The Kaiser has this moment been
wakened from sleep by the entrance of a big gorgeously dressed footman,
carrying his morning tea. The panelling of the royal chamber in the
palace at Potsdam is faintly indicated. The Kaiser sits up in bed, and a
look of agony gathers on his face as he realizes that he has wakened up
to the grim horror of a new day, and that the delightful time which he
has just been living through was only a dream. He had dreamed that the
whole thing was not true--that the War had never really occurred, and
that he could face the world with a conscience clear from guilt; and now
he has wakened up to bear the burden for another day. It is written in
his face what he thinks. You see the deep down-drawn lines in the lower
part of the face, the furrows upon the forehead, and the look almost of
terror in the eyes. But a smug-faced flunkey offers him a cup of tea
with buttered toast, and he must come back to the pretence of that
tragi-comedy, the life of the King-Emperor.
The Dutch artist is fully alive to the comic element which underlies
that tragedy. The King-Emperor, as he awakes from sleep and sits forward
from that mountain of pillows, would be a purely comic figure were it
not for the terrible tragedy written in his face. A footman in brilliant
livery is a comic figure. The splendour of this livery brings out the
comic element by its contrast to, and yet its harmony with, the stupid
self-satisfaction of the countenance and the curls of the powdered hair.
Pages:
76
77
78
79
80
81
82
83
84
85
86
87
88
89
90
91
92
93
94
95
96
97
98
99
100