From Goethe's account of their
intercourse we gather that their intercourse was not wholly
satisfactory to either. Klopstock was in his fiftieth year, and his
somewhat self-conscious and pedantic manner did not encourage
effusion.[192] Like certain other poets he affected the tone of a man
of the world and deliberately avoided topics relative to his own art.
The two themes on which he expanded were riding and skating--of which
latter pastime he had indeed made himself the laureate. Goethe himself
was passionately fond of both exercises, but from "the patriarch of
German poetry" he might have expected discourse on higher themes.
Apparently, however, their relations remained sufficiently cordial,
as, when Klopstock took his departure, Goethe accompanied him to
Mannheim. On his way home in the post-carriage Goethe gave utterance
to his feelings in some rhapsodical lines--_An Schwager Kronos_--(To
Time the Postillion)--which may be regarded as a commentary on his
impressions of the great man. Written in the unrhymed, irregular
measure which Klopstock had been the first to employ, and containing
phrases directly borrowed from Klopstock, they give passionate
expression to his desire for a life, brief it might be, but a life
alive to the end with the zest of living.
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