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84 Hermann Sudermann
drawn, I will give you a toast. For, you see, my dear
Pastor, something of the old pagan, a spark of heathen
ism, is still glowing somewhere within us all. It has
outlived century after century, from the time of the old
Teutons. Once every year that spark is fanned into
flame it flames up high, and then it is called
"
The
Fires of St. John." Once every year we have
"
free
night." Then the witches ride upon their brooms
the same brooms with which their witchcraft was once
driven out of them with scornful laughter the wild
hordes sweep across the tree-tops, up, up, high upon the
Blocksberg! Then it is, when in our hearts awake those
wild desires which our fates could not fulfill
and, understand me well, dared not fulfill then,
no matter what may be the name of the law that governs
the world on that day, in order that one single wish may
become a reality, by whose grace we prolong our miser
able existence, thousand others must miserably perish,
part because they were never attainable; but the others,
yes, the others, because we allowed them to escape us
like wild birds, which, though already in our hands, but
too listless to profit by opportunity, we failed to grasp
at the right moment. But no matter. Once every year
we have
"
free night." And yonder tongues of fire
shooting up towards the heavens do you know what
they are? They are the spirits of our dead perished
wishes! That is the red plumage of our birds of para
dise we might have petted and nursed through our entire
lives, but have escaped us! That is the old chaos, the
heathenism within us; and though we be happy in sun
shine and according to law, to-night is St. John s night.
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