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For those who desire to know more of the poet’s life than has been told, this is added. He did not live to be very old. A painful disease (the result of mental toil), borne through many years, ended his life almost in its prime. He retained his faculties till the last, and bore protracted suffering with a heroism and endurance which he had not always displayed in smaller trials. The medical men pronounced, on the authority of a post-mortem examination, that he must for years have suffered a silent martyrdom. Truly, his bodily sufferings (when known at last) might well excuse many weaknesses and much moody, irritable impatience; especially when it is remembered that the mental sufferings of intellectual men are generally great in proportion to their gifts, and (when clogged with nerves and body that are ever urged beyond their strength) that they often mock the pride of humanity by leaving but little space between the genius and the madman.

Another fact was not known till he had died–his charity. Then it was discovered how much kindness he had exercised in secret, and that three poor widows had been fed daily from his table during all the best years of his prosperity. Before his death he arranged all his affairs, even to the disposal of his worn-out body.

“My country has been gracious to me,” he said, “and, if it cares, may dispose of my carcase as it will. But I desire that after my death my heart may be taken from my body and buried at the feet of my father and my mother in the churchyard of my native town. At their feet,” he added, with some of the old imperiousness–“strong in death.” “At their feet, remember!”

In one of the largest cities of Germany, a huge marble monument is erected to the memory of the Great Man. On three sides of the pedestal are bas-relief designs illustrating some of his works, whereby three fellow-countrymen added to their fame; and on the fourth is a fine inscription in Latin, setting forth his talents, and his virtues, and the honours conferred on him, and stating in conclusion (on the authority of his eulogizer) that his works have gained for him immortality.

In a quiet green churchyard, near a quiet little town, under the shadow of the quaint old church, a little cross marks the graves of a tradesman and of his wife who lived and laboured in their generation, and are at rest. Near them, daisies grow above the dust of the “Fraeulein,” which awaits the resurrection from the dead. And at the feet of that simple couple lies the heart of their great son–a heart which the sickness of earthly hope and the fever of earthly ambition shall disturb no more.

By the Poet’s own desire, “the rude memorial” that marks the spot contains no more than his initials, and a few words in his native tongue to mark the foundation of the only ambition that he could feel in death–

“Ich verlasse mich auf Gottes Guete immer und ewiglich.”

—My trust is in the tender mercy of GOD for
ever and ever.