The St. Cloud journal. [volume] (St. Cloud, Minn.) 1866-1876, 1875-11-04

OAVVO =" L. -
That seriesofterrific events by which
our quiet city and university in the
northeastern quarter of Germany
were 'convulsed durinsths var 1916
has, in itself, and considered merely
as blind movement of human tiger
passion S1s9ing SSnnoha;ned amongst
men, something too memorable to be
f, Or left Without its own sep
arate record but the moral. lesson,
impressed by these events, is yet more
memorable, and deserves, the deep at
tention Of coming generations in their
struggle after human improvement,
not merely in its own limited field of
interest directly awakened, but in all
analogous felds}of interest," !: as in .fac1ti: 1i
already, and more than once. in con-
nection with these very events, this
lesson has obtained the efectual atten-
ton Of Christian. kings and princes
assembled in congress. No tragedy:
indeed, amongst all the md, ones by
WHICH the charities Of the human
heart or Of the freside have ever been
outraged, can better merit q separate
chapter in the private history of Ger
man manners or social life than this
unparalleled case. And, on the other
hand, no one can put in 2: better
claim to be the historian -thansmy,elf.,
Twas at the time; and still am, 4
professor in that city and university
which had the melancholy distinct.
ion Of being its theatre. I knew "a
miliarly all the parties who were con-
cerned in it, either as sufferers or as
agents. was present from first TO-
last, and watched the whole course Of
the mysterious storm which fell upon
our devoted city, in a strength like
that Of a West India hurricane, and
which did seriously threaten at one
time to depopulate our university,
through the dark suspicious which
settled upon its members, and the
natural reaction Of generous indiena-
ton in repelling them; whilst the
city in its more stationary and native
classes would very soon have mani.
tested their awful sense of things of
the hideous insecurity for life, and Of
the unfathomable dangers which had
undermined their hearths below their
very feet, by sacrificing, whenever
circumstances allowed them, their
houses and beautiful gardens in OK
change for days uncursed by panic,
and nights unpoauted by. blood;
Nothing, 1 can take upon. myself to
assert, was left undone Of all that hu-
man foresight sould suggest, or b9,
man ingenuity could accomplish.
But observe the melancholy result:
the more certain did these arrange
ments strike people as remedies for
the evil, so much the more efectually
did they aid the terror, but, .boye
all, the awe, the sense Of mystery,
when ten cases of total determination,
applied to separate households, had
occurred, in every one Of which thsee
precautionary aids had failed to yield
the slightest assistance. The horror,
the perfect frenzy Of fear, which seiz-
ed upon the town after that expert
ence, battles all attempt at description.
Had these various. .contrivances failed
merely in some human and intelligi.
bic way, as by bringing the aid too
tardily,-still, in such cases, though
the danger would no less have been
evidently deepened, nobody would
have felt any further mystery than
what, from the very first, rested upon
the persons and the motives Of the
murderers. But asiit was, when in
ten separate cases of exterminating
carnage, the astounded. police, aftel
an. examination the most searching
pursued from day to day, and almost
exhausting the patience by the, min;
uteness Of the investigation, had fin;
ally pronounced that no attempt app; p
parently had been made to benefit iby ib3
any Of the signals preconoerted,, that
no footstep apparently had moved il
that direction,-then and after tha,
result, a blind misery Of fear fell up
on the population, so much the WORSE
than any anguish of beleaguered
city that is awaiting the stormine
fury ola victorious enemy, by how
much the shadowy, the uncertain, thu
| infinita ia at all timoa mora ,oton,