224 
The German Student , No. XX — Schiller. [Oct. 1, 
st udies were a part of tlie establishment, 
which included a provision for educat¬ 
ing army surgeons. To this branch of 
the profession Schiller gave a preference 
of attention, as better suited to him 
than practical warfare, which lie seems 
to have considered but as organized 
robbery. His Ode to a Conqueror, writ¬ 
ten in 177 f >5 includes this stanza. 
Your forms, ye conquerors, float among 
my dreams, 
By horrors circled : then I start aghast, 
Stamp on the earth, and bawl with voice of 
storm 
Your hated names to midnight’s shuddering 
ear : 
And back from ocean’s mouutain-swallow- 
ing* vaults, 
From Orcus’ deeper deadly-peopled halls, 
Echo, in hoarser curse, your hated names. 
The oppressively severe discipline of 
the Stutgard College was felt indig¬ 
nantly by the young man, who sought 
in segregation, and in an ideal world, 
for those amusements which were denied 
to him by reality. The works of Klop- 
stock were dear to him, and his earliest 
literary project was an epopcea on the 
history of Moses. He submitted to 
subordination with apparent patience, 
and pursued the official employments 
with formal assiduity, but seemed never 
so happy as when lie was declaiming 
boisterous speeches from his German 
Shakspeare. Werter’s Sufferings, and 
the other works of Goethe, were fa¬ 
vourite books; and he concurred with 
some of his fellow-students in a private 
performance of Clavigo: but his acting 
was of the exaggerated kind, ludicrously 
overloaded with gesture, grin, mouth¬ 
ing, stamping and starting. The Ugo- 
lino of Gerstenberg, and the Julio of 
Leisewitz, fell into his hands, both 
which plays left an impression visible 
in his first productions of (lie dramatic 
kiud. That discontent with all human 
institutions and social relations, so 
natural to a young man of genius, 
whose lot in life is not cast conformably 
with his inclinations, preyed on him, 
and assisted to inspire liis first tragedy 
44 The Robbers,” which was completed 
in his twentieth year, and offered by 
him during a vacation to the theatre at 
Manheim, where it was performed with 
success. In Stutgard it was deemed 
irregular that a student should write 
for the stage ; and when Schiller re¬ 
turned from Manheim, covered with 
applause, the doors of his college were 
closed against him; happily he had 
alreadv taken his degree. 
u The Robbers” Is a remarkable tia- 
gedy, which forms an epocha in the 
theatric art of his country. The scene 
is laid in Germany at the beginning of 
the sixteenth century. Maximilian, 
count of Moor, has two sons, Charles 
and Francis. The younger, jealous of 
his brother’s seniority, prejudices the 
father against him by false insinuations, 
and causes a letter of disinheritance to 
be written to Charles, who is absent at 
Leipzig. Driven to desperation, this 
young man flees into the forests of Bo¬ 
hemia, and becomes captain of a band 
of robbers, whose manners are depicted 
with atrocious energy. Charles next 
returns in disguise to the mansion of 
his father in Franconia, discovers that 
his beloved and betrothed Amelia is 
become inconstant, and that his brother 
Francis has not only intercepted all his 
letters of love and contrition, but has 
imprisoned their aged father in a tower, 
with the view of starving him to death. 
Charles releases the old man, puts 
Francis in his place, poignards Amelia, 
and then delivers himself up to a poor 
officer, who labours in vain for the 
maintenance of eleven children, that 
the reward offered for apprehending 
him may contribute to the relief of a 
worthy family. 
The situations in this play are vio¬ 
lent, harrowing, and improbable in a 
high degree. The characters are not 
less extraordinary and unnatural: cou¬ 
rage and generosity are combined with 
the insanities of criminality ; romantic 
affection with versatility of object; 
deliberate treachery with poignant re¬ 
morse ; all is oversliotten. ultra-tragic. 
The diction harmonizes marvellously 
with the convulsionary movement of 
the incidents: it stalks about for me¬ 
taphors on giant limbs, and writhes 
with the agonies of passion and emo¬ 
tion. Schiller at a later period became 
aware of the faults of this tragedy; he 
observed, that it was concerted from 
the reverberations of his stimulant 
reading, and composed without any of 
that knowledge of human nature which 
observation and experience bestows, 
and prior to his intercourse with the 
other sex : for he appears to have con¬ 
sidered fruition as forming an epocha 
of mind, as well as body, and to have 
believed the young artist interested in 
accelerating this period of maturity. 
In the English translation of 44 The 
Robbers,” (executed, we believe, by II. 
Mackenzie, Esq. of Edinburgh) the 
following scene has been wisely cur¬ 
tailed ; 
