“Kindle the light of reason, kindle the light of reason, O God in heaven!”

He rose in his berth, and saw that Rosa, the servant-girl, was in reality holding a burning candle over him.  She bent down slightly, and said: 

“You are dreaming hard.  Aren’t you feeling well, Doctor von Kammacher?”

The door creaked.  The servant-girl Rosa had left.  The ship was moving quietly.  Or was he mistaken?  Was the Roland no longer proceeding so calmly and steadily as before?  He listened intently, and heard the screw whirring regularly under the water.  Monotonous calls penetrated from the deck.  Then came the loud rattling of the cinders pouring overboard.  Frederick looked at his watch.  It was five o’clock.  So three hours had passed since he had first awakened!  Again, with a clatter and a thunder, a load of ashes slid into the Atlantic Ocean.  Was it not the mates of the dead stoker, Zickelmann, who were throwing it overboard?  Frederick heard the crying of children, thereupon the sobbing and whimpering of his hysterical neighbour, and finally Rosa’s voice, trying to quiet Siegfried and Ella, who was a talkative little girl.  Siegfried was fretfully begging to be taken back to his grandmother in Luckenwalde.  Mrs. Liebling was scolding Rosa, telling her she was responsible for the children’s behaviour.  Frederick heard her say: 

“You all trample about on my nerves.  I wish the three of you were at the bottom of the sea.  For heaven’s sake, let me sleep!”

XXXIII

Notwithstanding all these impressions, Frederick fell asleep again.  He dreamed that he and Rosa, the maid, and little Siegfried Liebling were in a life-boat, rocking on a calm, shimmering green sea.  Strangely enough, there was a mass of gold ingots in the bottom of the boat, probably the gold ingots that the Roland was supposed to be carrying to the mint in Washington.  Frederick was at the helm, and after cruising about a while, they reached a bright, cheery port.  It may have been a port in the Azores, or the Madeira Islands, or the Canary Islands.  At a short distance from the quay, Rosa jumped overboard and reached land holding Siegfried clear of the water.  People received them, and they disappeared in one of the snowy white buildings at the harbour front.  When Frederick landed, to his joy he was greeted on the marble steps of the quay by his old friend, Peter Schmidt, the physician he intended to visit in America.  In response to curious questions, he always said that this was his main purpose in crossing the ocean.  His delight at seeing him in a dream, in the setting of the white tropical town, after a separation of eight or nine years, was a surprise to himself.  How was it possible that he had only occasionally and superficially remembered so magnificent a man, so dear a youthful companion?