The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. IV by Editor in Chief: Kuno Francke

E >> Editor in Chief: Kuno Francke >> The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. IV

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When the Elector received this letter there were present at the palace
Prince Christiern of Meissen, Generalissimo of the Empire, uncle of
that Prince Friedrich of Meissen who had been defeated at Muehlberg and
was still laid up with his wounds, also the Grand Chancellor of the
Tribunal, Count Wrede, Count Kallheim, President of the Chancery of
State, and the two lords, Hinz and Kunz Tronka, the former Cup-bearer,
the latter Chamberlain--all confidential friends of the sovereign from
his youth. The Chamberlain, Sir Kunz, who in his capacity of privy
councilor, attended to the private correspondence of his master and
had the right to use his name and seal, was the first to speak. He
once more explained in detail that never, on his own authority, would
he have suppressed the complaint which the horse-dealer had lodged in
court against his cousin the Squire, had it not been for the fact
that, misled by false statements, he had believed it an absolutely
unfounded and worthless piece of mischief-making. After this he passed
on to consider the present state of affairs. He remarked that by
neither divine nor human laws had the horse-dealer been warranted in
wreaking such horrible vengeance as he had allowed himself to take for
this mistake. The Chamberlain then proceeded to describe the glory
that would fall upon the damnable head of the latter if they should
negotiate with him as with a recognized military power, and the
ignominy which would thereby be reflected upon the sacred person of
the Elector seemed to him so intolerable that, carried away by the
fire of his eloquence, he declared he would rather let worst come to
worst, see the judgment of the mad rebel carried out and his cousin,
the Squire, led off to Kohlhaasenbrueck to fatten the black horses,
than know that the proposition made by Dr. Luther had been accepted.

The Lord High Chancellor of the Tribunal of Justice, Count Wrede,
turning half way round toward him, expressed regret that the
Chamberlain had not, in the first instance, been inspired with such
tender solicitude for the reputation of the sovereign as he was
displaying in the solution of this undoubtedly delicate affair. He
represented to the Elector his hesitation about employing the power of
the state to carry out a manifestly unjust measure. He remarked, with
a significant allusion to the great numbers which the horse-dealer was
continually recruiting in the country, that the thread of the crime
threatened in this way to be spun out indefinitely, and declared that
the only way to sunder it and extricate the government happily from
that ugly quarrel was to act with plain honesty and to make good,
directly and without respect of person, the mistake which they had
been guilty of committing.

Prince Christiern of Meissen, when asked by the Elector to express his
opinion, turned deferentially toward the Grand Chancellor and declared
that the latter's way of thinking naturally inspired in him the
greatest respect, but, in wishing to aid Kohlhaas to secure justice,
the Chancellor failed to consider that he was wronging Wittenberg,
Leipzig, and the entire country that had been injured by him, in
depriving them of their just claim for indemnity or at least for
punishment of the culprit. The order of the state was so disturbed in
its relation to this man that it would be difficult to set it right by
an axiom taken from the science of law. Therefore, in accord with the
opinion of the Chamberlain, he was in favor of employing the means
appointed for such cases--that is to say, there should be gathered a
force large enough to enable them either to capture or to crush the
horse-dealer, who had planted himself in the castle at Luetzen. The
Chamberlain brought over two chairs from the wall and obligingly
placed them together in the middle of the room for the Elector and the
Prince, saying, as he did so, that he was delighted to find that a man
of the latter's uprightness and acumen agreed with him about the means
to be employed in settling an affair of such varied aspect. The
Prince, placing his hand on the chair without sitting down, looked at
him, and assured him that he had little cause to rejoice on that
account since the first step connected with this course would be the
issuing of a warrant for his arrest, to be followed by a suit for
misuse of the sovereign's name. For if necessity required that the
veil be drawn before the throne of justice over a series of crimes,
which finally would be unable to find room before the bar of judgment,
since each led to another, and no end--this at least did not apply to
the original offense which had given birth to them. First and
foremost, he, the Chamberlain, must be tried for his life if the state
was to be authorized to crush the horse-dealer, whose case, as was
well known, was exceedingly just, and in whose hand they had placed
the sword that he was wielding.

The discomfited Chamberlain at these words gazed at the Elector, who
turned away, his whole face flushing, and walked over to the window.
After an embarrassing silence on all sides, Count Kallheim said that
this was not the way to extricate themselves from the magic circle in
which they were captive. His nephew, Prince Friedrich, might be put
upon trial with equal justice, for in the peculiar expedition which he
had undertaken against Kohlhaas he had over-stepped his instructions
in many ways--so much so that, if one were to inquire about the whole
long list of those who had caused the embarrassment in which they now
found themselves, he too would have to be named among them and called
to account by the sovereign for what had occurred at Muehlberg.

While the Elector, with doubtful glances, walked up to his table, the
Cup-bearer, Sir Hinz Tronka, began to speak in his turn. He did not
understand, he said, how the governmental decree which was to be
passed could escape men of such wisdom as were here assembled. The
horse-dealer, so far as he knew, in return for mere safe-conduct to
Dresden and a renewed investigation of his case, had promised to
disband the force with which he had attacked the land. It did not
follow from this, however, that he must be granted an amnesty for the
wanton revenge he had taken into his own hands. These were two
different legal concepts which Dr. Luther, as well as the council of
state, seemed to have confounded. "When," he continued, laying his
finger beside his nose, "the judgment concerning the black horses has
been pronounced by the Tribunal at Dresden, no matter what it may be,
nothing prevents us from imprisoning Kohlhaas on the ground of his
incendiarism and robberies. That would be a diplomatic solution of the
affair, which would unite the advantages of the opinion of both
statesmen and would be sure to win the applause of the world and of
posterity." The Prince, as well as the Lord Chancellor, answered this
speech of Sir Hinz with a mere glance, and, as the discussion
accordingly seemed at an end, the Elector said that he would turn over
in his own mind, until the next sitting of the State Council, the
various opinions which had been expressed before him. It seemed as if
the preliminary measure mentioned by the Prince had deprived the
Elector's heart, which was very sensitive where friendship was
concerned, of the desire to proceed with the campaign against
Kohlhaas, all the preparations for which were completed; at least he
bade the Lord Chancellor, Count Wrede, whose opinion appeared to him
the most expedient, to remain after the others left. The latter showed
him letters from which it appeared that, as a matter of fact, the
horse-dealer's forces had already come to number four hundred men;
indeed, in view of the general discontent which prevailed all over the
country on account of the misdemeanors of the Chamberlain, he might
reckon on doubling or even tripling this number in a short time.
Without further hesitation the Elector decided to accept the advice
given him by Dr. Luther; accordingly he handed over to Count Wrede the
entire management of the Kohlhaas affair. Only a few days later a
placard appeared, the essence of which we give as follows:

"We, etc., etc., Elector of Saxony, in especially gracious
consideration of the intercession made to us by Doctor Martin Luther,
do grant to Michael Kohlhaas, horse-dealer from the territory of
Brandenburg, safe-conduct to Dresden for the purpose of a renewed
investigation of his case, on condition that, within three days after
sight, he lay down the arms to which he has had recourse. It is to be
understood, however, that in the unlikely event of Kohlhaas' suit
concerning the black horses being rejected by the Tribunal at Dresden,
he shall be prosecuted with all the severity of the law for
arbitrarily undertaking to procure justice for himself. Should his
suit, however, terminate otherwise, we will show mercy to him and his
whole band, instead of inflicting deserved punishment, and a complete
amnesty shall be accorded him for the acts of violence which he has
committed in Saxony."

Kohlhaas had no sooner received through Dr. Luther a copy of this
placard, which had been posted in all the public squares throughout
the land, than, in spite of the conditional language in which it was
couched, he immediately dispersed his whole band of followers with
presents, expressions of gratitude, and appropriate admonitions. He
deposited whatever he had taken in the way of money, weapons, and
chattels, with the courts at Luetzen, to be held as the property of the
Elector, and after he had dispatched Waldmann to the bailiff at
Kohlhaasenbrueck with letters about repurchasing his farm, if that were
still possible, and had sent Sternbald to Schwerin for his children
whom he wished to have with him again, he left the castle at Luetzen
and went, without being recognized, to Dresden, carrying with him in
bonds the remnant of his little property.

Day was just breaking and the whole city was still asleep when he
knocked at the door of the little dwelling situated in the suburb of
Pirna, which still, thanks to the honesty of the bailiff, belonged to
him. Thomas, the old porter, in charge of the establishment, who on
opening the door was surprised and startled to see his master, was
told to take word to the Prince of Meissen, in the Government Office,
that Kohlhaas the horse-dealer had arrived. The Prince of Meissen, on
hearing this news, deemed it expedient to inform himself immediately
of the relation in which they stood to this man. When, shortly
afterward, he appeared with a retinue of knights and servants, he
found an immense crowd of people already gathered in the streets
leading to Kohlhaas' dwelling. The news that the destroying angel was
there, who punished the oppressors of the people with fire and sword,
had aroused all Dresden, the city as well as the suburbs. They were
obliged to bolt the door of the house against the press of curious
people, and the boys climbed up to the windows in order to get a peep
at the incendiary, who was eating his breakfast inside.

As soon as the Prince, with the help of the guard who cleared the way
for him, had pushed into the house and entered Kohlhaas' room, he
asked the latter, who was standing half undressed before a table,
whether he was Kohlhaas, the horse-dealer. Kohlhaas, drawing from his
belt a wallet containing several papers concerning his affairs and
handing it respectfully to the Prince, answered, "Yes;" and added
that, in conformity with the immunity granted him by the sovereign, he
had come to Dresden, after disbanding his force, in order to institute
proceedings against Squire Wenzel Tronka on account of the black
horses.

The Prince, after a hasty glance which took Kohlhaas in from head to
foot, looked through the papers in the wallet and had him explain the
nature of a certificate which he found there executed by the court at
Luetzen, concerning the deposit made in favor of the treasury of the
Electorate. After he had further tested him with various questions
about his children, his wealth, and the sort of life he intended to
lead in the future, in order to find out what kind of man he was, and
had concluded that in every respect they might set their minds at rest
about him, he gave him back the documents and said that nothing now
stood in the way of his lawsuit, and that, in order to institute it,
he should just apply directly to the Lord High Chancellor of the
Tribunal, Count Wrede himself. "In the meantime," said the Prince
after a pause, crossing over to the window and gazing in amazement at
the people gathered in front of the house, "you will be obliged to
consent to a guard for the first few days, to protect you in your
house as well as when you go out!" Kohlhaas looked down disconcerted,
and was silent. "Well, no matter," said the Prince, leaving the
window; "whatever happens, you have yourself to blame for it;" and
with that he turned again toward the door with the intention of
leaving the house. Kohlhaas, who had reflected, said "My lord, do as
you like! If you will give me your word that the guard will be
withdrawn as soon as I wish it, I have no objection to this measure."
The Prince answered, "That is understood, of course." He informed the
three foot-soldiers, who were appointed for this purpose, that the man
in whose house they were to remain was free, and that it was merely
for his protection that they were to follow him when he went out; he
then saluted the horse-dealer with a condescending wave of the hand,
and took his leave.

Toward midday Kohlhaas went to Count Wrede, Lord High Chancellor of
the Tribunal; he was escorted by his three foot-soldiers and followed
by an innumerable crowd, who, having been warned by the police, did
not try to harm him in any way. The Chancellor received him in his
antechamber with benignity and kindness, conversed with him for two
whole hours, and after he had had the entire course of the affair
related to him from beginning to end, referred Kohlhaas to a
celebrated lawyer in the city who was a member of the Tribunal, so
that he might have the complaint drawn up and presented immediately.

Kohlhaas, without further delay, betook himself to the lawyer's house
and had the suit drawn up exactly like the original one which had been
quashed. He demanded the punishment of the Squire according to law,
the restoration of the horses to their former condition, and
compensation for the damages he had sustained as well as for those
suffered by his groom, Herse, who had fallen at Muehlberg in behalf of
the latter's old mother. When this was done Kohlhaas returned home,
accompanied by the crowd that still continued to gape at him, firmly
resolved in his mind not to leave the house again unless called away
by important business.

In the mean time the Squire had been released from his imprisonment in
Wittenberg, and after recovering from a dangerous attack of erysipelas
which had caused inflammation of his foot, had been summoned by the
Supreme Court in peremptory terms to present himself in Dresden to
answer the suit instituted against him by the horse-dealer, Kohlhaas,
with regard to a pair of black horses which had been unlawfully taken
from him and worked to death. The Tronka brothers, the Chamberlain and
the Cup-bearer, cousins of the Squire, at whose house he alighted,
received him with the greatest bitterness and contempt. They called
him a miserable good-for-nothing, who had brought shame and disgrace
on the whole family, told him that he would inevitably lose his suit,
and called upon him to prepare at once to produce the black horses,
which he would be condemned to fatten to the scornful laughter of the
world. The Squire answered in a weak and trembling voice that he was
more deserving of pity than any other man on earth. He swore that he
had known but little about the whole cursed affair which had plunged
him into misfortune, and that the castellan and the steward were to
blame for everything, because they, without his knowledge or consent,
had used the horses in getting in the crops and, by overworking them,
partly in their own fields, had rendered them unfit for further use.
He sat down as he said this and begged them not to mortify and insult
him and thus wantonly cause a relapse of the illness from which he had
but recently recovered.

Since there was nothing else to be done, the next day, at the request
of their cousin, the Squire, the lords Hinz and Kunz, who possessed
estates in the neighborhood of Tronka Castle, which had been burned
down, wrote to their stewards and to the farmers living there for
information about the black horses which had been lost on that
unfortunate day and not heard of since. But on account of the complete
destruction of the castle and the massacre of most of the inhabitants,
all that they could learn was that a servant, driven by blows dealt
with the flat of the incendiary's sword, had rescued them from the
burning shed in which they were standing, but that afterward, to the
question where he should take them and what he should do with them, he
had been answered by a kick from the savage madman. The Squire's gouty
old housekeeper, who had fled to Meissen, assured the latter, in reply
to his written inquiry, that on the morning after that horrible night
the servant had gone off with the horses toward the Brandenburg
border, but all inquiries which were made there proved vain, and some
error seemed to lie at the bottom of this information, as the Squire
had no servant whose home was in Brandenburg or even on the road
thither. Some men from Dresden, who had been in Wilsdruf a few days
after the burning of Tronka Castle, declared that, at the time named,
a groom had arrived in that place, leading two horses by the halter,
and, as the animals were very sick and could go no further, he had
left them in the cow-stable of a shepherd who had offered to restore
them to good condition. For a variety of reasons it seemed very
probable that these were the black horses for which search was being
made, but persons coming from Wilsdruf declared that the shepherd had
already traded them off again, no one knew to whom; and a third rumor,
the originator of which could not be discovered, even asserted that
the two horses had in the mean time passed peacefully away and been
buried in the carrion pit at Wilsdruf.

This turn of affairs, as can be easily understood, was the most
pleasing to the lords Hinz and Kunz, as they were thus relieved of the
necessity of fattening the blacks in their stables, the Squire, their
cousin, no longer having any stables of his own. They wished, however,
for the sake of absolute security, to verify this circumstance. Sir
Wenzel Tronka, therefore, in his capacity as hereditary feudal lord
with the right of judicature, addressed a letter to the magistrates at
Wilsdruf, in which, after a minute description of the black horses,
which, as he said, had been intrusted to his care and lost through an
accident, he begged them to be so obliging as to ascertain their
present whereabouts, and to urge and admonish the owner, whoever he
might be, to deliver them at the stables of the Chamberlain, Sir Kunz,
in Dresden, and be generously reimbursed for all costs. Accordingly, a
few days later, the man to whom the shepherd in Wilsdruf had sold them
did actually appear with the horses, thin and staggering, tied to the
tailboard of his cart, and led them to the market-place in Dresden. As
the bad luck of Sir Wenzel and still more of honest Kohlhaas would
have it, however, the man happened to be the knacker from Doebeln.

As soon as Sir Wenzel, in the presence of the Chamberlain, his
cousin, learned from an indefinite rumor that a man had arrived in the
city with two black horses which had escaped from the burning of
Tronka Castle, both gentlemen, accompanied by a few servants hurriedly
collected in the house, went to the palace square where the man had
stopped, intending, if the two animals proved to be those belonging to
Kohlhaas, to make good the expenses the man had incurred and take the
horses home with them. But how disconcerted were the knights to see a
momentarily increasing crowd of people, who had been attracted by the
spectacle, already standing around the two-wheeled cart to which the
horses were fastened! Amid uninterrupted laughter they were calling to
one another that the horses, on account of which the whole state was
tottering, already belonged to the knacker! The Squire who had gone
around the cart and gazed at the miserable animals, which seemed every
moment about to expire, said in an embarrassed way that those were not
the horses which he had taken from Kohlhaas; but Sir Kunz, the
Chamberlain, casting at him a look of speechless rage which, had it
been of iron, would have dashed him to pieces, and throwing back his
cloak to disclose his orders and chain, stepped up to the knacker and
asked if those were the black horses which the shepherd at Wilsdruf
had gained possession of, and for which Squire Wenzel Tronka, to whom
they belonged, had made requisition through the magistrate of that
place.

The knacker who, with a pail of water in his hand, was busy watering a
fat, sturdy horse that was drawing his cart asked--"The blacks?" Then
he put down the pail, took the bit out of the horse's mouth, and
explained that the black horses which were tied to the tailboard of
the cart had been sold to him by the swineherd in Hainichen; where the
latter had obtained them and whether they came from the shepherd at
Wilsdruf--that he did not know. "He had been told," he continued,
taking up the pail again and propping it between the pole of the cart
and his knee "he had been told by the messenger of the court at
Wilsdruf to take the horses to the house of the Tronkas in Dresden,
but the Squire to whom he had been directed was named Kunz." With
these words he turned around with the rest of the water which the
horse had left in the pail, and emptied it out on the pavement. The
Chamberlain, who was beset by the stares of the laughing, jeering
crowd and could not induce the fellow, who was attending to his
business with phlegmatic zeal, to look at him, said that he was the
Chamberlain Kunz Tronka. The black horses, however, which he was to
get possession of, had to be those belonging to the Squire, his
cousin; they must have been given to the shepherd at Wilsdruf by a
stable-man who had run away from Tronka Castle at the time of the
fire; moreover, they must be the two horses that originally had
belonged to the horse-dealer Kohlhaas. He asked the fellow, who was
standing there with his legs apart, pulling up his trousers, whether
he did not know something about all this. Had not the swineherd of
Hainichen, he went on, perhaps purchased these horses from the
shepherd at Wilsdruf, or from a third person, who in turn had bought
them from the latter?--for everything depended on this circumstance.

The knacker replied that he had been ordered to go with the black
horses to Dresden and was to receive the money for them in the house
of the Tronkas. He did not understand what the Squire was talking
about, and whether it was Peter or Paul, or the shepherd in Wilsdruf,
who had owned them before the swineherd in Hainichen, was all one to
him so long as they had not been stolen; and with this he went off,
with his whip across his broad back, to a public house which stood in
the square, with the intention of getting some breakfast, as he was
very hungry.

The Chamberlain, who for the life of him didn't know what he should do
with the horses which the swineherd of Hainichen had sold to the
knacker of Doebeln, unless they were those on which the devil was
riding through Saxony, asked the Squire to say something; but when
the latter with white, trembling lips replied that it would be
advisable to buy the black horses whether they belonged to Kohlhaas or
not, the Chamberlain, cursing the father and mother who had given
birth to the Squire, stepped aside out of the crowd and threw back his
cloak, absolutely at a loss to know what he should do or leave undone.
Defiantly determined not to leave the square just because the rabble
were staring at him derisively and with their handkerchiefs pressed
tight over their mouths seemed to be waiting only for him to depart
before bursting out into laughter, he called to Baron Wenk, an
acquaintance who happened to be riding by, and begged him to stop at
the house of the Lord High Chancellor, Count Wrede, and through the
latter's instrumentality to have Kohlhaas brought there to look at the
black horses.

When the Baron, intent upon this errand, entered the chamber of the
Lord High Chancellor, it so happened that Kohlhaas was just then
present, having been summoned by a messenger of the court to give
certain explanations of which they stood in need concerning the
deposit in Luetzen. While the Chancellor, with an annoyed look, rose
from his chair and asked the horse-dealer, whose person was unknown to
the Baron, to step to one side with his papers, the latter informed
him of the dilemma in which the lords Tronka found themselves. He
explained that the knacker from Doebeln, acting on a defective
requisition from the court at Wilsdruf, had appeared with horses whose
condition was so frightful that Squire Wenzel could not help
hesitating to pronounce them the ones belonging to Kohlhaas. In case
they were to be taken from the knacker not-withstanding, and an
attempt made to restore them to good condition in the stables of the
knights, an ocular inspection by Kohlhaas would first be necessary in
order to establish the aforesaid circumstance beyond doubt. "Will you
therefore have the goodness," he concluded, "to have a guard fetch the
horse-dealer from his house and conduct him to the market-place where
the horses are standing?" The Lord High Chancellor, taking his glasses
from his nose, said that the Baron was laboring under a double
delusion--first, in thinking that the fact in question could be
ascertained only by means of an ocular inspection by Kohlhaas, and
then, in imagining that he, the Chancellor, possessed the authority to
have Kohlhaas taken by a guard wherever the Squire happened to wish.
With this he presented to him Kohlhaas who was standing behind him,
and sitting down and putting on his glasses again, begged him to apply
to the horse-dealer himself in the matter.

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