Washington standard. [volume] (Olympia, Wash. Territory) 1860-1921, 1879-08-29
The Child Goethe.


In the first glimpse we have of the
child Goethe be was engaged in piece
of mischief. He was alone, Of course,
or the affair could not have happened;
and he was then about three years old.
This is the way he told the story some
years after:
"A crockery fair had just been held,
from which not only our kitchen had
been supplied with wares for long
time to come, but great deal of small
gear had been purchased as playthings
for us children. One beautiful after
noon, when everything was quiet about
the house, 1 whiied away the time with
my pots and dishes in the frame.room;
and, finding that nothing more was to
be got out of them, hurled one of them
into the street, vastly tickled to hear
the chatter it made in breaking. There
were three brothers living on the oppo-
site side of the street, who were always
much diverted at my pranks. These
men, the Won Ochsensteins, seeing me
on this occasion relish the sport until
clapped my hands in delight, cried out
to me: Another I did not withhold
a kettle, and, as they made no end to
their calls for more, in little while,
the whole collection-platters, pipkins,
mugs, and all-were dashed to pieces
on the pavement. My neighbors con.
tinued to express their appreciation,
and 1 was highly delighted to give them
pleasure. But my stock was exhausted,
and still they shouted More 7 I ran.
therefore, straight to the kitchen, and
brought the earthen ware, which pro-
duced still livelier spectacle in break
ing; and thus I kept running back and
forth fetching one vessel after another.
as could reach it from where they
stood in rows on the dresser; and de-
voted all the wares I could drag out to
similar destruction. It was too late
when some one appeared, to hinder and
save. The mischief was done, and in
place of large amount Of crockery
there was only ludicrous history Of
its loss, in which my roguish accom-
plices took delight to the end of their
days"
Our next view of the boy is from a
little account his mother has written of
ner method of teaching and amusing
her children by lnventing stories for
them. She writes:
"Air, fire, earth, water, I represented
under the forms of princesses, and to
all natural phenomena I gave mean
ing. AS we thought of the paths that
led from star to star, and that we should
perhaps, one day inhabit the stars, and
thought of the great spirits we should
meet there, l was as eager for the hours
of storytelling as the children them
selves; I was quite curious about 1.-The
future course of my own improvisation,
and any invitation which interrupted
these evenings was disagreeable. There
I sat, and there Wolfgang held me with
his large black eyes; and when the
fate of one of his favorites was not &C.
cording to his fancy, I saw the angry
veins swell on his temples, saw him
repress his tears. He often burst in
with, But. mother, the princess won't
marry the horrid tailor, even if he does
kill the giant And when I made q
pause for the night, promising to con-
tinue it on the morrow, was certain
that he would, in the interval, think ii
out for himself. When I turned the
story according to his plan, and told
him he had found out the ending, then
he was all fire and fame, and one could
see his little heart beating underneath
his dress His grandmother, who
made q great pet of him, was the con-
fidant of all his ideas as to how the story
would turn out; and, as she repeated
these to me, and turned the story &C.
cording to these hints, I had the pleas
ure of continuing my story to the de-
light and establishment of my hearers,
and Wolfgang saw with glowing eyes
the fulfllment of his own conceptions,
and listened with enthusiastic ap-
plause."
This was when he was three and four
years old. He soon learned to read
and write, and at six years of age, not
only wrote quite we'll in German, but
also in Latin. When he was eight years
old, he wrote original compositions
and very good ones-in German French,
Italian, Latin and Greek! He was not
taught italian, but picked it up from
hearing it taught to his sister. He was
truly wonderful child. And he did
not love study because he was weak and
sickly, and could not do anything else
for he was generally healthy, and very
bright, active boy at play, and as I said
before, always ready for o frolic. He
was born with an eager desire for know
ledge, and the capacity to acquire it,
as we'll as with the genius to invent
stories and poems.-St. Nicholas.