An Egyptian Princess | Page 4

Georg Ebers
from my pen involuntarily, even against my will (I
intended to write a novel in prose) in the quiet night, by the eternal Nile,
among the palms and roses. The first love-scene has a story of its own
to me. I wrote it in half an hour, almost unconsciously. It may be read
in my book that the Persians always reflected in the morning, when
sober, upon the resolutions formed the night before, while drunk. When
I examined in the sunshine what had come into existence by lamplight,
I grew doubtful of its merits, and was on the point of destroying the
love-scenes altogether, when my dear friend Julius Hammer, the author
of "Schau in Dich, und Schau um Dich," too early summoned to the
other world by death, stayed my hand. Their form was also approved
by others, and I tell myself that the 'poetical' expression of love is very
similar in all lands and ages, while lovers' conversations and modes of
intercourse vary according to time and place. Besides, I have to deal
with one of those by no means rare cases, where poetry can approach
nearer the truth than prudent, watchful prose. Many of my honored
critics have censured these scenes; others, among whom are some
whose opinion I specially value, have lavished the kindest praise upon
them. Among these gentlemen I will mention A. Stahr, C. V. Holtei, M.
Hartmann, E. Hoefer, W. Wolfsohn, C. Leemans, Professor Veth of

Amsterdam, etc. Yet I will not conceal the fact that some, whose
opinion has great weight, have asked: "Did the ancients know anything
of love, in our sense of the word? Is not romantic love, as we know it, a
result of Christianity?" The following sentence, which stands at the
head of the preface to my first edition, will prove that I had not ignored
this question when I began my task.
"It has often been remarked that in Cicero's letters and those of Pliny
the younger there are unmistakeable indications of sympathy with the
more sentimental feeling of modern days. I find in them tones of deep
tenderness only, such as have arisen and will arise from sad and aching
hearts in every land and every age."
A. v. HUMBOLDT. Cosmos II. P. 19.
This opinion of our great scholar is one with which I cheerfully
coincide and would refer my readers to the fact that love-stories were
written before the Christian era: the Amor and Psyche of Apuleius for
instance. Indeed love in all its forms was familiar to the ancients.
Where can we find a more beautiful expression of ardent passion than
glows in Sappho's songs? or of patient faithful constancy than in
Homer's Penelope? Could there be a more beautiful picture of the union
of two loving hearts, even beyond the grave, than Xenophon has
preserved for us in his account of Panthea and Abradatas? or the story
of Sabinus the Gaul and his wife, told in the history of Vespasian? Is
there anywhere a sweeter legend than that of the Halcyons, the
ice-birds, who love one another so tenderly that when the male
becomes enfeebled by age, his mate carries him on her outspread wings
whithersoever he will; and the gods, desiring to reward such faithful
love, cause the sun to shine more kindly, and still the winds and waves
on the "Halcyon days" during which these birds are building their nest
and brooding over their young? There can surely have been no lack of
romantic love in days when a used-up man of the world, like Antony,
could desire in his will that wherever he died his body might be laid by
the side of his beloved Cleopatra: nor of the chivalry of love when
Berenice's beautiful hair was placed as a constellation in the heavens.
Neither can we believe that devotion in the cause of love could be
wanting when a whole nation was ready to wage a fierce and obstinate
war for the sake of one beautiful woman. The Greeks had an insult to
revenge, but the Trojans fought for the possession of Helen. Even the

old men of Ilium were ready "to suffer long for such a woman." And
finally is not the whole question answered in Theocritus' unparalleled
poem, "the Sorceress?" We see the poor love- lorn girl and her old
woman-servant, Thestylis, cowering over the fire above which the bird
supposed to possess the power of bringing back the faithless Delphis is
sitting in his wheel. Simoetha has learnt many spells and charms from
an Assyrian, and she tries them all. The distant roar of the waves, the
stroke rising from the fire, the dogs howling in the street, the tortured
fluttering bird, the old woman, the broken- hearted girl and her awful
spells, all join in forming
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