is Father acknowledged receipt of this
latter Work with the words, "That I possess a copy of thy new Tragedy
I tell nobody; for I dare not, on account of certain passages, let any
one notice that it has pleased me." Nevertheless the Piece, as already
the _Robbers_ had done, came in Stuttgart also to the acting point;
and was received with loud approval. Schiller now, with new pleasure
and inspiration, laid hands on his _Don Carlos_; and with the happy
progress of this Work, there began for him a more confident temper of
mind, and a clearing-up of horizon and outlook; which henceforth only
transiently yielded to embarrassments in his outer life.

'Soon after this, however, there came upon him an unexpected event so
suddenly and painfully that, in his extremest excitement and misery,
he fairly hurt the feelings of his Father by unreasonable requirements
of him, and reproaches on their being refused. A principal Stuttgart
Cautioner of his, incessantly pressed upon by the stringent measures
of the creditors there, had fairly run off, saved himself by flight,
from Stuttgart, and been seized in Mannheim, and there put in jail.
Were not this Prisoner at once got out, Schiller's honour and peace of
conscience were at stake. And so, before his (properly Streicher's)
Landlord, the Architect Hoelzel, could get together the required 300
gulden, and save this unlucky friend, the half-desperate Poet had
written home, and begged from his Father that indispensable sum. And
on the Father's clear refusal, had answered him with a very unfilial
Letter. Not till after the lapse of seven weeks, did the Father reply;
in a Letter, which, as a luminous memorial of his faithful honest
father-heart and of his considerate just character as a man, deserves
insertion here:

"Very unwilling," writes he, "am I to proceed to the answering of thy
last Letter, 21st November of the past year; which I could rather wish
never to have read than now to taste again the bitterness contained
there. Not enough that thou, in the beginning of the said Letter, very
undeservedly reproachest me, as if I could and should have raised the
300 gulden for thee,--thou continuest to blame me, in a very painful
way, for my inquiries about thee on this occasion. Dear Son, the
relation between a good Father and his Son fallen into such a strait,
who, although gifted with many faculties of mind, is still, in all
that belongs to true greatness and contentment, much mistaken and