from the original story by Erckmann-Chatrian [Émile Erckmann & Alexandre Chatrian] (uncredited), trans. by H. Horbury (uncredited).
Originally published in Temple Bar (Richard Bentley) vol.27 #107 (Oct 1869).
In the year 1805, I had reached my sixth year of study in transcendental philosophy at Heidelberg. It is well known what life at a German university is like. We used to rise at noon, smoke our morning pipe, and drink two or three classes of Schnaps. Then buttoning our tight-fitting jackets up to our chins, and adjusting our college caps carefully over our left ear à la Prussian, we would quietly stroll to the lecture-hall for half an hour, and hear the renowned Professsor Hasenkopf discourse on the nature of reason and instinct—every student, however, feeling himself at liberty to yawn, or to go to sleep, if he thought fit. Lecture over, we used to find our way to our favourite hostelry, the Coup d'Or. Here we would stretch our legs comfortably under the table, while the pretty waitresses, dressed in their little black-silk jackets, ran up with plates of sausages, slices of ham, and cans of strong beer. Then we would eat and drink, sing our favourite songs from Schiller, and enjoy ourselves generally; one amusing himself with his dog—another, of a different taste, passing his arm affectionately round Charlotte's or Gretchen's waist. At this point, sometimes, fierce wrangling would arise, and soon find expression in blows. Walking-sticks would be brought into free play, and beer-cans and fragments of chops and sausages would fly about the room. Presently the watchman would arrive, and march us off to pass the night in the guardhouse. After this fashion our time passed away.
At Heidelberg you would meet the scions of dukes, barons, and princes; you would also meet the sons of cobblers, schoolmasters, and worthy tradesmen. The former made a select set of their own, but all the rest mixed cordially together.
At the time of which I write I was thirty years old; my beard was already tinged with grey, and an existence whose main business was smoking tobacco and eating sausages and sauerkraut was beginning to decline in my estimation. As to Hasenkopf, I had so long heard him discourse on ideas consequential and ideas intuitive, on logical and dogmatic truth, and so on, that his doctrines formed a complete hotch-potch in my head. I seemed to have reached the lowest depth of science, ex nihilo nihil, and often said to myself, "Karl—Karl! it is not well to know too much. Nature has no more illusions for thee. Thou canst say with the Hebrew king, who had wearied of everything, 'Vanity of vanities, all is vanity!'"
Such was my despondent frame of mind, when, towards the spring of that same year 1805, a startling circumstance taught me that I did not yet know everything, and that the philosopher's career is not always a path of roses.
Among the oldest of my fellow-students was one Heinrich Erdmann, without exception the acutest logician I ever met. His personal appearance was not prepossessing. Picture to yourself a short rough-looking man, with sunken eyes, blonde eyebrows, and red hair dashed with bronze—with hollow cheeks ornamented with a beard like a bush, and massive shoulders covered with magnificent rags. To see him glide along the street close to the wall, with a hunch of bread under his arm, his eyes gleaming, and his back bending with a marvellous suppleness, you would have taken him for an old cat in search of his belle.
But Heinrich thought of nothing but metaphysics. For five or six years he had lived in a garret over a disused slaughterhouse, subsisting entirely on bread and water. Never had a bottle of foaming beer or of Rhenish wine been suffered to damp his scientific zeal, nor a plate of ham to interfere with his transcendental studies. The poor creature made one absolutely frightened to look at him, for, in spite of his obvious state of consumption, his meagre large-boned frame still retained fearful power, the muscles of his hands and jaws stood out like bands of iron, and, together with his squinting look, made it impossible to pity him. This strange being, spite of his voluntary isolation, seemed to have a sort of liking for me. He would occasionally come to see me, and, seating himself in my armchair, would treat me to some of his metaphysical speculations.
"Karl," he used to begin, in his harsh voice, proceeding on the Socratic method of interrogation—"Karl, what is the soul?"
Proud enough to parade my learning before him, I replied, with a dogmatic air: "According to Thales, it is a kind of magnet; according to Plato, a substance which originates itself; according to Asclepiades, an activity of the senses. Anaximander considers it a mixture of earth and water; Empedocles, the blood; Hippocrates, an intelligence fused through the body; Zeno, the quintessence of the four elements; Xenocrates, the—"
"Yes—yes," said he; "but you—what do you think is the substance of the soul?"
"I, Heinrich!" I replied: "I think, with Lactance, that I know nothing about it. I am, naturally, an epicurean. Now, the epicureans believe. that all knowledge must come through the senses; and as the soul does not fall within the range of my senses, I cannot form any notion of it."
"But, Karl," continued he, "observe what an immense number of living beings—insects, for instance, and fishes—there are that lack one or more of our senses. And who knows whether we ourselves possess all, or whether there are not some existing of which we have not even the faintest idea?"
"That is possible," said I; but, being doubtful, I refrain from pronouncing upon it.
"Do you believe, Karl," he resumed, "that it is possible to know anything without having learnt it?"
"Certainly not," I replied; "all knowledge proceeds from study or experience."
"Then how does it happen that the young of the fowl no sooner leave the egg than they begin to run about in search of food? How is it that they perceive the hawk while yet in the sky, and hide themselves under their mothers' wings? Have they made the acquaintance of their enemy in the egg?"
"That is the effect of instinct, Heinrich; all animals obey the dictates of instinct."
"Then it appears that instinct consists in knowing what they have never learnt?"
"Ah!" cried I, "now you ask too much. How can I answer you?"
Smiling scornfully, he would throw the flap of his shabby cloak over his shoulder, and walk away without adding a word. I used to think him a madman, but a madman of the most harmless kind; for who would have thought that a passion for metaphysics could be dangerous?
Such was the state of affairs when Catherine Lemwig, the old Küchlein dealer, suddenly disappeared. This good woman used generally to turn up at the Coup d'Or towards eleven o'clock. We students were always glad to have some fun with her; she remembered some of the frolics of her youth, and made no secret of them. Indeed, she would relate them herself, and laugh till she held her sides. "Ah, mon Dieu!" she used to say, "I have not always been fifty years old; I've spent some pleasant 'quarters of an hour.' And, after all, do you suppose I repent them? Ah, if only they were to come over again!" Here she would heave a deep sigh, which made us all laugh.
About the third day after her disappearance, her absence began to be remarked.
"What the devil has become of old Catherine?" said one. "Can she be ill? Strange! Seemed so merry last time she was here."
"The police are looking for her, I hear," said another. "For myself, I had no doubt that the poor old woman had been drinking too much cherry-brandy, and had fallen in the evening into the river."
The morning after this conversation, while on my way to lecture, I met Heinrich slowly strolling along the road to the Minster. As soon as he saw me he came quickly up, his eyes sparkling with excitement. "Karl," he said, "I was looking for you—I was looking for you. The hour of triumph has come! Follow me—follow me." His look, his gestures, his pallor, betrayed extreme agitation; and as he seized my arm, and dragged me along in the direction of the tanners' quarter, I could not help an indefinable feeling of fear, and yet had not the courage to resist.
The lane, along which we were passing with rapid strides, ran behind the Minster, through a block of houses as old as Heidelberg itself. The gabled roofs, the wooden balconies, where the common people hung out their linen; the outside staircases with their worm-eaten balustrades; the innumerable wan, emaciated, inquisitive faces, looking from the windows, and watching with a hungry look the strangers passing through their street; the long poles reaching from roof to roof, and hung with red hides; the thick smoke rising in zigzag clouds from every storey—all passed confusedly before my eyes like a scene out of the middle ages: and the very splendour of the sky, its azure cut by the strangely-shaped gables, and its rays illuminating the dilapidated walls, increased my emotion by the strangeness of the contrast. At such a time as this it is that a man loses his presence of mind; it never even occurred to me to ask where we were going. After passing through this wretched quarter, we reached a deserted district, principally composed of old slaughterhouses. Suddenly Heinrich—whose hand, dry and cold, seemed riveted to my wrist—led me into a ruined old building, situated between a disused granary and a slaughterhouse.
"Walk on," said he.
I entered, and crossed a large half-lighted room, keeping close by the wall, which was built of mud. At the end of this was a staircase, the steps of which were worn, broken, and covered with rubbish, over which we had to pick our way. My companion, impatient of the slowness of my pace, kept exclaiming, "Higher—higher;" but finding myself in a dilapidated room, at the foot of a ladder the top of which was lost in darkness, a sudden apprehension seized me, and under the pretence of stopping to take breath, I paused to consider whether it were not better to fly. I have never since been able to explain to myself how I came to climb that ladder, for no reason whatever, in spite of a vague feeling of fear, and without asking my companion for a word of explanation. Suffice it that I did, and found myself in an enormous corn-loft, lighted by three dormer-windows; on the left the high grey wall of the gable, a small table covered with books and papers in the middle of the room—over our heads the beams of the roof. The windows being ten or twelve feet from the ground, it was impossible to look out. A large opening had been cut in the gable from the floor upwards, and a small door fixed there, but this I did not notice until afterwards. Heinrich, without uttering a word, pushed towards me an old box which he used as a chair, and refreshed himself with a deep draught of water from a pitcher in the corner.
"We are in the garret of an old slaughterhouse," said he, with a strange laugh, as he replaced the jug on the floor. "The town council have voted funds to build a new one outside the town. I have lived here five years without paying any rent, and not a soul has ever come to interfere with my studies." And, seating himself upon some logs of wood in the corner, he continued:—
"Ah! now we come to the point. Are you perfectly certain, Karl, that you have a soul?"
"Look here, Heinrich," I answered, not in the best possible temper; "if you have brought me here to chatter about metaphysics, let me tell you you have made a great mistake. I had just left lecture, and was on my way to the Coup d'Or when I met you. I have taken my daily dose of a abstraction, you understand; that is enough for me. So let me ask you to explain yourself clearly, or leave me to find my way back to the inn."
"You only live to eat, then," said he, in a harsh tone; "do you know that for love of science I have spent whole days without a morsel of food?"
"Every one to his taste," said I: "you live on syllogisms and logic; I prefer sausages and strong beer. What would you have? I can't help it."
His face had become pale, and his lips trembled, but, conquering his anger, he said:
"Kasper, since you won't answer my question, at least listen to my explanations. A man must have some one to admire him, and I want you to admire me. I want you to be even overpowered by the discovery I have just made. That, I think, is not too much to ask—an hour of attention for ten years of conscientious study?"
"All right," said I—"go on. I'm listening. Only, make haste."
A fresh convulsion passed over his face at this, and I began to repent having climbed that ladder; but, thinking him a maniac, I assumed a sober expression, so as not to irritate him. This seemed to calm him a little, for after a pause he said:
"You are hungry? Here is my bread, and there is my pitcher; eat and drink, but listen."
"Never mind, Heinrich," said I; "I can listen very well without that."
He laughed bitterly, and continued: "Not only have we a soul—that has always been admitted; all living beings, from the plant up to man, have a soul, because they live. Is it necessary to study six years under Hazenkopf to know that? No. But this is what is not universally known, that the more perfect the physical organisation becomes, the more numerous become its souls. This it is that distinguishes living beings from each other. The plant has but one, the vegetable soul. Its functions are perfectly simple—viz., to drink in nutrition by means of its leaves and roots. The animal has two souls: first, the vegetable soul, whose functions are exactly similar to those of the plant, its organs being the lungs and stomach; and, secondly, the distinctively animal soul, which drinks in sensations, and whose organ is the heart. Now man, who sums up in himself all terrestrial life, has three souls—the vegetable and the animal, with functions similar to those of the brutes; and the human soul, which includes the reason and the intelligence. Its organ is the brain. The nearer any animal approaches to man in its cerebral formation, the greater is its share of this third soul. Such are the dog, the elephant, or the horse. But the man of genius alone possesses it in full."
Here Heinrich stopped, and, fixing his eyes upon me, said: "Well, what do you say to that?"
"Oh," said I, "it is all very well as a theory; like any other theory, it only lacks proof."
At this a sort of frantic joy seized Heinrich; he left his seat with a bound, his head thrown back, his hands in the air. "Yes—yes," he exclaimed, "the proof is wanting! That is what has tortured me for years; that is what has caused me so much labour and suffering and privation. For I began, Karl, by making experiments on myself. Fasting forced the conviction of the truth of my sublime doctrine on me more and more, without its being possible for me to prove it conclusively. But at length it is proved! I have the proof. You are going to hear the Three Souls manifest and proclaim themselves! You shall hear them!"
After this burst of enthusiasm, which seemed so much like raving madness that I felt alarmed, he suddenly became cool, and sitting down, his elbows on the table, he resumed, pointing to the high gable-wall:
"The proof is there, behind that wall; I will show it you directly. But, first, it is necessary that you should follow the course of my argument. You know what was the doctrine of the ancients respecting the soul. They held the existence of four, all united in man—viz., caro, the body, a mixture of water and earth, which is decomposed by death; manes (from manere, to remain), the phantom which haunts the tombs; umbra, the shade, more ethereal than the manes, Which disappears after visiting its relatives; lastly, spiritus, the mind, the spirit, which rises, an ethereal substance, to the gods. This classification seemed to me just, leaving the first out of the question. In order to establish it, therefore, it became necessary to decompose the human being. Leason told me that every man, before attaining his final development, must pass through the plant and animal stage; that Pythagoras, in short, had perceived the truth without being able to furnish proof of it. I determined myself to solve the problem. I set myself the task of extinguishing, one by one, the Three Souls in myself. To do this I had recourse to severe fasting. Unfortunately, however, the human soul had to succumb first, in order to allow the animal soul to act freely. It thus became impossible for me to judge of myself in the animal condition, for by reducing myself to it, I lost the faculty of observation. After a host of fruitless attempts on my own body, I became convinced that there was but one way of attaining my object—to experiment on some one else. But who would lend himself to this kind of inquiry?" Heinrich paused; his lips worked convulsively, and he abruptly added: "I was obliged to have a subject at any price. I resolved to experiment in anima vili!"
I trembled. This man then was capable of anything.
"Do you understand?" said he.
"Perfectly. You needed a victim—"
"To decompose," he added, coolly.
"And have you found one?"
"Yes; I promised to let you hear the Three Souls. That will perhaps be difficult now, but yesterday you might have heard them, by turn, howling, roaring, beseeching, and grinding their teeth."
An icy shudder passed over me; but Heinrich, perfectly unmoved, lighted a small lamp, which he used to work by, and, going towards the opening in the gable on the left, "Look!" said he; "come and look, and then listen."
In spite of the most terrible presentiments—in spite of the internal trembling agitating me—drawn by the attraction of mystery, I leant over the low door and looked down. Presently I perceived, by the pale rays of the lamp, about fifteen feet below the level of the floor, a dark recess, with no other exit than where we were standing. I saw that it was one of the holes where butchers used to put hides from the slaughterhouse until they were ready to send to the tanner. It was empty, and for several seconds I could only see that pit full of shadows.
"Look well," said he, in a low voice; "don't you see a bundle of rags huddled up in a corner? That is old Catherine Lemwig, the dealer in little cakes, who--"
He had not time to finish his sentence, for a piercing savage cry, like the painful mewing of a cat when it is trodden on, came from the pit. A frightened creature gave a bound, and tried to climb up the wall by its talons. More dead than alive, my forehead covered with cold sweat, I started back, exclaiming: "Horrible!—horrible!"
"Did you hear her?" said Heinrich, his face lighted up with infernal triumph. "Is not that the cry of a cat? Ha!—ha!—ha! The old woman, before reaching the human condition, has formerly been a cat, or a panther. Now the beast reawakens. Oh, hunger, hunger, and above all, thirst, does wonders!"
He did not notice me, so carried away was he by his joy; a horrid exultation appeared in his look and posture and smile. The howlings of the old woman had ceased, and the madman, replacing the lamp on the table, added, by way of commentary:
"She has fasted now four days. I got her here under the pretext of selling her a quantity of Kirschwasser very cheap. I made her go down into the pit, and shut her up. Drunkenness has ruined her; she is now paying the penalty of her immoderate thirst. Ha!—ha!—ha! The first two days the human soul was in full vigour: she besought and implored me, protesting her innocence, and saying she had never done anything to me, and that I had no right over her. Then anger came on: she overwhelmed me with reproaches, denouncing me as a monster, a wretch, and so on. The third day (that was yesterday) the human soul disappeared altogether: the cat began to send out its claws, and she took to mewing and howling. Fortunately, however, we are in a district much favoured by cats and dogs, where a few more or less attracts no attention. And last night the folks of the neighbourhood must have thought there was a pitched battle of cats, for the old creature's cries were enough to make you shudder. Do you know, Karl, what will happen when the animal soul has been exhausted? The vegetable soul will have its turn; that is the one which perishes last. It is affirmed by some, that the hair and nails of corpses continue to grow in the grave, and that a kind of lichen sprouts from the interstices of the skull—a sort of moss engendered by the juices of the brain. Finally, the vegetable soul itself vanishes. You see, Karl, the proof of the Three Souls is complete!"
His words sounded in my ears like the ravings of delirium, or the fancies of a horrid nightmare. Catherine Lemwig's cries had pierced me to the marrow; a dizziness came into my head, and for a moment I lost consciousness. Coming to myself, I was filled with indignation. I rose, seized the madman by the throat, and dragged him towards the ladder.
"Wretch!" I cried, "who has given thee authority to lay thy sacrilegious hand upon thy like, upon the creature of God, in order to satisfy thy infamous curiosity? I will myself deliver thee up to justice!"
He was so surprised at my indignation—his conduct had seemed to himself so simple, so perfectly scientific—that at first he offered no resistance, and allowed himself to be dragged as fur as the ladder without making any reply; but there, gliding from my grasp with the agility of a wild beast, he turned upon me—his eyes gleaming, his mouth foaming—seized me by the throat with a grasp of iron, and, pinning me against the wall with one hand, opened the door of the pit with the other. Comprehending his intention, I made a desperate effort to escape; but my adversary seemed endowed with superhuman strength, and my frantic efforts served only to exhaust myself. After a brief struggle I was hurled to the ground again, and then thrust, as it seemed, into space. As I reached the ground, cut and bruised, after falling fifteen feet, I heard the heavy door close, whilst above me sounded these strange words:
"So perishes the rebellious body!—so triumphs the immortal spirit!"
Falling thus suddenly to the bottom of the den, and feeling myself caught like a rat in a trap, my alarm was so great that I forgot my pain, and gathered myself up without uttering a groan. "Karl," I said to myself, with an unaccountable calmness, leaning my back against the wall,—"Karl, you must presently either devour that old woman, or be devoured by her. Make your choice. As to thinking of getting out of this den, that is only losing time. Heinrich has you in his claws, and he wont let you slip; the walls are of stone, and the floor is of thick oak planks. No one saw you pass through the tanners' quarter—no one knows you in the part where you are now—no one has any idea where to look for you. It's all over, Karl, all over; your last resource is that poor Catherine Lemwig, or rather, you are the last resource of each other." All this passed through my mind like a flash of lightning. I began to tremble like a leaf, and seeing Heinrich's pale face at the opening, I tried, my hands clasped in terror, to beseech him, and found myself stammering in an atrocious manner; not a word would come from my lips. Seeing me thus he began to smile, and I heard him murmur:
"Poor coward! he is entreating me."
That gave me the coup de grâce. I fell on my face and should have fainted, but the fear of being attacked by the old woman brought me to myself: She did not, however, move for some time yet. Heinrich's head disappeared. I heard him cross the garret and sit by his table. At intervals I heard his dry consumptive cough. My hearing was so abnormally acute that the least noise made me quiver. I even heard the old woman yawn, and on looking in her direction, I saw for the first time her eyes glistening in the darkness. Presently I heard Heinrich descend the ladder, and I counted his steps, one by one, until the sound of them died away in the distance. Where had the wretch gone? I knew not; but during the whole of that day and the following night he never reappeared. It was not until about eight o'clock in the evening of the next day that he returned. I had not had a moment's sleep. I no longer felt fear or rage. I felt nothing but hunger, devouring hunger—hunger that I knew would be continually increasing. I heard the noise of Heinrich's return, and looking up saw presently, by the light on the ceiling, that he was lighting his lamp. "No doubt," I thought, "he is coming to look at me now," and with this expectation I prepared a touching entreaty. But soon the lamp was extinguished,—he never came! That moment was the bitterest of all that bitter time. I was cut to the heart. All the recollections of our friendship, of our studies together, of my kindness to him in former times, came into my mind and filled my eyes with tears. I recognised the truth, that Heinrich, knowing I was not yet emaciated enough, would not deign to give me a glance; that in his eyes I was not an interesting subject, and should only be ripe for science during the three or four days between then and my death. I seemed to feel my hair slowly whitening on my head. And so it actually was; my hair was blanched in that hour. My terror continued to increase with the darkness, until I lost all feeling and swooned away.
Towards midnight I was wakened by feeling a cold hand touch me, and sprang away with horror. It was the old woman who had approached me, attracted by hunger. Her hands clutched my clothes, and at the same time her catlike cry resounded through the den. I expected a fearful struggle to ensue, but the poor creature had no strength left—it was her fifth day! The words of Heinrich recurred to me: "The animal soul once extinguished, the vegetable soul will supervene; the hair and the nails will grow into the ground, and green moss will take root in the interstices of the skull." I pictured to myself the old woman reduced to that condition, her head covered with lichen, and myself lying beside her gradually approaching the same state. This image took such possession of me that I ceased to feel the pangs of hunger, and stood leaning against the wall, my eyes wide open, staring before me, but seeing nothing. After standing thus some time—I do not know how long—a feeble light appeared. I looked up, and there was Heinrich holding up his lamp, his pale face looking over the door into the opening. He was not smiling; he did not seem to experience joy, nor satisfaction, nor remorse—he simply observed. The expression on his face seemed to me to seal my doom. If he had laughed, or gloated over his revenge, I could have hoped to move him; but he looked as if no emotion respecting me were any longer possible to him. We remained thus several seconds, our eyes fixed on each other; I shivering with fear—he cold, calm, scrutinising, as if looking at an inanimate object. The insect which the naturalist impales with a needle, and examines through a microscope, would, if it could think and see the observer's eye, experience sensations similar to mine. I could see that until I died I should fail to satisfy the wretch's curiosity. Seeing, therefore, that entreaty would be useless, I said nothing. After having thus inspected me, the madman, pleased no doubt with the result of his observation, turned his head to look at the old woman. Mechanically I followed his look. Human language cannot describe the sight that greeted my eyes: a haggard emaciated face, an attenuated form, limbs so thin and bony that it seemed as though they must cut through the rags which covered them. Her hair, hanging in disorder all round her head, looked like a mass of dried herbage, and just descernible through it were two eyes glistening with the light of fever. I could not endure the sight, but, hiding my face, said to myself, "And in three days I shall be like that!" When I reopened my eyes the light was gone.
"Heinrich!" I exclaimed, in despair, "there is a God above us. He sees us. He will avenge me and punish thee." After passing the night in vainly trying to devise some plan of escape, I resolved all at once to make up my mind to die, and this resolution gave me a few moments' peace. I mentally reviewed all the arguments of Hasenkopf relative to the immortality of the soul, and for the first time I found them of irresistible force. "Yes!" I exclaimed; "the passage through this world is only a time of probation; injustice, avarice, the darkest passions, govern the heart of man. The weak is oppressed by the strong, the poor by the rich. On earth virtue is nothing but a name, but after death perfect order and harmony will be restored. The Almighty sees the injustice of which I am the victim. He takes count of the sufferings I endure. He will forgive my ungoverned appetite, my immoderate love of good cheer. Before receiving me into His bosom, He has wished to purify my nature by severe fasting," &c., &c. And many more reflections of the same kind. Nevertheless, I am bound to confess to you, my dear reader, that in spite of my deep contrition, regret for the pleasant tavern and my happy comrades, for that happy existence in the midst of songs and wine, made me heave many sighs. I could hear in fancy the hissing and crackling of the frying-pan in the fireplace, the gurgling of the wine pouring from the bottles, and the clinking of the little cans; and my stomach seemed to moan like a living being, forming a kind of existence apart from my proper self, and protesting against all the philosophical arguments of Hasenkopf.
My thirst was the greatest of my sufferings, and it now became intolerable. When the daylight came in at the windows of the garret, and showed me part of the room, I was seized with an access of fury. "That fiend is there!" I thought; "he has some bread and a jug of water—perhaps he is drinking?" Then I pictured him raising his huge jug to his lips. I seemed to see streams of water slowly passing down his throat—a delicious river flowing, flowing without cessation, until he was satisfied. Rage, indignation, and despair possessed me, and I began to run like a madman round the den, shouting, "Water!—water!—water!" In the midst of this, Heinrich's wan face appeared at the opening for the third time. Seeing him I stopped, and said:
"Heinrich! listen to me. Let me have just one drink out of your pitcher, and you shall let me die of hunger, and I wont so much as reproach you. You are too cruel," I said, "in keeping me here. As for this poor old woman, it is, as you justly said, quite right to experiment in anima vili. But I am a scholar, and I find your doctrine perfectly sound. I am worthy to understand you—I admire you! Let me have just a single draught of water. What more would you do? The world has never heard of such a sublime conception as yours. It is certain that three souls do exist in man; I am convinced of it. I wish to make it known; I will be your truest disciple. Wont you let me have a single drink of water?"
He made no answer, and walked away. My anger then knew no bounds. I threw myself against the wall, bruising my limbs, and apostrophising him in the strongest terms. This, however, could not last; my strength soon abandoned me, and I fell fainting on the ground.
How long I remained there lost to consciousness I cannot tell, but I was aroused from it by a strange circumstance, the recollection of which will never be effaced from my mind. I was aroused by the plaintive howling of a dog—so piercing, so pitiful, more moving even than the moans of a human being. One could not hear it without pain. I rose up, my face bathed in tears, wondering whence these cries, so in unison with my own sufferings, proceeded. I listened intently. Judge of my surprise when I discovered that I was uttering them myself, without knowing it!
Of what happened after that I can remember nothing; all powers of memory seem to have deserted me. Certain it is that I remained in that den two days more, to the immense delight of Heinrich, whose ecstasy at witnessing a fresh proof of his doctrine was such that he could not refrain from bringing several savants from Heidelberg to see our condition, that he might enjoy their wonder at his discovery.
Six weeks later I awoke in my little bedroom, in the Rue de Mars, surrounded by my comrades, who cordially congratulated me on my escape from that lesson in transcendental philosophy. At my request my friend Otto Weber brought me a looking-glass; and when I saw my face, more haggard than that of Bramar's "Lazarus coming forth from the Tomb," I could not refrain from bursting into tears.
Poor Catherine Lemwig was dead.
As for myself, I had a long and critical illness, and for many years suffered from weakness of digestion; but, thanks to my good constitution—thanks, above all, to the skilful care of Dr. Ahn—I eventually recovered my former health.
I need scarcely add that justice laid its hand upon the wretched Heinrich; but instead of his being hanged, as he richly deserved, his friends succeeded, after six months of litigation, in obtaining his acquittal, on the plea of insanity. He was therefore sent to a public asylum, where visitors might hear him, long after, discoursing upon the subject of the "THREE SOULS," accusing humanity of ingratitude, and protesting that if justice were done statues would be raised to him in honour of his magnificent discovery.