Page:Hoffmann's Strange Stories - Hoffman - 1855.djvu/71

Rh and pushed him out, to the great glorification of the journeymen and apprentices, who had witnessed this scene. The old man Valentine, his hands clasped and his brow clouded, said in a low voice:—"I thought that there was something better in that journeyman than in a common workman." Dame Martha, who liked Frederick, and her little ones whom he often regaled with delicacies, were inconsolable at his departure.

Master Martin's workshop became sadder than ever. The new journeymen gave him nothing but care. Forced to watch over the least details, he passed his days in burdensome fatigue, and at night, tormented by wakefulness, he repeated incessantly: "Ah! Reinhold, ah! Frederick, why did you thus deceive me? Why were you not simply honest and laborious workmen?" The poor man visibly failed, and was many times on the point of giving up his calling, and dying of langour [sic]. He was seated one evening before the door of his house, preoccupied with painful reveries, when he saw coming towards him Jacobus Paumgartner, accompanied by master Johannes Holzschuer; he thought truly that they were going to speak to him about Frederick. In effect, Paumgartner turned the conversation towards this subject, and Holzschuer exerted himself in eulogizing the young artist; and both rivalled each other in praising the excellent qualities of Frederick, and in predicting the future that was reserved for his talents, supplicated master Martin to give up his prejudices in his favor, and not to renounce the idea of granting the hand of his daughter to this young man, who after all would make her happy, and would do credit some day to his father-in-law. Master Martin allowed them to have their say: then taking off his fur cap slowly, he very calmly answered them:—"My dear gentlemen, you take so pressing an interest in what relates to this youth, that I would fain pardon him