chief at Niagara, by this introduction, Machtig ziinit der Himmel im Gewitter, Schmettert manche Reiseneich'in Splitter, tjbertont des Niagara Stimme, Und mit seiner Blitze Flammenruten Peitscht er schneller die beschaumten Fluten, Dass sie stiirzen mit emportem Grimme. (Page 116.) The poets use contrast, also, to lend greater force to the action which is to occupy the foreground. Korner prefaces a description of battle with a moonlit scene and the sleeping world, Es schweigt die Nacht, die Erde traumt, Und bleich der Mond die Wolken saumt. — Was bist du Welt, so still, so leer? Was lau'rst du wie ein falsches Meer ? Es saust so ode durch dein Reich Und Schauder fasst die Seele, gleich Als wolltest du mit leisem Beben Des Morgens blut'gen Schleier heben. (Page 12.) Even in the peaceful scene there is felt a premonition of something terrible impending — a calm which precedes the storm and almost heralds it. For a like effect compare Dun- can's interpretation of the scene as he enters the castle of Macbeth on the fatal evening; This castle has a pleasant seat ; the air Nimbly and sweetly recommends itself Unto our gentle senses. (Macbeth, Act i, Sc. vi) which heightens the effect of the coming events as portended by lady Macbeth' s words from within the castle walls, . . . The raven himself is hoarse That croaks the fatal entrance of Duncan Under mv battlements. (Act I, vSc. V.) In the first scene of "Tell" the dramatic use of contrast is equally strong. The play opens by the lake in a quiet sunlit IC6 THE DBVBI,OPMENT OF THE NATURE-SENSE scene. A fisher-boy in his boat is singing to the melody of the "Kuhreihen," Es lachelt der See, es ladet zum Bade, Der Knabe schlief ein am griinen Gestade, and the herdsman answers from the mountain side with a va- riation of the same melody. Then immediately the land- scape changes, and before the first pleasant picture can fade from the reader's mind, the storm has broken over the scene, Baumgarten has rushed up escaping for his life, a violent scene on the shore is followed by Tell and Baumgarten in a boat battling against wind and wave. The gap is clearly widening more and more between the old singers and the new as we compare them in the progress of the nature-sense. IX— LANDSCAPE. Landscape, or the consideration of Nature for itself and not as accessory to man, belongs to the period of full and complete development of the nature-sense. It is, in its own completeness, the last word on Nature. It demands in the writer or artist an ability to apprehend Nature in its largeness and breadth, and too its depth ; an ability to see clearly not only minor things, the flowers and trees and streams of the foreground, but also broad sweeps of earth and sky, mountains and the great clouds, which fill in the background on Na- ture's picture ; ability to see not only the individuals, but the scene in its tout ensemble. The proportion, the relations, the perspective, the depth, the atmosphere, all enter into the landscape, whether in Nature or in its artistic reproduction. And this whole must be apprehended not as dead, but as liv- ing and breathing and having expression. Landscape would therefore, naturally come, in the progress of the nature-sense, after the use of Nature as background. It would be, indeed, only a development of this use of Nature ; only an accentua- tion of the background instead of the foreground, the assign- ing of greater importance to the setting as compared with the thing set. An examination, especially of painting, shows that such a gradual transition really took place. Symonds says, (p. 304), "Clinging still to the tradition that some his- torical or mythological subject is required to make up a pict- ure, these masters introduce Abraham, Odysseus, a sacrifice to Pan, or possibly S. Jerome with his skull, somewhere in their composition. But the relation between the human mo- tive and the landscape is reversed. The former, which had hitherto been all-important, is now subordinated to the lat- ter. The artist's energies are bestowed on working out the scene, the atmospheric luminocity, the open champlain, the massive foliage, and the mighty clouds. The figures are carelessly sketched in, and little heed is paid to emphasizing their action." io8 the; drvei^opmkn't op thk nature-sknsb He is speaking of Rubens, Claude, the two Poussins and Salvator Rosa, and therefore of the last stages of this transition in painting, for Claude and S. Rosa, at least, are sometimes called the first pure landscape-artists. Their paint- ings show the fading out of the human foreground from canvas. But what qualities has our investigation showed us thus far in the nature-sense of the Minnesinger? We have found, as already indicated, that he notices minor things, the indi- viduals of the scene, birds, flowers, brooks, things usually- near at hand, such features as would enter into the making of a foreground ; that he omits the larger features such as broad expanses of earth or sky ; that he does not mention mountains nor extended woods nor clouds, such features as would enter into the background. Under these limitations, his landscape, if he drew one, could not be otherwise than simple and flat. Biese, (p. 233) has very aptly put the general case in these words, "A landscape painting will not be possible in times and and among people . . . who grasp only the individual, who consider only brooks and flowers, grasses and dew-drops, who without reference to the whole landscape, offer mere foreground without distance, as is the case in the middle ages until the renaissance in po- etry." Professor Palgrave properly confesses to a limited knowl- edge of the Minnesingers when he makes this statement ; (p. 79) "It is indeed only among the once famous Minnesinger school of the 12th and 13th centuries, so far as my limited knowledge goes, that a distinctive landscape element is found." In factjthere is almost no landscape element in the writings of this school, as will be indicated by selections below- A glance at the "Naturanschauuug" in painting may not be inapropos just here, since this art runs almost parallel with literature as a medium of expression. That the Greek school made use of Nature as a background in painting is proven by the surviving vestiges of that school in the fresco paintings of Pompeii. But from the Christian era until well IN THB GERMAN LYRIC 109 into the 14th century there is almost no recognition of Na- ture. The old painters gave to their figures a background of gold. These works are almost without exception relig- ious in subject, "But at the close of the thirteenth cent- ury," says Ruskin, "Giotto, and in the course of the four- teenth, Arcogna, sought for the first time, to give some re- semblance to Nature in their backgrounds and introduced behind their figures pieces of true landscape, formal enough, but complete in intention." (Lectures on Archi- tecture and Painting, lecture III.) With the advent of Ra- phael (1483- 1 520) and his contemporaries nature back- ground had advanced somewhat as may be seen in his ' 'Trans- figuration," "Mount Parnassus," and "Madonna of Foligno," in the Vatican; and also from the works of his master Perugino. This tendency to Nature in art developed in the different schools at different paces. Miss Reynolds says that in the English school up to 1725, "even a landscape background is of rare occurrence. ' ' Biese says that in the Dutch school landscape was considered for its own sake as early as Rubens (i 577-1 640). Claude Lorraine (i 600-1 682) of the French, and Salvator Rosa (1615-1673) of the Italian school are considered as landscape painters. These meagre data will serve to give us an idea as to the date of the ap- pearance of Nature in art and its rapid growth in certain ground. It seems that in the 15th century the time was ripe ; but it had not occurred to the old masters "that laud- scape might be treated as an object in itself." But the Minnesingers belong to the 12th and 13th centu- ries, full two hundred years before Rapheal. We can hardly expect in them a distinctive landscape element. Let us ex- amine their utterances in this field first hand, and see if these conclusions are in accordance with facts. Walter's single landscape, if such it can be called, is con- tained in these lines, Ich saz uf einen griienen le, da ensprungen bluomen unde kle zwischen mir und einem se. no THK DKVKLOPM^NT OP THE NATURE-SENSE der ougenweide ist da niht me : da wir schapel brachen e, da lit nu rife unde sne. daz tuot den vogellineu we. (Page 8.) This is but the veriest skeleton of a landscape. It is only a picture drawn in, as if the artist had said, "I shall paint a picture with flowers and clover in the foreground and beyond the meadow some water. ' ' It has not been filled in. There is no coloring, no "atmosphere," no depth : it is a flat sur- face, which only makes us wonder what the picture would be. We of today can so easily fill it in that we are in danger of thinking it is full. Nithart gives us just such another sketch in these words, Komen ist uns ein liehtiu ongenweide man siht der r6senwunder uf der heide ; die bluomen dringen durch daz gras. wie schone ein wise getouwet was, da mir min geselle zeinem kranze las ! (D. L., page 109) This is a foreground solely, where roses fill the meadow. The poet keeps his eye to earth so persistently that we almost wonder if there were no distance to him, no horizon, no serrate rim where earth and heaven meet, no clouds. He never gets beyond the individual in his picture, and this individual is the simplest, most patent that Nature affords. lyiutolt von Savene furnishes another example of early landscape attempt ; In dem walde und uf der griienen heide meiet ez so rehte wol. Daz man sich der lieben ougenweide wol von schulden troesten sol : (D. L,., page 126.) The Minnesinger praises the "ougenweide" — the "pas- ture for the eyes," but despite his passing praise his eyes seem never to have found great sustenance there, for they return ever and and anon to ' 'pasture' ' upon his mistress. In the above cited lines there is the usual simplicity. We should scarcely take the description of the first two lines to IN THE GERMAN LYRIC III be that of a landscape, if he did not label it as such in the the third line. Toggenburc makes a bundle of the landscape and throws it in as not worth mention along with his "vrowe," Bluomen loup kle berge und tal und des meien sumersiieziu wunne Diu sint gegen dem rosen val s6 min vrowe treit. (D. Iv., page 200.) Kuonrat der Schenke gives us this winter landscape, as bare as the naked tree that is not drawn by the poet, wait und ouwe die sint val, Da bi anger und diu heide, die man sach in liehtem kleide, in den landen iiber al. (D. I,., page 232.) Der wilde Alexander seems to have in mind something like a picnic scene in these lines, Ich gedenk wol daz wir sazen in den bluomen unde mazen welch diu schoenest mohte sin. do schein unser kintlich schin mit dem niuwen kranze zuo dem tanze alsus gat diu zit von hin. Seht d6 lief wir ertber suochen von der tannen zuo der buochen iiber stoc und iiber stein der wile daz diu sunne schein, (D. Iv., page 231.) There is here, as elsewhere, no landscape proper ; there are only a few objects immediately at hand, — trees and flowers. Otte zem Turne's description has at least the virtue of brevity commensurate with the picture, Schouwent wie diu heide lit ; liehte bluomen sint entsprungen. (D. L., page 286.) These descriptions of landscape represent the very best the Minnesong affords, so far as I have discovered it ; and they 112 THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE NATURE-SENSE show that our inference regarding the landscape of this liter- ature was not far wrong. Let us consider now briefly landscape as found after five hundred years in the literature of the same people. Goethe in " Wilkommen und Abschied," describes a night scene," Der Abend wiegte schon die Brde, Und an den Bergen hing die Nacht ; Schon stand im Nebelkleid die Biche Ein aufgetiirmter Riese da, Wo Finsternis aus dem Gestrauche Mit hundert schwarzen Augen sah. Der Mond von einem Wolkenhiigel Sah klaglich aus dem Duft hervor, Die Winde schwaugen leise Fliigel Umsausten schauerlich mein Ohr. (I, page 45.) In this scene all is intended to be obscure, but there is clearness in the obscurity. There is no vagueness in con- ception such as appeared in the early period, but only the obscurity of night, through the veil of which we can see the individual features. There are the mountains through the gloom, and the giant oak wrapped in the mist like a spectre in its shroud, and the struggling moon-beams : and even the soft beating of the unseen wings, that makes the scene breathe with a sigh. Nature sometimes paints, like Par- rhasius, a veil over her picture, but we can always see the face behind. She is never vague. The painter tnay be. Herder gives a similar veiled picture in "Abendlied" ; Der Mond ist aufgegangen, Die Goldnen Sternlein prangen Am Himmel hell und klar : Der Wald steht schwarz und schweiget Und aus den Wiesen steiget Der weisse Nebel wunderbar. (II. page 314.) A beautiful picture is that which Goethe makes Mignon give of her native land Italy ; it is the voice of his own longing for the south-l^ud ; IN THE GBRMAN I,YRIC II3 Kennst du das Land wo die Citronen bliihn, Im dunkeln I^aub die Goldorangen gliihn, Ein sanfter Wind vom blauen Himniel weht, Die Myrte still und hoch der I,orbeer steht. (I, page 106.) An ideal Italian landscape — green trees and golden apples kissed by the zephyrs, and over all the deep blue sky. In "Ilmenau" he gives us a kinetoscopic picture ; a quick shift- ing of the scene ; Melodisch rauscht die hohe Tanne wieder, Melodisch eilt der Wasserfall hiernieder ; Die Wolke sinkt, der Nebel driickt ins Thai, Und es ist Nacht und Dammrung auf einmal. (I, page 421.) Schiller describes in "Der Spaziergang" the view which greeted him from the hill-top, a description notable for its breadth and intensity ; Unabsehbar ergiesst sich vor meinem Blicke die Feme, Und ein blaues Berg endigt im Dufte die Welt. Tief an des Berges Fuss, der gahlings unter mir abstiirzt, Wallet des griinlichten Stroms fliessender Spiegel vorbei. Endlos unter mir seh ich den Aether, iiber mir endlos, Blicke mit Schwindeln hinauf , blicke mit Schaudern hinab. Aber zwischen der ewigen Hoh und der ewigen Tiefe Tragt ein gelanderter Steig sicher den Wandrer dahin. I^achend fliehen an mir die reichen Ufer voriiber Und den frohlichen Fleiss riihmet das prangende Thai. Jene I^inien, sieh ! die des I^andmanns Eigentum scheiden, In den Teppich der Flur hat sie Demeter gewirkt. (I, page 224.) Claude L,orraine nor Salvator Rosa could have desired a wider compass than is found in these lines, nor a more exqui- site blending of the sublime and the idyllic on a single can- vas. Heine, the poet of the sea par excellence, gives us in "Die Nordsee, this graphic seascape, Wie schwarzgriine Rosse mit silbernen Mahnen Sprangen die weissgekniuselten Wellen ; Wie Schwanenziige schifften voriiber Mit schimmernden Segeln die Helgolauder 114 1*HE DEVKLOPMENT OF THE NATURE-SENSE Die kecken Nomaden der Nordsee ! Ueber mir,in dem ewigen Blau, Flatterte weisses Gewolk Und prangte die ewige Sonne, Die Rose des Himmels, die feuerbliihende, Die freudvoll im Meer sich bespiegelte, (I, page igr.) Biirger, who loved rather the gentler aspects of Nature than the sterner, describes in the poem "Das Dorfchen" the landscape in which the little village lay, Welch ein Gefilde ! Kein Dietrich fand Zu einem Bilde Den Gegenstand ! Hier Felsenwand, Dort Aehrenf elder Und Wiesengriin Dem blaue Walder Die Grenze ziehn ; An jener Hohe Die Schaferei Und in der Nahe Mein Sorgenfrei. (Page 30) Here are sheep pasturing on the slope, rocky walls, corn fields and green meadows shut in by hlue woods. Heretofore the woods had been stereotyped green ; now the poet puts them far enough away from him to be blue, a result of larger landscape. Elsewhere the poet gives us a morning landscape of a like tone, Die lyuft war rein, der Himmel blau ; Die Bachlein flossen still und heiter ; Es glanzten Blumen, Gras und Krauter Noch von Aurorens Perlentau. Die Sonne kaum ein wenig weiter Als durch ein Viertel ihrer Bahn Liess auch auf schattenlosem Plan Ihr Strahlenlicht, gemildert von Zephyren, Die lebende Natur nur noch zur Wollust spiiren. (Page 372.) lycnau in four lines draws a landscape which, in the great- IN THE GERMAN LYRIC II 5 ness of its elements, reminds one of the strokes of a Rubens or a Rembrandt ; Schon ist der Berge Purpurglut verglommen, Und zitternd flieht des Tages letzter Strahl Der Nacht schon aus dem Wege. Sei willkommen, O Dunkelheit, im ernsten Eichenthal ! (Page 75.) Here the minor features of the foreground have been lost before the titanic movement in the background ; the mountains, the flight of day before the night, and the fall of darkness. One of the most perfect landscape pictures in the poetry of the whole period is that given by the same writer in "Auf eine hollandische Landschaf t. ' ' The gem is so exquisite that I would not mar it — here is the whole poem, Miide schleichen hier die Bache Nich ein Liiftchen horst du wallen. Die entfarbten Blatter fallen Still zu Grund, vor Alterschwache. Krahen, kaum die Schwingen regend, Streichen langsam ; dort am Hiigel Lasst die Windmuhl' ruhn die Fliigel ; Ach, wie schlafrig ist die Gegend ! Lenz und Sommer sind verflogen Dort das Hiittlein, ob es trutze, Blickt nicht aus, die Strohkapuze Tief ins Aug' herabgezogen. Schlummernd, oder trage sinnend, Rulit der Hirt bei seinen Schafen, Die Natur Herbstnebel spinnend, Scheint am Rocken eingeschlafen. (Page 179.) Saint Pierre (1737-18 14) said of the travellers of his day, "If they describe a country to you, you will see in it towns, rivers, mountains ; but their descriptions are as barren as a geographic map : Hindostan resembles Europe ; there is no character in it.'' No one could possibly mistake the above Il6 THB DEVBl,OPMENT OF THK NATURB-SENSE description of a Dutch landscape, with its windmill and thatched-roof huts. The landscape of the modern period is stamped with char- acter. IhhsLS breadth and dejyth. It has diversity and unity. "Quam fluctus diversi, quam mare conjucti" might be said of the features of the 19th century landscape. It embraces all the phenomena of Nature — the great and the small, the far and the near. . It has perspective and proportion ; it has depth ; it is natural. X.-CONCLUSION. The Minnesinger recognized in Nature first and foremost that which ministered to his physical comfort — the spring, the summer, the shade of the trees. Secondly, he recognized the simpler forms of beauty — flower, brook and bird. He had no eye, however, for largeness nor extent. Nature never became for him a voice, nor a language. She never spoke to him. He looked upon her, within the narrow com- pass of his view, but there was never any communication. There was, therefore, never a companionship between the two. We have indicated above (page 67 ) the gradual reve- lation of Nature to man as, "first a silence, then a murmur, then a voice, then a companion." The "silence," when man saw only comfort or discomfort; the "murmur," when he began to see beauty; the "voice," when Nature was personi- fied; the "companion," when man found that personality congenial. Emerson classes Nature in an ascending scale of Coinrnodity , Beauty, Language, Discipline. This is notably parallel to our classification, reached independently and in another field. The Minnesinger never passed perceptibly beyond the first two classes. It might seem that this judgment is unfair; that the very theme which, as a singer of love, he treated, excluded from his consideration a large field of Nature, which he might, in other circumstances, have brought into his treatment. This would qualify a judgment of the old poet's nature-sense if he really were solely a singer of love. But he did treat a great variety of subjects. For instance, Walter furnishes us 79 Lieder; thirty of these are devoted to other subjects than love, of which thirty, six are dedicated to Nature. The same poet has given us 108 Spriiche, of which three only are devoted to love; the others treat politia, the church, morality, friendship, constancy, tolerance, vmr, etc. So wide a range of subjects would give great freedom to the poet; and yet, as has been already said, even this largest of the Minnesingers scarcely oversteps in his "Natur- anschauung" the narrow limits of his contemporaries. We are constrained to conclude that the nature-sen.se in the Minnesong is fairly representative of the whole period. The nature-sense of the modern period contains the whole gamut of Nature. THE END. yiTft.* The author of this thesis was born and reared at Melton's, Virginia. Until his 15th year he attended an old field school, where the yearly term was six months. He then attended the graded school of Gordonsville, Virginia, beginning there the study of foreign languages, and afterwards spent one year in an Academy at Culpeper, Virginia. At the age of eighteen he began teaching, and after five years en- tered the University of Virginia. At the end of three years he graduated with the Bachelor of Arts degree, having com- pleted, also, all the residence work required for the Doctor of Philosophy. The Graduate work was in Latin, directed by Prof. W. E- Peters, and in the German and French, direc- ted by the late Prof. W. H. Perkinson. Immediately after graduating he was elected to the chair of German and French in Wofford College, Spartanburg, South Carolina, where he has since served. In the summer of 1898, he spent a term in the University of Chicago, studying the Romance and Germanic languages. In 1899 he went to Europe for a year's study. At Gottingen he took work under Professors Heyne and Roethe in Germanic language and literature, under Professor Stimming in old French. Two months were spent in the University of Ber- lin to hear lectures on German literature by Professor Erich Schmidt. The summer of 1900 was spent at Tours, France, in the study of French. The final work of the degree was directed and approved by Professor Jas. A. Harrison, chair of Teutonic Languages, University of Virginia. *The Vita is appended by request of Professor Harrison. 14 DAY USE RETURN TO DESK FROM WHICH BORROWED LOAN DEPT. Renewed books are subject to immediate recall. nzz-v u:^ APH \t\nir: ?#^ REC'D LD jv^y^es^ m^ ^4l0ft« * RECEIVED piirsR^jm LQANl np-^ RaiiRNED TO Ui>i J9Z1 »0/^N AH^ LD {D32 n >ir.'7'^. C^ G«neral Library . 21Acf5niR>li7'6^ Y,-J. -> O CToiversity of Calif orma i32lS^H7eB^ Berkeley X ^