Debit and Credit | Page 9

that has inspired our author in the
composition of the work which is here offered to the English reading
public. It is his highest praise, however, that he has imbodied this faith
in a true work of art, which speaks for itself. He has thereby enkindled
or strengthened a like faith in many thousand hearts, and that with a
noble and conciliatory intention which the dedication well expresses.
The admirable delineation of character, the richness of invention, the
artistic arrangement, the lively descriptions of nature, will be ever more
fully acknowledged by the sympathizing reader as he advances in the
perusal of the attractive volumes.

TO HIS HIGHNESS ERNEST II.,
DUKE OF SAXE-COBURG-GOTHA.
I visited Kallenberg one lovely evening in the month of May. The high
ground near the castle was steeped in perfume from the blossoms of the
spring, and the leaves of the pink acacia cast their checkered shadows
on the dewy grass. Beneath me, in the shady valley, deer bounded
fearless from their covert in the wood, following greedily with their
eyes the bright figure of that lady who greets with kind and hospitable
welcome all who enter the precincts of the castle--men, and all living
things. The repose of evening lay on hill and dale; no sound was heard
save the occasional roll of thunder from afar above the bright and
cheerful landscape. On this very evening, leaning against the wall of
the ancient castle, your highness gazed with troubled aspect into the
gloomy distance. What my noble prince then said about the conflicts of
the last few years, the relaxed and utterly despondent temper of the
nation, and the duty of authors, at such a time especially, to show the
people, for their encouragement and elevation, as in a mirror, what they
are capable of doing--those were golden words, revealing a great grasp
of intellect and a warm heart, and their echo will not soon die away in
the heart of him who heard them. It was on that evening the desire

awoke within me to grace with your highness's name the work whose
plan had been already in my mind.
Nearly two years have passed since then. A terrible war is raging, and
Germans look with gloomy apprehension to the future of their
fatherland. At such a time, when the strongest political feelings agitate
the life of every individual, that spirit of cheerful tranquillity, so
needful to an author for the artistic moulding of his creations, readily
forsakes his writing-table. It is long, alas! since the German author has
enjoyed it. He has far too little interest in home and foreign life; he
wants that composure and proud satisfaction which the writers of other
countries feel in dwelling on the past and present of their nation, while
he has enough and to spare of humiliation on account of his country, of
wishes unfulfilled and passionate indignation. At such a time, in
drawing an imaginative picture, not love alone, but hatred too, flows
freely and readily from the pen--practical tendencies are apt to usurp
the place of poetic fancy; and, instead of a genial tone and temper, the
reader is apt to find an unpleasing mixture of blunt reality and artificial
sentiment.
Surrounded by such dangers, it becomes twofold the duty of an author
carefully to avoid distortion in the outline of his pictures, and to keep
his own soul free from unjust prepossession. To give the highest
expression to the beautiful in its noblest form is not the privilege of
every time; but, in all times alike, it is the duty of the writer of fiction
to be true to his art and to his country. To seek for this truth, and where
found to exhibit it, I hold to be the duty of my own life.
And now let me dedicate, with deepest reverence, my unimportant
work to you, my honored lord. I shall rejoice if this novel leaves on the
mind of your highness the impression that its conception is in faithful
keeping with the laws of life and of art, without ever being a slavish
copy of the accidental occurrences of the day.
GUSTAV FREYTAG.
LEIPSIC, April, 1855.

DEBIT AND CREDIT.
CHAPTER I.
Ostrau is a small town near the Oder, celebrated even as far as Poland
for its gymnasium and its gingerbread. In this patriarchal spot had
dwelt for many years the accountant-royal, Wohlfart, an
enthusiastically loyal subject, and a hearty lover of his
fellow-men--with one or two exceptions. He married late in life, and his
wife and he lived in a small house, the garden of which he himself kept
in order. For a long time the happy pair were childless; but at length
came a day when the good woman, having smartened up her white
bed-curtains with a broad