cessary as the elder Schiller always was to him at home. For the old
man, now Major Schiller, still carried on his overseeing of the Ducal
Gardens and Nurseries at Solituede, and his punctual diligence,
fidelity, intelligence and other excellences in that function had long
been recognised.

'In a few weeks after, 24th October 1793, Duke Karl died; and was, by
his illustrious Pupil, regarded as in some sort a paternal friend.
Schiller thought only of the great qualities of the deceased, and of
the good he had done him; not of the great faults which as Sovereign,
and as man, he had manifested. Only to his most familiar friend did he
write: "The death of old Herod has had no influence either on me or my
Family,--except indeed that all men who had immediately to do with
that Sovereign Herr, as my Father had, are glad now to have the
prospect of a man before them. That the new Duke is, in every good,
and also in every bad meaning of the word." Withal, however, his
Father, to whom naturally the favour of the new Duke, Ludwig Eugen,
was of importance, could not persuade Schiller to welcome him to the
Sovereignty with a poem. To Schiller's feelings it was unendurable to
awaken, for the sake of an external advantage from the new Lord, any
suspicions as if he welcomed the death of the old.'[55]

[Footnote 55: _Saupe_, p. 60.]

Christophine, Schiller's eldest Sister, whom he always loved the most,
was not here in Swabia;--long hundred miles away, poor Christophine,
with her sickly and gloomy Husband at Meiningen, these ten years
past!--but the younger two, Luise and Nanette, were with him, the
former daily at his hand. Luise was then twenty-seven, and is
described as an excellent domestic creature, amiable affectionate,
even enthusiastic; yet who at an early period though full of
admiration about her Brother and his affairs, had turned all her
faculties and tendencies upon domestic practicality, and the
satisfaction of being useful to her loved ones in their daily life and
wants.[56] 'Her element was altogether house-management; the aim of
her endeavour to attain the virtues by which she saw her pious Mother
made happy herself, in making others happy in the narrow in-door
kingdom. This quiet household vocation with its manifold labours and
its simple joys, was Luise's world; beyond which she needed nothing
and demanded nothing. From her Father she had inherited this feeling
for the practical, and this restless activity; fro