became obtrusive and fatiguing, she had to be "called to order" so often, that at last his patience was fairly worn out. The continuation of such a relation was obviously impossible. She gave herself the license of a child, and would not be treated as a child. She fatigued him. Riemer relates that during this very visit she complained to him of Goethe's coldness. This coldness, he rightly says, was simply patience; a patience which held out with difficulty against such assaults. Bettina quitted Weimar, to return in 1811, when by her own conduct she gave him a reasonable pretext for breaking off the connection; a pretext, I am assured, he gladly availed himself of. It was this. She went one day with Goethe's wife to the Exhibition of Art, in which Goethe took great interest; and there her satirical remarks, especially on Meyer, offended Christiane, who spoke sharply to her. High words rose, gross insult followed. Goethe took the side of his insulted wife, and forbade Bettina the house. It was in vain that on a subsequent visit to Weimar she begged Goethe to receive her. He was resolute. He had put an end to a relation which could not be a friendship, and was only an embarrassment. Such being the real story, as far as I can disentangle it, we have now to examine the authenticity of the "Correspondence," in as far as it gives support to the two charges: first, of Goethe's alternate coldness and tenderness; second, of his using her letters as material for his poems. That he was ever tender to her is denied by Riemer, who pertinently asks how we are to believe that the coldness of which she complained during her visit to Weimar grew in her absence to the loverlike warmth glowing in the sonnets addressed to her? This is not credible; but the mystery is explained by Riemer's distinct denial that the sonnets were addressed to her. They were sent to her, as to other friends; but the poems, which she says were inspired by her, were in truth written for another. The proof is very simple. These sonnets were written before she came to Weimar, and had already passed through Riemer's hands, like other works, for his supervision. Riemer, moreover, knew to whom these passionate sonnets were addressed, although he did not choose to name her. I have no such cause for concealment, and declare the sonnets to have been addressed to Minna Herzlieb, of whom we shall hear more presently; as indeed the charade on her name, which closes the -- series (Herz-Lieb), plainly indicates. Not only has Bettina appropriated the sonnets which were composed at Jena while Riemer was with Goethe, and inspired by one living at Jena, but she has also appropriated poems known by Riemer to have been written in 1813-1819, she then being the wife of Achim von Arnim, and having since 1811 been resolutely excluded from Goethe's house. To shut your door against a woman, and yet write love-verses to her, to respond so coldly to her demonstrations that she complains of it, and yet pour forth sonnets throbbing with passion, is a course of conduct certainly not credible on evidence such as the "Correspondence with a Child." Hence we are the less surprised to find Riemer declaring that some of her letters are "little more than metaand para-phrases of Goethe's poems, in which both rhythm and rhyme are still traceable." So that instead of Goethe turning her letters into poems, Riemer accuses her of turning Goethe's poems into her letters. An accusation so public and so explicit an accusation which ruined the whole authenticity of the "Correspondence"- should at once have been answered. The production of the originals with their postmarks might have silenced accusers. But the accusation has been many years before the world, and no answer attempted. Although the main facts had already been published, a loud uproar followed the first appearance of this chapter in Germany. Some ardent friend of Bettina's opened fire upon me in a pamphlet, which called forth several replies in newspapers and journals; and I believe there are few Germans who now hesitate to acknowledge that the whole correspondence has been so tampered with as to have become, from first to last, a romance. For the sake of any still unconvinced partisans in England, a few evidences of the manipulation which the correspondence has undergone may not be without interest. In the letter bearing date 1st March, 1807, we read of the King of Westphalia's court, when, unless History be a liar, the kingdom of Westphalia was not even in existence. Goethe's mother, in another letter, speaks of her delight at Napoleon's appearance,-four months before she is known to have set eyes upon him. The letters of Goethe, from November to September, all imply that he was at Weimar; nay, he invites her to Weimar on the 16th of July; she arrives there at the end of the month; visits him, and on the 16th of August he writes to her from hence. Düntzer truly says that these letters must be spurious, since Goethe left for Carlsbad on the 25th of May, and did not return till September. Not only does Bettina visit Goethe at Weimar at a time when he is known to have been in Bohemia, but she actually receives letters from his mother dated the 21st September and 7th October, 1808, although the old lady died on the 13th of September. One may overlook Bettina's intimating that she was only thirteen, when the parish register proves her to have been two and twenty; but it is impossible to place the slightest reliance on the veracity of a book which exhibits flagrant and careless disregard of facts; and if I have been somewhat merciless in the exposure of this fabrication, it is because it has greatly helped to disseminate very false views respecting a very noble nature. In conclusion, it is but necessary to add that Bettina's work thus deprived of its authenticity, all those hypotheses which have been built on it respecting Goethe's conduct fall to the ground. Indeed, when one comes to think of it, the hypothesis of his using her letters as poetic material does seem the wildest of all figments; for not only was he prodigal in invention and inexhaustible in material, but he was especially remarkable for always expressing his own feelings, his own experience, not the feelings and experience of others. GOETHE'S CORRESPONDENCE WITH A CHILD. BY BETTINA BRENTANO. [ELIZABETH VON ARNIM, generally known as Bettina Brentano, born at Frankfort-on-the-Main, April 4, 1785, was the wife of Ludwig Achim von Arnim, poet and novelist, and sister of Clemens Brentano, romantic writer. In her girlhood she was an enthusiastic admirer of Goethe, with whom she corresponded, and in 1835 published "Goethe's Correspondence with a Child," largely fictitious. She died at Berlin, January 20, 1859.] To GOETHE. WHAT shall I write to you, since I am sad, and have nothing new or welcome to say? Rather would I at once send thee the white paper, instead of first covering it with letters, which do not always say what I wish,—and that thou shouldst fill it up at thy leisure, and make me but too happy and send it back to me; and when I then see the blue cover and tear it open, curiously hasty, as longing is always expectant of bliss, and I should then read what once charmed me from thy lips: "Dear child, my gentle heart, my only love, little darling,” - the friendly words with which thou spoiledst me, soothing me the while so kindly, - ah, more I would not ask. I should have all again, even thy whisper I should read there, with which thou softly pouredst into my soul all that was most lovely, and madest me forever beautiful to myself. As I there passed through the walks on thy arm, —ah, how long ago does it seem! I was contented; all wishes were laid to sleep; they had, like the mountains, enveloped color and form in mist; I thought, thus it would glide, and ever on, without much labor, from the land to the high sea, - bold and proud, with unfolded flags and fresh breeze. But, Goethe, fiery youth wants the customs of the hot season: when the evening shadows draw over the land, then the nightingales shall not be silent; all shall sing or express itself joyfully; the world shall be a luxuriant fruit garland, all shall crowd in enjoyment, -and all enjoyment shall expand mightily; it shall pour itself forth like fermenting wine juice, which works in foam till it comes to rest; we shall sink in it, as the sun beneath the ocean waves, but also return like him. So it has been with thee, Goethe; none knows how thou heldst communion with heaven, and what wealth thou hast asked there, when thou hadst set in enjoyment. That delights me, to see when the sun sets, when the earth drinks in his glow, and slowly folds his fiery wings and detains him prisoner of night: then it becomes still in the world; out of the darkness, longing rises up so secretly, and the stars there above lighten so unreachingly to it, so very unreachably, Goethe! He who shall be happy becomes so timid: the heart, trembling, pants with happiness ere it has dared a welcome; I also feel that I am not matched for my happiness; what a power of senses to comprehend thee! Love must become a mastership, to want the possession of that which is to be loved, in the common understanding, is worthy of eternal love, and wrecks each moment on the slightest occurrence. This is my task, that I appropriate myself to thee, but will not possess thee, thou most to be desired! I am still so young that it may be easily pardoned if I am ignorant. Ah! I have no soul for knowledge; I feel I cannot learn what I do not know; I must wait for it, as the prophet in the wilderness waits for the ravens to bring him food. The simile is not so unapt: nourishment is borne to my spirit through the air, often exactly as it is on the point of starvation. Since I have loved thee, something unattainable floats in my spirit, a mystery which nourishes me. As the ripe fruits fall from the tree, so here thoughts fall to me, which refresh and invigorate me. O Goethe! had the fountain a soul, it could not hasten more full of expectation on to light, to rise again, than I, with foreseeing certainty, hasten on to meet this new life, which has been given me through thee, and which gives me to know that a higher impulse of life will burst the prison, not sparing the rest and ease of accustomed days, which in fermenting inspiration it destroys. This lofty fate the loving spirit evades as little as the seed evades the blossom when it once lies in fresh earth. Thus I feel myself in thee, thou fruitful, blessed soil! I can say what it is when the germ bursts the hard rind, it is painful; the smiling children of spring are brought forth amid tears. O Goethe, what happens with man? what does he feel? what happens in the most flaming cup of his heart? I would willingly confess my faults to thee, but love makes me quite an ideal being. Thou hast done much for me, even before thou knewest me; above much that I coveted and did not ask, thou hast raised me. BETTINA. THE LAST METAMORPHOSIS OF MEPHISTOPHELES. BY FRANK MARZIALS. CANDID he is, and courteous therewithal, Nor, as he once was wont, in the far prime, Of after-days, with antic bestial Convenes the ape in man to carnival; Nor as the cynic of a later time Jeers, that his laughter, like a jangled chime, But now, in courtliest tones of cultured grace, He glories in the growth of good, his glance |