press your thanks insistently upon him — he doesn’t want such thanks, as his generosity wasn’t and isn’t motivated by the wish to receive something beggarly in return. Under certain circumstances, giving thanks is only a form of begging, nothing more. Then there’s another thing: In the country, thanks are more silent and still than loquacious. The person obliged to feel gratitude acts in a certain way because he sees his counterpart doing so as well. Refined givers are almost even more diffident than takers, and they prefer for takers to take unselfconsciously, since this allows them, the givers, to give decorously, without fuss. The teacher, by the way, is my sister, but this circumstance wouldn’t prevent her from driving me, as a ne’er-do-well, from her doorstep if the desire happened to seize her. She is courageous and sincere. She received me with a mix of loving-kindness and distrust, as was quite natural, for how could she help but assume that if this good-for-nothing brother of hers came sailing and sauntering up to see her, his comfortably-settled sister, it had to be because in all God’s world he hadn’t the slightest notion where else to go. Certainly there was something disturbing and hurtful about this, for if truth be told I hadn’t written her a single letter for months, indeed years. She must have thought I was coming only out of concern for my own body, which at times might truly profit from a good whipping, rather than because I was worried about my sister and wished to see her. Things have changed meanwhile, these sensitivities have been put to rest, and now we live side by side not merely as blood relatives but as comrades who get along splendidly. Ah, in the countryside it’s simple enough for two people to get along. It’s customary here to thrust aside distrust and secrecy more quickly, and to love more cheerfully and brightly than in the thronging city with its hordes of people and constant woes. In the country, even the poorest man has fewer worries than a far less impoverished city-dweller — for in the city everything is measured by human words and human deeds — while worries here go on worrying as quietly as they may, and pain provides pain’s own natural surcease. In the city, everyone races about pell-mell trying to get rich (for which reason so many think themselves bitterly poor), while in the country, at least to a large extent, the poor are spared the insult of constantly being compared with the rich. They can peacefully go on breathing despite their poverty, for they have a whole sky above them to breathe! What is the sky in the city? — I myself have only a single small silver coin left by way of money, and this must cover the laundry. My sister, who has no secrets from me except those that are utterly unspeakable, has even confessed to me that her money has run out. Not that we’re starting to worry. We have the most luscious bread here, and fresh eggs and fragrant cakes, as much as we could wish for. The children bring us all of this, for their parents send it to school for Teacher. In the country, people know how to give in such a way that it does honor to the taker. In the city you practically have to be afraid to give because it’s begun to defile the taker, I truly cannot say for what reason, perhaps because in the city takers display insolence toward the kind givers. So then people take care not to display noble sympathies toward those suffering privation and give only furtively, or as a form of personal aggrandizement. What atrocious weakness, fearing the poor, and for this reason consuming one’s own riches alone rather than allowing oneself the glory attained, say, by a queen when she reaches out her hand to a lowly beggar-woman. I consider it a great misfortune to be poor in the city because a person isn’t allowed to ask for things, it being quite clear that benevolence is not the order of the day. One thing at least holds true: Better not to give nor feel pity at all than to do so unwillingly, conscious of having succumbed to a weakness. In the country, giving doesn’t make a person weak; people wish to give and sometimes give themselves entirely to the pastime of giving. If a person is wary of giving, he will surely himself — should he one day find himself trampled by destinies of various sorts and forced to ask for help — ask badly and accept what he is given gracelessly and with embarrassment, that is, in a beggarly fashion. How reprehensible it is when those blessed with commodities insist on ignoring the poor. Better to torment them, force them into indentured servitude, inflict compulsion and blows — this at least produces a connection, fury and a pounding heart, and these too constitute a form of relationship. But to cower in elegant homes behind golden garden gates, fearful lest the breath of warm humankind touch you, unable to indulge in extravagances for fear they might be glimpsed by the embittered oppressed, to oppress and yet lack the courage to show yourself as an oppressor, even to fear the ones you are oppressing, feeling ill at ease in your own wealth and begrudging others their ease, to resort to disagreeable weapons that require neither true audacity nor manly courage, to have money, but only money, without splendor: That’s what things look like in our cities at present, and I find the picture disagreeable, it needs bettering. In the countryside, matters are still quite different. Here, a poor devil knows better where he stands; he can gaze up at the wealthy and well-off with a salubrious envy, and this is permitted, as it only serves to increase the grandeur of the object of these glances. In the country, the wish to possess a house of one’s own is a deeply rooted longing that reaches all the way up to God. For here, beneath the vast open sky, possessing a beautiful roomy house is heavenly. In the city, things are different. There an arriviste can dwell right beside a count of ancient lineage; indeed, money can raze houses and sacred old edifices at will. Who would wish to own a building in the city? There, owning a home is nothing more than a business, not a matter of pride and pleasure. City buildings are filled from top to bottom with the most different sorts of people, all of whom cross paths without knowing one another or expressing the desire to be allowed to make each other’s acquaintance. Is this a dwelling in the true sense? And long, long streets are filled with just such buildings, which certainly don’t deserve to be referred to as homes. In the countryside more happens, properly speaking, than in town; for while city-dwellers coldly, jadedly read of recent occurrences in the newspaper, news in the country passes feverishly, breathlessly from mouth to mouth. Something happens in the country perhaps once a year, but then it is an experience shared by all. A village with all its nooks and crannies is certainly almost always livelier and richer in intelligence than city folk generally assume. Many an old woman with facial features that would perhaps suit any fellow’s grandmother sits here behind white window-curtains with her store of enchantingly heartfelt tales, and many a village child is far more advanced in the education of her heart and mind than one might like to suppose. Often it’s happened that a village child like this, having been transferred to a school in town, has astounded her new classmates with her well-developed intellect. But let me not disdain the city and praise the country beyond its due. It’s just that the days here are so beautiful that one quickly learns to forget the city. They awaken a silent longing that draws one off into the distance — and yet one has no wish to go any farther. There is a going in all things and a coming in all. As the day takes its leave, it gives us in exchange the wonderful twilight when you can go strolling about on paths the evening appears to have discovered — paths you discover for the evening. The houses become more prominent, and their windows gleam. Even when it’s raining, it’s still beautiful; for then one thinks how good it is it’s raining. Since my coming here, spring has almost arrived, and it’s arriving more and more, you can leave your doors and windows standing open, and we’re starting to turn over the earth in the garden, everyone else has already done so. We’re the late bloomers, as befits us. An entire cartload of black, moist, expensive soil has been delivered, and this must be mixed with the dirt already in the garden. This will be a job which — implausible as it may sound when I say so — I’m looking forward to. I’m not a born lazybones, really not; I’m a ne’er-do-well only because various offices and notaries public are refusing me employment since they don’t have any idea how useful I could be to them. Every Saturday I shake out the rugs, which is work of a sort, and I’m industriously learning to cook, also a form of ambition. After the meal I dry the plates and chat with the teacher; for there is much to be said and discussed, and I love chatting with a sister. In the morning I sweep the room and carry packages to the post office, then return home and set to pondering what else there is to do. Ordinarily there’s nothing, and so then I go down into the forest and sit beneath the beech trees until the time has come, or I believe the time has come, for me to return home. When I see people at work, I involuntarily feel ashamed that I have no occupation, but it seems to me that beyond feeling this shame there’s nothing I can do. To me it’s as if the day has been tossed into my lap by a benevolent god who likes to give things to good-for-nothings. I demand of myself nothing more than the willingness to work, and the resolve to seize hold of any job I should espy before me — and that way things go well. This outlook, you see, accords quite splendidly with country living. You mustn’t overdo it all too much here, otherwise you lose your view of the lovely whole, along with your perspective as an observer — for even a looker-on must, in the end, exist in the world. The only pain I feel is occasioned by my sister, as I am incapable of repaying the debt I owe her and must watch her laboriously fulfilling her sour duties while I lie about daydreaming. Later ages will punish me for my malingering if intervening earlier ones haven’t done so already, but I believe I am pleasing to my God just as I am; God loves the happy and hates the sad. My sister is never sad for long; for I am constantly cheering her up and giving her something to laugh about by behaving ludicrously, for which I have a talent. But it is only my sister laughing at me, only she who finds me appealingly comical — with others, I comport myself in a dignified manner, though not stiffly. If one doesn’t wish to be taken for a scoundrel, it’s one’s duty to justify one’s existence to the outside world through serious behavior. Country people are quite sensitive about the comportment of young people, whom they wish to see courteous, staid, and modest. I shall conclude here and hope I’ve earned some money with this essay; if not, I nonetheless found it most interesting to write, and my doing so has caused several hours to pass. Several hours? Indeed! For in the country a person writes slowly — you’re constantly being interrupted, your fingers have become less nimble, and even your thoughts wish to think in a country manner. Farewell, cosmopolitans!