“You seem, as a general rule, to keep yourself apart from society. One sees you nowhere. Are you a misanthrope? But, no; I withdraw the question. From a good deal you have said I drew the conclusion that you love all men.”
“I love humanity; but as to all men, no. There are too many among them worthless, bornés, self-seeking, cold-blooded, cruel. Those I cannot love, though I may pity them, because their education and circumstances have not allowed them to be worthy of love.”
“Circumstances and education? But character depends chiefly on one’s inborn disposition. Do you not think so?”
“What you call ‘inborn disposition’ is, however, nothing more than circumstances—ancestral circumstances.”
“Then, are you of the opinion that a bad man is not blamable for his badness, and, therefore, not to be abominated?”
“The consequent is not determined by the antecedent; he may be not blamable and still to be abominated. You also are not responsible for your beauty, still you are to be admired—”
“Baron Tilling! we began to talk about serious matters like two reasonable persons. Do I deserve then all of a sudden to be treated like a compliment-hunting society lady?”
“I beg your pardon, I did not so intend it. I only used the nearest argument I could find.”
A short pause followed. Tilling’s look rested with an admiring, almost tender, expression on my eyes, and I did not drop them. I am quite aware that I ought to have looked away; but I did not. I felt my cheeks glow, and knew that, if he had thought me pretty before, I must at that moment be looking still more pretty—it was a pleasant, “mischievous,” confusing sensation, and lasted half-a-minute. It could not continue longer. I put my fan before my face and changed my position; then in an indifferent tone I said:—
“You gave Minister ‘To-be-sure’ a capital answer just now.”
Tilling shook his head as if he were rousing himself out of a dream.
“I? just now? I don’t recollect. On the contrary, I fancy that I gave offence by my remark about Springauf—or Hupsauf was it?—or whatever the name of the brave sharpshooter was.”
“Hupfauf.”
“You were the only one who liked what I said. Their excellencies, on the other hand, I offended, of course, by an expression so unbecoming to an imperial and royal lieutenant-colonel as ‘hard heart,’ applied to one who had given the enemy so grand a sample of his shooting. Blasphemy! Soldiers, as is well known, are the more agreeable company the more coolly they deal out death, while there is no more sentimental character to move the feelings in the melodramatic repertory than the warrior grey in battle, but soft of heart—a wooden-legged veteran who could not hurt a fly.”
“Why did you become a soldier?”
“You put the question in a way which shows you have looked into my heart. It was not I, nor Frederick Tilling, thirty-nine years old, who had seen three campaigns, who chose the profession, but little Freddy, ten or twelve years old, who had grown up among wooden warhorses and regiments of leaden soldiers, and to whom his father, the decorated general, and his uncle, the lady-killing lieutenant, would put the question cheeringly: ‘Now, my boy, what are you going to be?’ What else except a real soldier, with a real sabre, and a live horse?”
“I had a box of leaden soldiers given me today for my son Rudolf, but I am not going to give them to him. But why, now that Freddy has grown into Frederick, why have you not quitted a condition which has become hateful to you?”
“Hateful? That is saying too much. I hate the position of affairs which lays on us men such cruel duties as making war; but as this position does exist, and exists inevitably, why, I cannot hate the people who take on themselves the duties arising from it, and fulfil them conscientiously with the expenditure of their best powers. Suppose I left the service of the army, would there be any the less warfare? Truly not. It would only be that someone else would hazard his life in my place, and I can do that myself.”
“Could not you render better service to your fellow-men in another condition?”
“I do not know. I have learned nothing thoroughly except soldiering. A man can always do something good and useful in his surroundings. I have plenty of opportunity of lightening the lot of those around me. And as far as concerns myself—for I may regard myself also as a fellow-man—I enjoy the respect which the world pays to my profession. I have passed a tolerably distinguished career, am beloved by my comrades, and am pleased at what I have attained. I have no estate, and, as a private person, I should not have the means to assist anyone else, nor even myself. So on what grounds should I abandon my way of life?”
“Because killing people is repulsive to you.”
“If it is a question of defending one’s life against another man attacking it, one’s personal responsibility for causing death ceases. War is often, and justly, styled murder on a large scale; still, no individual feels himself to be a murderer. However, that fighting is repulsive to me, that the sad entry on to a field of battle causes me pain and disgust, that is true enough. I suffer from it, suffer intensely, but so must many a seaman suffer during a storm from seasickness; still, if he is anything of a brave man, he holds out on deck, and always, if needs must, ventures to sea again.”
“Yes, if needs must. But must there then be war?”
“That is a different question. But individuals must do their share in it, and that gives them, if not pleasure, at least strength to do their duty.”
And so we went on speaking for a time in a low tone,
