Still more! Our new Regent--as in Italy, the people get the palace of the deceased Doge or Pope gratis--let the furniture of his illustrious father be sold at auction for a song; he did it, as all Crown princes do, out of respect for him, so that the people might inherit a souvenir of the departed, as the Roman people did the gardens of Cæsar. The Professor proposed to himself, therefore, to inherit and purchase. He bid, therefore, for the benefit of the Captain, in whose chamber the commode, the looking-glass, and the chairs were miserable objects--not upon those three objects, but upon three to match them--upon two elegant bronze vases, with goats' heads and myrtle leaves, for the miserable commode; upon a straight-legged pier-table, with pointed feet, to go under the miserable looking-glass; upon a splendid bergére to stand between the miserable chairs. The whole was knocked off to him. His first word, as he went from the auction room into his own, was to his wife: "Is the Captain up stairs? I have bought some elegant things for him." At this she sang the first verse of her war-song, without having yet noticed a single article of his purchase. He did not name one of them to her; for he had the greatest misfortune of a husband, namely, contempt for his wife, just as she, on the contrary, took his part against all persons, even the best, only not against herself. During the unpacking of the purchases he responded to the first verse of the war-song, yet did not name an article; and no they merely kept up an antiphonal chanting. At last the goats' heads and pointed feet were set down in the house. Then broke loose the war-cry: "That is stupid, stupid, stupid! Ha! you stupid man, you! the stuff! the rubbish! where were your five senses to-day! I wont pay a doit (besides she was never treasurer), and so dear! But when children and fools go to market!"
Quite coolly he said: "Just see that no harm comes to them, and take them up to the Captain, my sweet!" She obeyed on the instant; but then went into his room and opened all the sluices of her roaring wrath. At a late period of this roaring he said, at last, threateningly: "You know, wife!..." Now the wind grew to a storm in her mouth. He was not the man to be carried away by anger or any other passion, but he was a genuine Stoic, and always himself; hence, it is easily explained how, as Epictetus and Seneca advise Stoics to make up for the forbidden inward anger by the outward show of the same, so as to get the upper hand of people, he too diligently availed himself of his show of anger, and quickly petrified his fist and threw this bunch as a _fire-ball_ at those members of his spouse, which were devoid of light in the matter. This blunt Wilsonian conducting-knob of her anger was the first thing to draw forth from her the greatest spark of eloquence; and, in fact, it is in marriage as in the old Republics, which (according to Hume's observation), never produced greater orators than in the stormy times of war. He made the material thing a mere vehicle of the mental, and accompanied his hand with fragmentary extracts from the manual of Epictetus: "I am really quite in my senses," said he, "but you will scream altogether too loud if I don't strike into the midst of it." His carnal arm continued to move upon her. "I shall just keep on," he continued, "meanwhile, thank God that your husband has so much composure, that he can weigh everything he does!" But she never grew cold till he grew heated; this she discovered, at any time, by his growing dumb as Socrates, and arming and winging his hand with his night-cap suddenly snatched down from its nail. In proportion as his stinging sunny friendliness before the irruption of her thunderstorms seemed hot to her, in the same degree was his cloudiness that followed disagreeably cold; in short, both parties played before and after the battle reversed parts. This time her anger found a crisis of relief, and vented its whole force upon the head of him who was sitting under the goat-headed vases on the bergére--the Captain. The latter at the first gazette of this disgusting war had his winter-things packed up in Scheerau, and his summer things unpacked in Auenthal, and went--yes, actually went away.