CHAPTER I

VOLUME VIII

BERTHOLD AUERBACH

JEREMIAS GOTTHELF

FRITZ REUTER

ADALBERT STIFTER

WILHELM HEINRICH RIEHL

#THE GERMAN CLASSICS#

Masterpieces of German Literature

TRANSLATED INTO ENGLISH

1914

CONTRIBUTORS AND TRANSLATORS

VOLUME VIII

CONTENTS OF VOLUME VIII

The Novel of Provincial Life. By Edwin C. Roedder

BERTHOLD AUERBACH

Little Barefoot. Translated by H.W. Dulcken; revised and abridged by

Paul Bernard Thomas

JEREMIAS GOTTHELF

Uli, The Farmhand. Translations and Synopses by Bayard Quincy Morgan

FRITZ REUTER

The Bräsig Episodes from _Ut mine Stromtid_. Translated by M.W.

Macdowall; edited and abridged by Edmund von Mach

ADALBERT STIFTER

Rock Crystal. Translated by Lee M. Hollander

WILHELM HEINRICH RIEHL

Wilhelm Heinrich Riehl. By Otto Heller

Field and Forest. Translated by Frances H. King

The Eye for Natural Scenery. Translated by Frances H. King

The Musical Ear. Translated by Frances H. King

The Struggle of the Rococo with the Pigtail. Translated by Frances H.

King

* * * *

ILLUSTRATIONS--VOLUME VIII

The Abduction of Prometheus. By Max Klinger

Berthold Auerbach. By Hans Meyer

Two Coffins were carried away from the little House. By Benjamin Vautier

Amrei briskly brought her Pitcher filled with Water. By Benjamin Vautier

Tears fell upon the Paternal Coat. By Benjamin Vautier

He gave her his Hand for the Last Time. By Benjamin Vautier

While she was milking John asked her all kinds of Questions. By Benjamin

Vautier

Jeremias Gotthelf

A New Citizen. By Benjamin Vautier

The Bath. By Benjamin Vautier

In Ambush. By Benjamin Vautier

First Dancing Lessons. By Benjamin Vautier

Fritz Reuter. By Wulff

Bible Lesson. By Benjamin Vautier

Between Dances. By Benjamin Vautier

The Bridal Pair at the Civil Marriage Office. By Benjamin Vautier

Adalbert Stifter. By Daffinger

A Mountain Scene. By H. Reifferscheid

Leavetaking of the Bridal Pair. By Benjamin Vautier

The Barber Shop. By Benjamin Vautier

Wilhelm Heinrich Riehl

An Official Dinner in the Country. By Benjamin Vautier

At the Sick Bed. By Benjamin Vautier

A Village Funeral. By Benjamin Vautier

* * * *

EDITOR'S NOTE

This volume, containing chiefly masterpieces of the Novel of Provincial

Life, is illustrated by the principal works of one of the foremost

painters of German peasant life, Benjamin Vautier. These picture's have

been so arranged as to bring out in natural succession typical

situations in the career of an individual from the cradle to the grave.

In order not to interrupt this succession, Auerbach's _Little Barefoot_,

likewise illustrated by Vautier, has been placed before Gotthelf's _Uli,

The Farmhand_, although Gotthelf, and not Auerbach, is to be considered

as the real founder of the German village story.

The frontispiece, Karl Spitzweg's _Garret Window_, introduces a master

of German genre painting who in a later volume will be more fully

represented.

KUNO FRANCKE.

* * * *

THE NOVEL OF PROVINCIAL LIFE

By EDWIN C. ROEDDER, PH.D.

Associate Professor of German Philology, University of Wisconsin

To Rousseau belongs the credit of having given, in his passionate cry

"Back to Nature!" the classic expression to the consciousness that all

the refinements of civilization do not constitute life in its truest

sense. The sentiment itself is thousands of years old. It had inspired

the idyls of Theocritus in the midst of the magnificence and luxury of

the courts of Alexandria and Syracuse. It reëchoed through the pages of

Virgil's bucolic poetry. It made itself heard, howsoever faintly, in the

artificiality and sham of the pastoral plays from the sixteenth to the

eighteenth century. And it was but logical that this sentiment should

seek its most adequate and definitive expression in a portrayal of all

phases of the life and fate of those who, as the tillers of the soil,

had ever remained nearer to Mother Earth than the rest of humankind.

Not suddenly, then, did rural poetry rise into being; but while its

origin harks back to remote antiquity it has found its final form only

during the last century. In this its last, as well as its most vigorous,

offshoot, it presents itself as the village story--as we shall term it

for brevity's sake--which has won a permanent place in literature by the

side of its older brothers and sisters, and has even entirely driven out

the fanciful pastoral or village idyl of old.

The village story was bound to come in the nineteenth century, even if

there had been no beginnings of it in earlier times, and even if it did

not correspond to a deep-rooted general sentiment. The eighteenth

century had allowed the Third Estate to gain a firm foothold in the

domain of dignified letters; the catholicity of the nineteenth admitted

the laborer and the proletarian. It would have been passing strange if

the rustic alone had been denied the privilege. An especially hearty

welcome was accorded to the writings of the first representatives of the

new species. Internationalism, due to increased traffic, advanced with

unparalleled strides in the third and fourth decades. The seclusion of

rural life seemed to remain the quiet and unshakable realm of

patriarchal virtue and venerable tradition. The political skies were

overcast with the thunder clouds of approaching revolutions; France had

just passed through another violent upheaval. Village conditions seemed

to offer a veritable haven of refuge. The pristine artlessness of the

peasant's intellectual, moral, and emotional life furnished a wholesome

antidote to the morbid hyperculture of dying romanticism, the

controversies and polemics of Young Germany, and the self-adulation of

the society of the salons. Neither could the exotic, ethnographic, and

adventure narratives in the manner of Sealsfield, at first

enthusiastically received, satisfy the taste of the reading public for

any length of time--at best, these novels supplanted one fashion by

another, if, indeed, they did not drive out Satan by means of Beelzebub.

And was it wise to roam so far afield when the real good was so close at

hand? Why cross oceans when the land of promise lay right before one's

doors? All that was needed was the poet discoverer.

The Columbus of this new world shared the fate of the great Genoese in

more than one respect. Like him, he set out in quest of shores that he

was destined never to reach. Like him, he discovered, or rather

rediscovered, a new land. Like him, he so far outstripped his

forerunners that they sank into oblivion. Like Columbus, who died

without knowing that he had not reached India, the land of his dreams,

but found a new world, he may have departed from this life in the belief

that he had been a measurably successful social reformer when he had

proved to be a great epic poet. Like Columbus, he was succeeded by his

Amerigo Vespucci, after whom his discovery was named. The Columbus of

the village story is the Swiss clergyman Albert Bitzius, better known by

his assumed name as Jeremias Gotthelf; the Amerigo Vespucci is his

contemporary Berthold Auerbach.

The choice of his _nom de guerre_ is significant of Jeremias Gotthelf's

literary activity. He regarded himself as the prophet wailing the misery

of his people, who could be delivered only through the aid of the

Almighty. It never occurred to him to strive for literary fame. He

considered himself as a teacher and preacher purely and simply; in a

measure, as the successor of Pestalozzi, who, in his _Lienhard und

Gertrud_ (1781-1789), had created a sort of pedagogical classic for the

humbler ranks of society; and if there be such a thing in Gotthelf's

make-up as literary influence, it must have emanated from the sage of

Burgdorf and Yverdun. To some extent also Johann Peter Hebel

(1760-1826), justly famed for his Alemannian dialect poems, may have

served him as a model, for Hebel followed an avowedly educational

purpose in the popular tales of his _Schatzkästlein des rheinischen

Hausfreunds_ ("Treasure Box of the Rhenish Crony"), of which it has been

said that they outweigh tons of novels.

Gotthelf's intention was twofold: to champion the cause of the rustic

yeomanry in the threatening of its peculiar existence--for the radical

spirit of the times was already seizing and preying upon the hallowed

customs of the peasantry's life--and to fight against certain inveterate

vices of the rural population itself that seemed to be indigenous to the

soil. As the first great social writer of the German tongue, he is not

content to make the rich answerable for existing conditions, but labors

with all earnestness to educate the lower classes toward self-help. At

first he appeared as an uncommonly energetic, conservative, polemic

author in whose views the religious, basis of life and genuine moral

worth coincided with the traditional character of the country yeomanry.

A more thorough examination revealed to his readers an original epic

talent of stupendous powers. He was indeed eminently fitted to be an

educator and reformer among his flock by his own nobility of character,

his keen knowledge and sane judgment of the people's real needs and

wants, his warm feeling, and his unexcelled insight into the peasant's

inner life. Beyond that, however, he was gifted with exuberant poetic

imagination and creative power, with an intuitive knowledge of the

subtlest workings of the emotional life, and a veritable genius for

finding the critical moments in an individual existence.

So it came about that the poet triumphed over the social reformer, in

spite of himself; and while in his own parish, at Lützelflüh in the

Canton of Berne--where he was installed as minister of the Gospel in

1832 after having spent some time there as a vicar--he is remembered to

this day for his self-sacrificing activity in every walk of life, the

world at large knows him only as one of the great prose writers of

Germany in the nineteenth century. His first work, _Bauernspiegel_ ("The

Peasants' Mirror"), was published in 1836, when he was thirty-nine years

old. From that time on until his death in 1854, his productivity was

most marvelous. _The Peasants' Mirror_ is the first village story that

deserves the name; here, for the first time, the world of the peasant

was presented as a distinct world by itself.[1] It is at the same time

one of the earliest, as well as the most splendid, products of realistic

art; and, considered in connection with his later writings, must be

regarded as his creed and program. For the motives of the several

chapters reappear later, worked out into complete books, and thus both

_Uli der Knecht_ ("Uli, the Farmhand," 1841) and _Uli der Pächter_

("Uli, the Tenant," 1849) are foreshadowed here.

As a literary artist Gotthelf shows barely any progress in his whole

career, and intentionally so. Few writers of note have been so perfectly

indifferent to matters of form. The same Gottfried Keller who calls

Gotthelf "without exception the greatest epic genius that has lived in a

long time, or perhaps will live for a long time to come," characterizes

him thus as to his style: "With his strong, sharp spade he will dig out

a large piece of soil, load it on his literary wheelbarrow, and to the

accompaniment of strong language upset it before our feet; good garden

soil, grass, flowers and weeds, manure and stones, precious gold coins

and old shoes, fragments of crockery and bones--they all come to light

and mingle their sweet and foul smells in peaceful harmony." His

adherence to the principle _Naturalia non sunt turpia_ is indeed so

strict that at times a sensitive reader is tempted to hold his nose. It

is to be regretted that so great a genius in his outspoken preference

for all that is characteristic should have been so partial to the rude,

the crude, and the brutal. For Gotthelf's literary influence--which, to

be sure, did not make itself felt at once--has misled many less original

writers to consider these qualities as essential to naturalistic style.

Very largely in consequence of his indifference to form and the

naturalistic tendencies mentioned--for to all intents and purposes

Gotthelf must be regarded as the precursor of naturalism--the Swiss

writer did not gain immediate recognition in the world of letters, and

the credit rightfully belonging to him fell, as already mentioned, to

Berthold Auerbach (1812-1882), a native of the village of Nordstetten in

the Württemberg portion of the Black Forest. From 1843-1853 Auerbach

published his _Black Forest Village Stories_, which at once became the

delight of the reading public. Auerbach himself claimed the distinction

of being the originator of this new species of narrative--an honor

which was also claimed by Alexander Weill, because of his _Sittengemälde

aus dem Elsass_ ("Genre Paintings from Alsace," 1843). While Gotthelf

had written only for his peasants, without any regard for others,

Auerbach wrote for the same general readers of fiction as the then

fashionable writers did. So far as his popularity among the readers of

the times and his influence on other authors are concerned, Auerbach has

a certain right to the coveted title, for a whole school of village

novelists followed at his heels; and his name must remain inseparably

connected with the history of the novel of provincial life. The

impression his stories made everywhere was so strong as to beggar

description. They afforded the genuine delight that we get from

murmuring brooks and flowering meadows--although the racy smell of the

soil that is wafted toward us from the pages of Gotthelf's writings is

no doubt more wholesome for a greater length of time. Auerbach has often

been charged with idealizing his peasants too much. It must be admitted

that his method and style are idealistic, but, at least in his best

works, no more so than is compatible with the demands of artistic

presentation. He does not, like Gotthelf, delight in painting a face

with all its wrinkles, warts, and freckles, but works more like the

portrait painter who will remove unsightly blemishes by retouching the

picture without in any way sacrificing its lifelike character. When

occasion demands he also shows himself capable of handling thoroughly

tragic themes with pronounced success. In his later years, it is true,

he fell into mannerism, overemphasized his inclination toward

didacticism and sententiousness, and allowed the philosopher to run away

with the poet by making his peasant folk think and speak as though they

were adepts in the system of Spinoza, with which Auerbach himself,

being of Jewish birth and having been educated to be a rabbi, was

intimately familiar. On the whole, however, the lasting impression we

obtain from Auerbach's literary work remains a very pleasant one--that

of a rich and characteristic life, sound to the core, vigorous and

buoyant.

Not as a writer of village stories--for in the portrayal of the rustic

population, as such, he was not concerned--but in his basic purpose of

holding up nature, pure and holy, as an ideal, Adalbert Stifter

(1805-1868), an Austrian, must be assigned a place of honor in this

group. A more incisive contrast to the general turbulence of the forties

could hardly be imagined than is found in the nature descriptions and

idyls of this quietist, who "from the madding crowd's ignoble strife"

sought refuge in the stillness of the country and among people to whom

such outward peace is a physical necessity. His feeling for nature,

especially for her minutest and seemingly most insignificant phenomena,

is closely akin to religion; there is an infinite charm in his

description of the mysterious life of apparently lifeless objects; he

renders all the sensuous impressions so masterfully that the reader

often has the feeling of a physical experience; and it is but natural

that up to his thirty-fifth year, before he discovered his literary

talent, he had dreamed of being a landscape painter. Hebbel's epigram,

"Know ye why ye are such past masters in painting beetles and

buttercups? 'Tis because ye know not man; 'tis because ye see not the

stars," utterly fails to do justice to Stifter's poetic individuality.

But in avoiding the great tempests and serious conflicts of the human

heart he obeyed a healthy instinct of his artistic genius, choosing to

retain undisputed mastery in his own field.

It is, of course, an impossibility to treat adequately, in the remainder

of the space at our disposal, the poetic and general literary merit of

Fritz Reuter (1810-1874), the great regenerator and rejuvenator of Low

German as a literary language. His lasting merit in the field of the

village story is that by his exclusive use of dialect he threw an

effective safeguard around the naturalness of the emotional life of his

characters, and through this ingenious device will for all time to come

serve as a model to writers in this particular domain. For dialectic

utterance does not admit of any super-exaltation of sentiment; at any

rate, it helps to detect such at first glance. But there are other

features no less meritorious in his stories of rural life, chief of

which is that unique blending of seriousness and humor that makes us

laugh and cry at the same time. With his wise and kind heart, with his

deep sympathy for all human suffering, with the smile of understanding

for everything truly human, also for all the limitations and follies of

human nature, Reuter has worthily taken his place by the side of his

model, Charles Dickens. It is questionable whether even Dickens ever

created a character equal to the fine and excellent Uncle Bräsig, who,

in the opinion of competent critics, is the most successful humorous

figure in all German literature. Bräsig is certainly a masterpiece of

psychology; as remote from any mere comic effect, despite his

idiosyncrasies, as from maudlin sentimentality; an impersonation of

sturdy manhood and a victor in life's battles, no less than his creator,

who, although he had lost seven of the most precious years of his life

in unjust imprisonment and even had been under sentence of death for a

crime of which he knew himself to be absolutely innocent, had not

allowed his fate to make him a pessimist. Nor does the central theme and

idea of his masterpiece _Ut mine Stromtid_ ("From my Roaming Days,"

1862), in its strength and beauty, deserve less praise than the

character delineation. Four years previous, in _Kein Hüsung_ ("Homeless

") the author had raised a bitter cry of distress over the social

injustice and the deceit and arrogance of the ruling classes. In spite

of a ray of sunshine at the end, the treatment was essentially tragic.

Now he has found a harmonious solution of the problem; the true

nobility of human nature triumphs over all social distinctions;

aristocracy of birth and yeomanry are forever united. Thus the marriage

of Louise Havermann with Franz von Rambow both symbolizes the fusion of

opposing social forces and exemplifies the lofty teaching of

Gotthelf--"The light that is to illumine our fatherland must have its

birth at a fireside." With his gospel of true humanity the North German

poet supplements and brings to its full fruition the religious austerity

of the doctrines and precepts of Jeremias Gotthelf, the preacher on the

Alpine heights of Switzerland.

* * * *

BERTHOLD AUERBACH

LITTLE BAREFOOT[2] (1856)

A TALE OF VILLAGE LIFE

TRANSLATED BY H.W. DULCKEN, PH.D. REVISED AND ABRIDGED BY PAUL BERNARD

THOMAS

CHAPTER I

THE CHILDREN KNOCK AT THE DOOR

Early in the morning through the autumnal mist two children of six or

seven years are wending their way, hand in hand, along the garden-paths

outside the village. The girl, evidently the elder of the two, carries a

slate, school-books, and writing materials under her arm; the boy has a

similar equipment, which he carries in an open gray linen bag slung

across his shoulder. The girl wears a cap of white twill, that reaches

almost to her forehead, and from beneath it the outline of her broad

brow stands forth prominently; the boy's head is bare. Only one child's

step is heard, for while the boy has strong shoes on, the girl is

barefoot. Wherever the path is broad enough, the children walk side by

side, but where the space between the hedges is too narrow for this, the

girl walks ahead.

[Illustration: BERTHOLD AUERBACH Hans Meyer]

The white hoar frost has covered the faded leaves of the bushes, and the

haws and berries; and the flips especially, standing upright on their

bare stems, seem coated with silver. The sparrows in the hedges

twitter and fly away in restless groups at the children's approach; then

they settle down not far off, only to go whirring up again, till at last

they flutter into a garden and alight in an apple-tree with such force

that the leaves come showering down. A magpie flies up suddenly from the

path and shoots across to the large pear-tree, where some ravens are

perched in silence. The magpie must have told them something, for the

ravens fly up and circle round the tree; one old fellow perches himself

on the waving crown, while the others find good posts of observation on

the branches below. They, too, are doubtless curious to know why the

children, with their school things, are following the wrong path and

going out of the village; one raven, indeed, flies out as a scout and

perches on a stunted willow by the pond. The children, however, go

quietly on their way till, by the alders beside the pond, they come upon

the high-road, which they cross to reach a humble house standing on the

farther side. The house is locked up, and the children stand at the door

and knock gently. The girl cries bravely: "Father! mother!"--and the boy

timidly repeats it after her: "Father! mother!" Then the girl takes hold

of the frost-covered latch and presses it, at first gently, and listens;

the boards of the door creak, but there is no other result. And now she

ventures to rattle the latch up and down vigorously, but the sounds die

away in the empty vestibule--no human voice answers. The boy then

presses his mouth to a crack in the door and cries: "Father! mother!" He

looks up inquiringly at his sister--his breath on the door has also

turned to hoar frost.

From the village, lying in a shroud of mist, come the measured sounds of

the thresher's flail, now in sudden volleys, now slowly and with a

dragging cadence, now in sharp, crackling bursts, and now again with a

dull and hollow beat. Sometimes there is the noise of one flail only,

but presently others have joined in on all sides. The children stand

still and seem lost. Finally they stop knocking and calling, and sit

down on some uprooted tree-stumps. The latter lie in a heap around the

trunk of a mountain-ash which stands beside the house, and which is now

radiant with its red berries. The children's eyes are again turned

toward the door-but it is still locked.

"Father got those out of the Mossbrook Wood," said the girl, pointing to

the stumps; and she added with a precocious look: "They give out lots

of heat, and are worth quite a little; for there is a good deal of resin

in them, and that burns like a torch. But chopping them brings in the

most money."

"If I were already grown up," replied the boy, "I'd take father's big

ax, and the beechwood mallet, and the two iron wedges, and the ash wedge

and break it all up as if it were glass. And then I'd make a fine,

pointed heap of it like the charcoal-burner, Mathew, makes in the woods;

and when father comes home, how pleased he'll be! But you must not tell

him who did it!" the boy concluded, raising a warning finger at his

sister.

She seemed to have a dawning suspicion that it was useless to wait there

for their father and mother, for she looked up at her brother very

sadly. When her glance fell on his shoes, she said:

"Then you must have father's boots, too. But come, we will play ducks

and drakes-you shall see that I can throw farther than you!"

As they walked away, the girl said:

"I'll give you a riddle to guess: What wood will warm you without your

burning it?"

"The schoolmaster's ruler, when you get the spatters," answered the boy.

"No, that's not what I mean: The wood that you chop makes you warm

without your burning it." And pausing by the hedge, she asked again:

"On a stick he has his head, And his jacket it is red, And filled with

stone is he--Now who may he be?"

The boy bethought himself very gravely, and cried "Stop! You mustn't

tell me what it is!--Why, its a hip!"

The girl nodded assentingly, and made a face as if this were the first

time she had ever given him the riddle to guess; as a matter of fact,

however, she had given it to him very often, and had used it many times

to cheer him up.

The sun had dispersed the mist, and the little valley stood in

glittering sheen, as the children turned away to the pond to skim flat

stones on the water. As they passed the house the girl pressed the latch

once more; but again the door did not open, nor was anything to be seen

at the window. And now the children played merrily beside the pond, and

the girl seemed quite content that her brother should be the more clever

at the sport, and that he should boast of it and grow quite excited over

it; indeed, she manifestly tried to be less clever at it, than she

really was, for the stones she threw almost always plumped down to the

bottom as soon as they struck the water--for which she got properly

laughed at by her companion. In the excitement of the sport the children

quite forgot where they were and why they had come there--and yet it was

a strange and sorrowful occasion.

In the house, which was now so tightly locked up, there had lived, but a

short time before, one Josenhans, with his wife and their two children,

Amrei (Anna Marie) and Damie (Damien). The father was a woodcutter in

the forest, and was, moreover, an adept at various kinds of work; the

house, which was in a dilapidated state when he bought it, he had

himself repaired and reroofed, and in the autumn he was going to

whitewash it inside--the lime was already lying prepared in the trench,

covered with withered branches. His wife was one of the best

day-laboring women in the village--ready for anything, day and night, in

weal and in woe; for she had trained her children, especially Amrei, to

manage for themselves at an early age. Industry and frugal contentment

made the house one of the happiest in the village. Then came a deadly

sickness which snatched away the mother, and the following evening, the

father; and a few days later two coffins were carried away from the

little house. The children had been taken immediately into the next

house, to "Coaly Mathew," and they did not know of their parents' death

until they were dressed in their Sunday clothes to follow the bodies.

Josenhans and his wife had no near relations in the place, but there

was, nevertheless, loud weeping heard, and much mournful praise of the

dead couple. The village magistrate walked with one of the children at

each hand behind the two coffins. Even at the grave the children were

quiet and unconscious, indeed, almost cheerful, though they often asked

for their father and mother. They dined at the magistrate's house, and

everybody was exceedingly kind to them; and when they got up from the

table, each one received a parcel of cakes to take away.

But that evening, when, according to an arrangement of the village

authorities, "Crappy Zachy" came to get Damie, and Black Marianne called

for Amrei, the children refused to separate from each other, and cried

aloud, and wanted to go home. Damie soon allowed himself to be pacified

by all sorts of promises, but Amrei obliged them to use force--she would

not move from the spot, and the magistrate's foreman had to carry her in

his arms into Black Marianne's house. There she found her own bed--the

one she had used at home--but she would not lie down on it. Finally,

however, exhausted by crying, she fell asleep on the floor and was put

to bed in her clothes. Damie, too, was heard weeping aloud at Crappy

Zachy's, and even screaming pitiably, but soon after he was silent.

The much-defamed Black Marianne, on the other hand, showed on this first

evening how quietly anxious she was about her foster-child. For many,

many years she had not had a child about her, and now she stood before

the sleeping girl and said, almost aloud:

"Happy sleep of childhood! Happy children who can be crying, and

before you look around they are asleep, without worry or restless

tossing!"

[Illustration: Benjamin Vautier TWO COFFINS WERE CARRIED AWAY FROM THE

LITTLE HOUSE]

She sighed deeply.

The next morning Amrei went early to her brother to help him dress

himself, and consoled him concerning what had happened to him, declaring

that when their father came home he would pay off Crappy Zachy. Then the

two children went out to their parents' house, knocked at the door and

wept aloud, until Coaly Mathew, who lived near there, came and took them

to school. He asked the master to explain to the children that their

parents were dead, because he himself could not make it clear to

them--Amrei especially seemed determined not to understand it. The

master did all he could, and the children became quiet. But from the

school they went back to the empty house and waited there, hungry and

forsaken, until they were fetched away.

Josenhans' house was taken by the mortgagee, and the payment the

deceased had made upon it was lost; for the value of houses had

decreased enormously through emigration; many houses in the village

stood empty, and Josenhans' dwelling also remained unoccupied. All the

movable property had been sold, and a small sum had thus been realized

for the children, but it was not nearly enough to pay for their board;

they were consequently parish children, and as such were placed with

those who would take them at the cheapest rate.

One day Amrei announced gleefully to her brother that she knew where

their parents' cuckoo-clock was--Coaly Mathew had bought it. And that

very evening the children stood outside the house and waited for the

cuckoo to sing; and when it did, they laughed aloud.

And every morning the children went to the old house, and knocked, and

played beside the pond, as we saw them doing today. Now they listen, for

they hear a sound that is not often heard at this season of the year--the

cuckoo at Coaly Mathew's is singing eight times.

"We must go to school," said Amrei, and she turned quickly with her

brother through the garden-path back into the village. As they passed

Farmer Rodel's barn, Damie said:

"They've threshed a great deal at our guardian's today." And he pointed

to the bands of threshed sheaves that hung over the half-door of the

barn, as evidence of accomplished work. Amrei nodded silently.

CHAPTER II

THE DISTANT SOUL

Farmer Rodel, whose house with its red beams and its pious text in a

large heart over the door, was not far from Josenhans's had let himself

be appointed guardian of the orphan children by the Village Council. He

made the less objection for the reason that Josenhans had, in former

days, served as second-man on his farm. His guardianship, however, was

practically restricted to his taking care of the father's unsold

clothes, and to his occasionally asking one of the children, as he

passed by: "Are you good?"--whereupon he would march off without even

waiting for an answer. Nevertheless a strange feeling of pride came over

the children when they heard that the rich farmer was their guardian,

and they looked upon themselves as very fortunate people, almost

aristocratic. They often stood near the large house and looked up at it

expectantly, as if they were waiting for something and knew not what;

and often, too, they sat by the plows and harrows near the barn and read

the biblical text on the house over and over again. The house seemed to

speak to them, if no one else did.

It was the Sunday before All Souls' Day, and the children were again

playing before the locked house of their parents,--they seemed to love

the spot,--when Farmer Landfried's wife came down the road from

Hochdorf, with a large red umbrella under her arm, and a hymn-book in

her hand. She was paying a final visit to her native place; for the day

before the hired-man had already carried her household furniture out of

the village in a four-horse wagon, and early the next morning she was to

move with her husband and her three children to the farm they had just

bought in distant Allgau. From way up by the mill Dame Landfried was

already nodding to the children--for to meet children on first going out

is, they say, a good sign--but the children could not see her nodding,

nor could they see her sorrowful features. At last, when she drew near

to them, she said:

"God greet ye, children! What are you doing here so early? To whom do

you belong?"

"To Josenhans--there!" answered Amrei, pointing to the house.

"Oh, you poor children!" cried the woman, clasping her hands. "I should

have known you, my girl, for your mother, when she went to school with

me, looked just as you do--we were good companions; and your father

served my cousin, Farmer Rodel. I know all about you. But tell me,

Amrei, why have you no shoes on? You might take cold in such weather as

this! Tell Marianne that Dame Landfried of Hochdorf told you to say, it

is not right of her to let you run about like this! But no--you needn't

say anything--I will speak to her myself. But, Amrei, you are a big girl

now, and must be sensible and look out for yourself. Just think--what

would your mother say, if she knew that you were running about barefoot

at this season of the year?"

The child looked at the speaker with wide-open eyes, as if to say:

"Doesn't my mother know anything about it?"

But the woman continued:

"That's the worst of it, that you poor children cannot know what

virtuous parents you had, and therefore older people must tell you.

Remember that you will give real, true happiness to your parents, when

they hear, yonder in heaven, how the people down here on earth are

saying 'The Josenhans children are models of all goodness--one can see

in them the blessing of honest parents.'"

The tears poured down the woman's cheeks as she spoke these last words.

The feeling of grief in her soul, arising from quite another cause,

burst out irresistibly at these words and thoughts; there was sorrow for

herself mingled with pity for others. She laid her hand upon the head of

the girl, who, when she saw the woman weeping, also began to weep

bitterly; she very likely felt that this was a good soul inclining

toward her, and a dawning consciousness began to steal over her that she

had really lost her parents.

Suddenly the woman's face seemed irradiated. She raised her still

tearful eyes to heaven, and said:

"Gracious God, Thou givest me the thought." Then, turning to the child,

she went on: "Listen--I will take you with me. My Lisbeth was just your

age when she was taken from me. Tell me, will you go with me to Allgau

and live with me?"

"Yes," replied Amrei, decidedly.

Then she felt herself nudged and seized from behind. "You must not!"

cried Damie, throwing his arms around her--and he was trembling all

over.

"Be still," said Amrei, to soothe him. "The kind woman will take you

too. Damie is to go with us, is he not?"

"No, child, that cannot be--I have boys enough."

"Then I'll not go either," said Amrei, and she took Damie by the hand.

There is a kind of shudder, wherein a fever and a chill seem to be

quarreling--the joy of doing something and the fear of doing it. One of

these peculiar shudders passed through the strange woman, and she looked

down upon the child with a certain sense of relief. In a moment of

sympathy, urged on by a pure impulse to do a kind deed, she had proposed

to undertake a task and to assume a responsibility, the significance

and weight of which she had not sufficiently considered; and,

furthermore, she had not taken into account what her husband would think

of her taking such a step without her having spoken to him about it.

Consequently when the child herself refused, a reaction set in, and it

all became clear to her; so that she at once acquiesced, with a certain

sense of relief, in the refusal of her offer. She had obeyed an impulse

of her heart by wishing to do this thing, and now that obstacles stood

in the way, she felt rather glad that it was to be left undone, and

without her having been obliged to retract her promise.

"As you like," said the woman. "I will not try to persuade you. Who

knows?--perhaps it is better that you should grow up first anyway. To

learn to bear sorrow in youth is a good thing, and we easily get

accustomed to better times; all those who have turned out really well,

were obliged to suffer some heavy crosses in their youth. Only be good,

and keep this in remembrance, that, so long as you are good, and so long

as God grants me life, there shall always be, for your parents' sake, a

shelter for you with me. But now, it's just as well as it is. Wait! I

will give you something to remember me by." She felt in her pockets; but

suddenly she put her hand up to her neck and said: "No, you shall have

this!" Then she blew on her fingers, which were stiff with the cold,

until they were nimble enough to permit her to unclasp from her neck a

necklace of five rows of garnets, with a Swedish ducat hanging from

them; and she fastened the ornament around the child's neck, kissing her

at the same time.

Amrei watched all this as if spell-bound.

"For you I unfortunately have nothing," said the good woman to Damie,

who was breaking a switch he had in his hand into little pieces. "But I

will send you a pair of leather breeches belonging to my John--they are

quite good still and you can wear them when you grow bigger. And now,

God keep you, dear children. If possible, I shall come to you again,

Amrei. At any rate, send Marianne to me after church. Be good children,

both of you, and pray heartily for your parents in eternity. And don't

forget that you still have protectors, both in heaven and on earth."

The farmer's wife, who, to walk the faster, had tucked her dress up all

around, let it down now that she was at the entrance of the village.

With hurried steps she went along the street, and did not look back

again.

Amrei put her hands up to her neck and bent down her face, wishing to

examine the coin; but she could not quite succeed. Damie was chewing on

the last piece of his switch; when his sister looked at him and saw

tears in his eyes, she said:

"You shall see--you'll get the finest pair of breeches in the village!"

"And I won't take them!" cried Damie, and he spat out a bit of wood.

"And I'll tell her that she must buy you a knife too. I shall stay home

all day today--she's coming to see us."

"Yes, if she were only there already," replied Damie without knowing

what he said; for a feeling that he had been slighted made him jealous

and reproachful.

The first bell was ringing, and the children hastened back to the

village. Amrei, with a brief explanation, gave the newly-acquired

trinket to Marianne, who said:

"On my word, you are a lucky child! I'll take good care of it for you.

Now make haste to church."

All during the service the children kept glancing across at Farmer

Landfried's wife, and when they came out they waited for her at the

door; but the wealthy farmer's wife was surrounded by so many people,

all eagerly talking to her, that she was obliged to keep turning in a

circle to answer first one and then another. She had no opportunity to

notice the wistful glances of the children and their continual nodding.

Dame Landfried had Rosie, Farmer Rodel's youngest daughter, in her hand.

Rosie was a year older than Amrei, who involuntarily kept moving her

hand, as though she would have pushed aside the intruder who was taking

her place. Had the well-to-do farmer's wife eyes for Amrei only out by

the last house, and when they were alone, and did she not know her when

other people were present? Are only the children of rich people noticed

then, and the children of relatives?

Amrei was startled when she suddenly heard this thought, which had begun

to stir gently within her, uttered aloud; it was Damie who uttered it.

And while she followed at a distance the large group of people

surrounding the farmer's wife, she strove to drive the bad thought out

of her brother's mind, as well as out of her own. Dame Landfried at last

disappeared into Farmer Rodel's house, and the children quietly turned

back.

Suddenly Damie said:

"If she comes to you, you must tell her to go to Crappy Zachy too, and

tell him to be good to me."

Amrei nodded; and then the children parted, and went to the separate

houses where they had found shelter.

The clouds, which had lifted in the morning, came back in the afternoon

in the shape of a perfect downpour of rain. Dame Landfried's large red

umbrella was seen here and there around the village, almost hiding the

figure beneath it. Black Marianne had not been able to find her, and she

said on her return home:

"She can come to me--I don't want anything of her."

The two children wandered out to their parents' house again and crouched

down on the door-step, hardly speaking a word. Again the suspicion

seemed to dawn upon them, that after all their parents would not come

back. Then Damie tried to count the drops of rain that fell from the

eaves; but they came down too quickly for him, and he made easy work of

it by crying out all at once: "A thousand million!"

"She must come past here when she goes home," said Amrei, "and then

we'll call out to her. Mind that you help me call, too, and then we'll

have another talk with her."

So said Amrei; for the children were still waiting there for Dame

Landfried.

The cracking of a whip sounded in the village. There was a trampling and

splashing of horses' feet in the slushy street, and a carriage came

rolling along.

"You shall see that it's father and mother coming in a coach to fetch

us," cried Damie.

Amrei looked around at her brother mournfully, and said:

"Don't chatter so."

When she looked back again the carriage was quite near; somebody in it

motioned from beneath a red umbrella, and away rolled the vehicle. Only

Coaly Mathew's dog barked after it for a while, and acted as if he

wanted to seize the spokes with his teeth; but at the pond he turned

back again, barked once more in front of the door, and then slunk into

the house.

"Hurrah! she's gone away!" cried Damie, as if he were glad of it. "It

was Farmer Landfried's wife. Didn't you know Farmer Rodel's black

horses?--they carried her off. Don't forget my leather breeches!" he

cried at the top of his voice, although the carriage had already

disappeared in the valley, and was presently seen creeping up the little

hill by the Holderwasen.

The children returned quietly to the village. Who knows in what way this

incident may take root in the inmost being, and what may sprout from it?

For the present another feeling covers that of the first, bitter

disappointment.

CHAPTER III

FROM THE TREE BY THE PARENTS' HOUSE

On the eve of All Souls' Day Black Marianne said to the children:

"Go, now, and gather some red berries, for we shall want them at the

graveyard tomorrow."

"I know where to find them! I can get some!" cried Damie with genuine

eagerness and joy. And away he ran out of the village, at such a pace

that Amrei could hardly keep up with him; and when she arrived at their

parents' house he was already up in the tree, teasing her in a boasting

manner and calling for her to come up too--because he knew that she

could not. And now he began to pluck the red berries and threw them down

into his sister's apron. She asked him to pick them with their stems on,

because she wanted to make a wreath. He answered, "No, I

shan't!"--nevertheless no berries fell down after that without stems on

them.

"Hark, how the sparrows are scolding!" cried Damie from the tree.

"They're angry because I'm taking their food away from them!" And

finally, when he had plucked all the berries, he said: "I shan't come

down again, but shall stay up here day and night until I die and drop

down, and shall never come to you at all any more, unless you promise me

something!"

"What is it?"

"That you'll never wear the necklace that Farmer Landfried's wife gave

you, so long as I can see it. Will you promise me that?"

"No!"

"Then I shall never come down!"

"Very well," said Amrei, and she went away with her berries. But before

she had gone far, she sat down behind a pile of wood and started to make

a wreath, every now and then peeping out to see if Damie was not coming.

She put the wreath on her head. Suddenly an indescribable anxiety about

Damie seized her; she ran back, and there was Damie, sitting astride a

branch and leaning back against the trunk of the tree with his arms

folded.

"Come down! I'll promise you what you want!" cried Amrei; and in a

moment Damie was down on the ground beside her.

When she got home, Black Marianne called her a foolish child and scolded

her for making a wreath for herself out of the berries that were

intended for her parents' graves. Marianne quickly destroyed the wreath,

muttering a few words which the children could not understand. Then she

took them both by the hand and led them out to the churchyard; and

passing where two mounds lay close together, she said:

"There are your parents!"

The children looked at each other in surprise. Marianne then made a

cross-shaped furrow in each of the mounds, and showed the children how

to stick the berries in. Damie was handy at the work, and boasted

because his red cross was finished sooner than his sister's. Amrei

looked at him fixedly and made no answer; but when Damie said, "That

will please father," she struck him on the back and said: "Be quiet!"

Damie began to cry, perhaps louder than he really meant to. Then Amrei

called out:

"For heaven's sake, forgive me!--forgive me for doing that to you. Right

here, I promise you that I'll do all I can for you, all my life long,

and give you everything I have. I didn't hurt you, Damie, did I? You may

depend upon it, it shall not happen again as long as I live--never

again!--never! Oh, mother! Oh, father! I shall be good, I promise you!

Oh, mother! Oh, father!"

She could say no more; but she did not weep aloud, although it was plain

that her heart was almost bursting. Not until Black Marianne burst out

crying did Amrei weep with her.

They returned home, and when Damie said "Good night," Amrei whispered

into his ear:

"Now I know that we shall never see our parents again in this world."

Even from making this communication she derived a certain

satisfaction--a childish pride which is awakened by having something to

impart. And yet in this child's heart there had dawned something like a

realization that one of the great ties in her life had been severed

forever, the thought that arises with the consciousness that a parent is

no longer with us.

When the lips which called thee child have been sealed by death, a

breath has vanished from thy life that shall nevermore return.

While Black Marianne was sitting beside the child's bed, the little one

said:

"I seem to be falling and falling, on and on. Let me keep hold of your

hand."

Holding the hand fast, she dropped into a slumber; but as often as Black

Marianne tried to draw her hand away, she clutched at it again. Marianne

understood what this sensation of endless falling signified for the

child; she felt in realizing her parents' death as if she were being

wafted along, without knowing whence or whither.

It was not until nearly midnight that Marianne was able to quit the

child's bedside, after she had repeated her usual twelve Paternosters

over and over again, who knows how many times? A look of stern defiance

was on the face of the sleeping child. She had laid one hand across her

bosom; Black Marianne gently lifted it, and said, half-aloud, to

herself:

"If there were only an eye to watch over thee and a hand to help thee

all the time, as there is now in thy sleep, and to take the heaviness

out of thy heart without thy knowing it! But nobody can do that--none

but He alone. Oh, may He do unto my child in distant lands as I do unto

this little one!"

Black Marianne was a shunned woman, that is to say, people were almost

afraid of her, so harsh did she seem in her manner. Some eighteen years

before she had lost her husband, who had been shot in an attempt which

he had made with some companions to rob the stage-coach. Marianne was

expecting a child to be born when the body of her husband, with its

blackened face, was carried into the village; but she bore up bravely

and washed the dead man's face as if she hoped, by so doing, to wash

away his black guilt. Her three daughters died, and only the son, who

was born soon afterward, lived to grow up. He turned out to be a

handsome lad, though he had a strange, dark color in his face; he was

now traveling abroad as a journeyman mason. For from the time of Brosi,

and especially since that worthy man's son, Severin, had worked his way

up to such high honor with the mallet, many of the young men in the

village had chosen to follow the mason's calling. The children used to

talk of Severin as if he were a prince in a fairy tale. And so Black

Marianne's only child had, in spite of her remonstrances, become a

mason, and was now wandering around the country. And she, who all her

life long had never left the village, nor had ever desired to leave it,

often declared that she seemed to herself like a hen that had hatched a

duck's egg; but she was almost always clucking to herself about it.

One would hardly believe it, but Black Marianne was one of the most

cheerful persons in the village; she was never seen to be sorrowful, for

she did not like to have people pity her; and that is why they did not

take to her. In the winter she was the most industrious spinner in the

village, and in the summer, the busiest at gathering wood, a large part

of which she was able to sell; and "my John"--for that was her surviving

child's name--"my John" was always the subject of her conversation. She

said that she had taken little Amrei to live with her, not from a desire

to be kind, but in order that she might have some living being about

her. She liked to appear rough before people, and thus enjoyed, all the

more, the proud consciousness of independence.

The exact opposite to her was Crappy Zachy, with whom Damie had found

shelter. This worthy represented himself to people as a kind-hearted

fellow who would give away anything he had; but as a matter of fact he

bullied and ill-used his entire household, and especially Damie, for

whose keep he received but a small sum of money. His real name was

Zechariah, and he got his nickname from his once having brought home to

his wife a couple of finely trussed pigeons to roast, but they were in

fact a pair of plucked ravens, which in that part of the country are

called "crappies." Crappy Zachy, who had a wooden leg, spent most of his

time knitting woolen stockings and jackets; and with his knitting he

used to sit about in the village wherever there was any opportunity to

gossip. This gossiping, in the course of which he heard all sorts of

news, was a source of some very profitable side-business for him. He was

what they called the "marriage-maker" of the region; for in those parts,

where there are large, separate estates, marriages are generally managed

through agents, who find out accurately the relative circumstances of

the prospective couples, and arrange everything beforehand. When a

marriage of this kind had been brought about, Crappy Zachy used to play

the fiddle at the wedding, for he had quite a reputation in the region

as a fiddler; moreover, when his hands were tired from fiddling, he

could play the clarionet and the horn. In fact, he was an undoubted

genius.

Damie's whining and sensitive nature was very disgusting to Crappy

Zachy, and he tried to cure him of it by giving him plenty to cry about

and teasing him whenever he could.

Thus the two little stems which had sprouted in the same garden were

transplanted into different soils. The position and the nature of the

ground, and the qualities that were inherent in each stem, made them

grow up very differently.

CHAPTER IV

"OPEN, DOOR"

All Souls' Day came. It was dull and foggy, and the children stood among

a crowd of people assembled in the churchyard. Crappy Zachy had led

Damie there by the hand, but Amrei had come alone, without Black

Marianne; many were angry at the hard-hearted woman, while a few hit a

part of the truth when they said that Marianne did not like to visit

graves, because she did not know where her husband's grave was. Amrei

was quiet and did not shed a tear, while Damie wept bitterly at the

pitying remarks of the bystanders, more especially because Crappy Zachy

had given him several sly pinches and pokes. For a time Amrei, in a

dreamy, forgetful way, stood gazing at the lights on the heads of the

graves, watching the flame consume the wax and the wick grow blacker,

and blacker, until at last the light was quite burnt out.

In the crowd a man, wearing handsome, town-made clothes and with a

ribbon in his button-hole, was moving about here and there. It was the

High Commissioner of Public Works, Severin, who, on a trip of

inspection, had come to visit the graves of his parents, Brosi and Moni.

His brothers and sisters and other relatives were constantly crowding

around him with a kind of deferential respect; in fact, the usual

reverence of the occasion was almost entirely diverted, nearly all the

attention being fixed upon this stranger. Amrei also looked at him, and

asked Crappy Zachy:

"Is that a bridegroom?"

"Why?"

"Because he has a ribbon in his button-hole."

Instead of answering her, the first thing that Crappy Zachy did was to

go up to a group of people and tell them what a stupid speech the child

had made; and from among the graves there arose a loud laugh over her

foolishness. Only Farmer Rodel's wife said: "I don't see anything

foolish in that. Although it is a mark of honor that Severin has, it is

after all a strange thing for him to go about in the churchyard with

such a decoration on--in the place where we see what we are all coming

to, whether in our lifetime we have worn clothes of silk or of homespun.

It annoyed me to see him wear it in the church--a thing of that kind

ought to be taken off when one goes to church, and more especially in

the churchyard!"

The rumor of little Amrei's question must have penetrated to Severin

himself, for he was seen to button his overcoat hastily, and as he did

so he nodded at the child. Now he was heard to ask who she was, and as

soon as he found out, he came hurrying across to the children beside the

fresh graves, and said to Amrei:

"Come here, my child. Open your hand. Here is a ducat for you--buy what

you want with it."

The child stared at him and did not answer. But scarcely had Severin

turned his back when she called out to him, half-aloud:

"I won't take any presents!"--and she flung the ducat after him.

Several people who had seen this came up to Amrei and scolded her; and

just as they were about to illuse her, she was again saved from their

rough hands by Farmer Rodel's wife, who once before had protected her

with words. But even she requested Amrei to go after Severin and at

least thank him. But Amrei made no answer whatsoever; she remained

obstinate, so that her protectress also left her. Only with considerable

difficulty was the ducat found again, and a member of the Village

Council, who was present, took charge of it in order to deliver it over

to the child's guardian.

This incident gave Amrei a strange reputation in the village. People

said she had lived only a few days with Black Marianne, and yet had

already acquired that woman's manners. It was declared to be an unheard

of thing that a child so sunk in poverty could be so proud, and she was

scolded up hill and down dale for this pride, so that she became

thoroughly aware of it, and in her young, childish heart there arose an

attitude of defiance, a resolve to evince it all the more. Black

Marianne, moreover, did her part to strengthen this state of mind, for

she said: "Nothing more lucky can happen to a poor person than to be

considered proud, for by that means he or she is saved from being

trampled upon by everybody, and from being expected to offer thanks for

such usage afterward."

In the winter Amrei was at Crappy Zachy's much of the time, for she was

very fond of hearing him play the violin; yes, and Crappy Zachy on one

occasion bestowed such high praise upon her as to say: "You are not

stupid;" for Amrei, after listening to his playing for a long time, had

remarked: "It's wonderful how a fiddle can hold its breath so long; I

can't do that." And, on quiet winter nights at home, when Marianne told

sparkling and horrifying goblin-stories, Amrei, when they were finished,

would draw a deep breath and say: "Oh, Marianne, I must take breath

now--I was obliged to hold my breath all the time you were speaking."

No one paid much attention to Amrei, and the child could dream away just

as she had a mind to. Only the schoolmaster said once at a meeting of

the Village Council, that he had never seen such a child--she was at

once defiant and yielding, dreamy and alert. In truth, with all her

childish self-forgetfulness, there was already developing in little

Amrei a sense of responsibility, an attitude of self-defense in

opposition to the world, its kindness and its malice. Damie, on the

other hand, came crying and complaining to his sister upon every

trifling occasion. He was, furthermore, always pitying himself, and when

he was tumbled over by his playmates in their wrestling matches, he

always whined: "Yes, because I am an orphan they beat me! Oh, if my

father and mother knew of it!"--and then he cried twice as much over the

injustice of it. Damie let everybody give him things to eat, and thus

became greedy, while Amrei was satisfied with a little, and thus

acquired habits of moderation. Even the roughest boys were afraid of

Amrei, although nobody knew how she had proved her strength, while Damie

would run away from quite little boys. In school Damie was always up to

mischief; he shuffled his feet and turned down the leaves of the books

with his fingers as he read. Amrei, on the other hand, was always bright

and attentive, though she often wept in the school, not for the

punishment she herself received, but because Damie was so often

punished.

Amrei could please Damie best by telling him the answers to riddles. The

children still used to sit frequently by the house of their rich

guardian, sometimes near the wagons, sometimes near the oven behind the

house, where they used to warm themselves, especially in the autumn.

Once Amrei asked:

"What's the best thing about an oven?"

"You know I can't guess anything," replied Damie, plaintively.

"Then I'll tell you:

'In the oven this is best, 'tis said,

That it never itself doth eat the bread.'"

And then, pointing to the wagons before the house, Amrei asked:

"What's full of holes, and yet holds? "--and without waiting for a

reply, she gave the answer: "A chain!"

"Now you must let me ask you these riddles," said Damie.

And Amrei replied: "Yes, you may ask them. But do you see those sheep

coming yonder? Now I know another riddle."

"No!" cried Damie, "no! Two are enough for me--I can't remember three!"

"Yes, you must hear this one too, or else I'll take the others back!"

And Damie kept repeating to himself, anxiously: "A chain," "Eat it

itself," while Amrei asked:

"On which side have sheep the most wool?"--"Ba! ba! on the outside!" she

sang merrily.

Damie now ran off to ask his playmates these riddles; he kept his fists

tightly clenched, as if he were holding the riddles fast and was

determined not to let them go. But when he got to his playmates, he

remembered only the one about the chain; and Farmer Rodel's eldest son,

whom he hadn't asked at all and who was much too old for that sort of

thing, guessed the answer at once, and Damie ran back to his sister

crying.

Little Amrei's cleverness at riddles soon began to be talked about in

the village, and even rich, serious farmers, who seldom wasted many

words on anybody, and least of all on a poor child, now and then

condescended to ask little Amrei one. That she knew a great many herself

was not strange, for she had probably learned them from Black Marianne;

but that she was able to answer so many new ones caused general

astonishment. Amrei would soon have been unable to go across the street

or into the fields without being stopped and questioned, if she had not

found out a remedy; she made it a rule that she would not answer a

riddle for anybody, unless she might propose one in return, and she

managed to think up such good ones that the people stood still as if

spell-bound. Never had a poor child been so much noticed in the village

as was this little Amrei. But, as she grew older, less attention was

paid to her, for people look with sympathetic eyes only at the blossom

and the fruit, and disregard the long period of transition during which

the one is ripening into the other.

Before Amrei's school-days were over, Fate gave her a riddle that was

difficult to solve.

The children had an uncle, a woodcutter, who lived some fifteen miles

from Haldenbrunn, at Fluorn. They had seen him only once, and that was

at their parents' funeral, when he had walked behind the magistrate, who

had led the children by the hand. After that time the children often

dreamt about their uncle at Fluorn. They were often told that this uncle

was like their father, which made them still more anxious to see him;

for although they still believed at times that their father and mother

would some day suddenly reappear--it could not be that they had gone

away forever--still, as the years rolled on, they gradually became

reconciled to giving up this hope, especially after they had over and

over again put berries on the graves, and had long been able to read the

two names on the same black cross. They also almost entirely forgot

about the uncle in Fluorn, for during many years they had heard nothing

of him.

But one day the children were called into their guardian's house, and

there sat a tall, heavy man with a brown face.

"Come here, children," said this man, as the children entered. "Don't

you know me?" He had a dry, harsh voice.

The children looked at him with wondering eyes. Perhaps some remembrance

of their father's voice awoke within them. The man continued:

"I am your father's brother. Come here, Lisbeth, and you too, Damie."

"My name's not Lisbeth--my name's Amrei," said the girl; and she began

to cry. She did not offer her hand to her uncle. A feeling of

estrangement made her tremble, when her own uncle thus called her by a

wrong name; she very likely felt that there could be no real affection

for her in anybody who did not know her name.

"If you are my uncle, why don't you know my name?" asked Amrei.

"You are a stupid child! Go and offer him your hand immediately!"

commanded Farmer Rodel. And then he said to the stranger, half in a

whisper: "She's a strange child. Black Marianne, who, you know, is a

peculiar sort of person, has put all sorts of odd notions into her

head."

Amrei looked around in astonishment, and gave her hand to her uncle,

trembling. Damie, who had done so already, now said:

"Uncle, have you brought us anything?"

"I haven't much to bring. I bring myself, and you're to go with me. Do

you know, Amrei, that it's not at all right for you not to like your

uncle. You'd better come here and sit down beside me--nearer still. You

see, your brother Damie is much more sensible. He looks more like our

family, but you belong to us too."

A maid now came in with some man's clothing, which she laid on the

table.

"These are your brother's clothes," said Farmer Rodel to the stranger;

and the latter went on to say to Amrei:

"As you see, these are your father's clothes. We shall take them with

us, and you shall go too--first to Fluorn, and then across the brook."

Amrei, trembling, touched her father's coat and his blue-striped vest.

But the uncle lifted up the clothes, pointed to the worn-out elbows, and

said to Farmer Rodel:

"These are worth very little--I won't have them valued at much. I don't

even know if I can wear them over in America, without being laughed at."

Amrei seized the coat passionately. That her father's coat, which she

had looked upon as a costly and invaluable treasure, should be

pronounced of little value, seemed to grieve her, and that these clothes

were to be worn in America, and ridiculed there, almost bewildered her.

And, anyway, what was the meaning of this talk about America? This

mystery was soon cleared up, when Farmer Rodel's wife came, and with

her, Black Marianne; for Dame Rodel said:

"Harkye, husband--to my mind this thing should not be done so fast, this

sending the children off to America with that man."

"But he is their only living relative, Josenhans' brother."

"Yes, to be sure. But until now he has not done much to show that he is

a relative; and I fancy that this cannot be done without the approval

of the Council, and even the Council cannot do it alone. The children

have a legal right to live here, which cannot be taken away from them in

their sleep, so to speak--for the children are not yet in a position to

say what they want themselves. It's like carrying people off in their

sleep."

"My Amrei is intelligent enough. She's thirteen now, but more clever

than many a person of thirty, and she knows what she wants," said Black

Marianne.

"You two ought to have been town-councilors," said Farmer Rodel. "But

it's my opinion, too, that the children ought not to be tied to a rope,

like calves, and dragged away. Well, let the man talk with them himself,

and then we shall see what further is to be done. He is after all their

natural protector, and has the right to stand in their father's place,

if he likes. Harkye; do you take a little walk with your brother's

children outside the village, and you women stay here, and let nobody

try to persuade or dissuade them."

The woodcutter took the two children by the hand, and went out of the

room and out of the house with them. In the street he asked the

children:

"Whither shall we go?"

"If you want to be our father, go home with us," suggested Damie. "Our

house is down yonder."

"Is it open?" asked the uncle.

"No, but Coaly Mathew has the key. But he has never let us go in. I'll

run on and get the key."

Damie released himself quickly, and ran off. Amrei felt like a prisoner

as her uncle led her along by the hand. He spoke earnestly and

confidentially to her now, however, and explained, almost as if he were

excusing himself, that he had a large family of his own and, that he

could hardly get along with his wife and five children. But now a man,

who was the owner of large forests in America, had offered him a free

passage across the ocean, and in five years, when he had cleared away

the forest, he was to have a large piece of the best farm-land as his

own property. In gratitude to God, who had bestowed this upon him for

himself and his family, he had immediately made up his mind to do a good

deed by taking his brother's children with him. But he was not going to

compel them to go; indeed, he would take them only on the condition that

they should turn to him with their whole hearts and look upon him as

their second father.

Amrei looked at him with eyes of wonder. If she could only bring herself

to love this man! But she was almost afraid of him--she could not help

it. And to have him thus fall from the clouds, as it were, and compel

her to love him, rather turned her against him.

"Where is your wife?" asked Amrei. She very likely felt that a woman

would have broached the subject in a more gentle and gradual manner.

"I will tell you honestly," answered her uncle. "My wife does not

interfere in this matter, and says she will neither persuade nor

dissuade me. She is a little sharp, but only at first--if you are good

to her, and you are a sensible child, you can twist her around your

finger. And if, once in a while, anything should happen to you that you

don't like, remember that you are at your father's brother's, and tell

me about it alone. I will help you all I can, and you shall see that

your real life is just beginning."

Amrei's eyes filled with tears at these words; and yet she could say

nothing, for she felt estranged toward this man. His voice appealed to

her, but when she looked at him, she felt as if she would have liked to

run away.

Damie now came with the key. Amrei started to take it from him, but he

would not give it up. With the peculiar pedantic conscientiousness of a

child he declared that he had faithfully promised Coaly Mathew's wife to

give it to nobody but his uncle. Accordingly the uncle took it from him,

and it seemed to Amrei as if a magic secret door were being opened when

the key for the first time rattled in the lock and turned--the hasp went

down and the door opened! A strange chill, like that of a vault, came

creeping from the black front-room, which had also served as a kitchen.

A little heap of ashes still lay on the hearth, and on the door the

initials of Caspar Melchior Balthasar and the date of the parent's

death, were written in chalk. Amrei read it aloud--her own father had

written it.

"Look," cried Damie, "the eight is shaped just as you make it, and as

the master won't have it--you know--from right to left."

Amrei motioned to him to keep quiet. She thought it terrible and sinful

that Damie should talk so lightly--here, where she felt as if she were

in church, or even in eternity--quite out of the world, and yet in the

very midst of it. She herself opened the inside door; the room was dark

as a grave, for the shutters were closed. A single sunbeam, shining

through a crack in the wall, fell on the angel's head on the tile stove

in such a way that the angel seemed to be laughing. Amrei crouched down

in terror. When she looked up again, her uncle had opened one of the

shutters, and the warm, outside air poured in. How cold it seemed in

there! None of the furniture was left in the room but a bench nailed to

the wall. There her mother used to spin, and there she had put Amrei's

little hands together and taught her to knit.

"Come, children, let us go now," said the uncle. "It is not good to be

here. Come with me to the baker and I will buy you each a white roll--or

do you like biscuits better?"

"No, let us stay here a little longer," said Amrei; and she kept on

stroking the place where her mother had sat. Then, pointing to a white

spot on the wall, she said, half in a whisper: "There our cuckoo clock

used to hang, and there our father's discharge from the army. And there

the hanks of yarn that mother spun used to hang--she could spin even

better than Black Marianne--Black Marianne has said so herself. She

always got a skein more out of a pound than anybody else, and it was

always so even--not a knot in it. And do you see that ring up there on

the ceiling? It was beautiful to see her twisting the threads there. If

I had been old enough to know then, I would not have let them sell

mother's spindle--it would have been a fine legacy for me. But there was

nobody to take any interest in us. Oh, mother dear! Oh, father dear! If

you knew how we have been pushed about, it would grieve you, even in

eternity."

Amrei began to weep aloud, and Damie wept with her; even the uncle dried

his eyes. He again urged them to come away from the place; he was vexed

for having caused himself and the children this grief. But Amrei said in

a decided way:

"Even if you do go, I shall not go with you."

"How do you mean? You will not go with me at all?"

Amrei started; for she suddenly realized what she had said, and it

seemed to her almost as if it had been an inspiration. But presently she

answered:

"No, I don't know about that yet. I merely meant to say, that I shall

not willingly leave this house until I have seen everything again. Come,

Damie, you are my brother--come up into the attic. Do you remember where

we used to play hide-and-seek, behind the chimney? And then we'll look

out of the window, where we dried the truffles. Don't you remember the

bright florin father got for them?"

Something rustled and pattered across the ceiling. All three started,

and the uncle said quickly:

"Stay where you are, Damie, and you too. What do you want up there?

Don't you hear the mice running about?"

"Come with me--they won't eat us!" Amrei insisted. Damie, however,

declared that he would not go, and Amrei, although she felt a secret

fear, took courage and went upstairs alone. But she soon came down

again, looking as pale as death, with nothing in her hand but a bundle

of old straws.

"Damie says he'll go with me to America," said the uncle, as she came

forward. Amrei, breaking up the straws in her hands, replied: "I've

nothing to say against it. I don't know yet what I shall do, but he can

go if he likes."

"No," cried Damie, "I shan't do that. You did not go with Dame Landfried

when she wanted to take you away, and so I shall not go off alone

without you."

"Well, then, think it over--you are sensible enough," said the uncle, to

conclude the matter. He then closed the shutters again, so that they

stood in the dark, and hurried the children out of the room and through

the vestibule, locked the outside door, and went to take the key back to

Coaly Mathew. After that he started for the village with Damie alone.

When he was some way off, he called back to Amrei:

"You have until tomorrow morning--then I shall go away whether you go

with me or not."

Amrei was left alone. She looked after the retreating figures and

wondered how one person could go away from another.

"There he goes," she thought, "and yet he belongs to you, and you to

him."

Strange! As in a sleep-dream, a subject that has been lightly touched

upon is renewed and interwoven with all sorts of strange details, so was

it now with Amrei in her waking-dream. Damie had made but a passing

allusion to the meeting with Farmer Landfried's wife. The remembrance of

her had half faded away; but now it suddenly rose up fresh again--like a

picture of past life in a vision. Amrei said to herself, almost aloud:

"Who knows if she may not thus suddenly think of you? One cannot tell

why she should, and yet perhaps she is thinking of you at this very

moment. For in this place she promised to be your protectress whenever

you came to her,--it was yonder by the stunted willows. Why is it, that

only the trees remain to be seen? Why is not a word like a tree,

something which stands firmly, something which one can hold to. Yes, one

can, if one will. Then one is as well off as a tree--and what an

honorable farmer's wife says, is firm and lasting. She, too, wept

because she had to go away from her native place, although she had been

married and away from it for a long time. And she has children of her

own--one of them is called John."

Amrei was standing by the tree where they had picked the berries. She

laid her hand upon the trunk and said:

"You--why don't you go away, too? Why don't people tell you to emigrate?

Perhaps for you, too, it would be better elsewhere. But, to be sure, you

are too large--you did not place yourself here, and who knows if you

would not die in some other place. You can only be hewn down, not

transplanted. Nonsense! I also had to leave my home. If it were my

father, I should be obliged to go with him--he would not need to ask me.

And he who asks too much, goes astray. No one can advise me in this

matter, not even Marianne. And, after all, with my uncle, it's like

this: 'I am doing you a good turn, and you must repay me.' If he's

severe with me, and with Damie, because he's awkward, and we have to run

away, where in this wide, strange world are we to go? Here everybody

knows us, and every hedge, every tree has a familiar face. 'You know me,

don't you?' she said, looking up at the tree. 'Oh, if you could but

speak! God created you too--why cannot you speak? You knew my father and

mother so well--why cannot you tell me what they would advise me to do?'

Oh, dear father! Oh, dear mother! It grieves me so to have to go away! I

have nothing here, and hardly anybody, and yet I feel as if I were being

driven out of a warm bed into the cold snow. Is this deep sadness that I

feel a sign that I ought not to go? Is it the true voice of conscience,

or is it but a foolish fear? Oh, good Heaven, I do not know! If only a

voice from Heaven would come now and tell me!"

The child trembled with inward terror, and the sense of life's

difficulties for the first time arose vividly within her. And again she

went on, half-thinking, half-talking to herself--but this time in a more

decided way:

"If I were alone, I know for certain that I should not go; I should

stay here. For it would grieve me too much. Alone I could get along.

Good--remember that; of one thing, then, you are sure--as to yourself

you are decided. But what foolish thoughts are these! How can I imagine

that I am alone, and without Damie? I am not alone--I belong to Damie,

and he belongs to me. And for Damie it would be better if he had a

fatherly hand to guide him--it would help him up. But why do you want

anybody else, Amrei?--can you not take care of him yourself, if it be

necessary? If he once starts out in that way, I can see that he'll be

nothing but a servant all his life, a drudge for other people. And who

knows how uncle's children will behave toward us? Because they're poor

people themselves, they'll play the masters with us. No, no! I'm sure

they're good,--and it would be a fine thing to be able to say: 'Good

morning, cousin.' If uncle had only brought one of the children with

him, I could decide much better--I could find out about things. Oh, good

heavens, how difficult all this is!"

Amrei sat down by the tree. A chaffinch came hopping along, picked up a

seed, looked around him, and flew away. Something crept across Amrei's

face; she brushed it off--it was a ladybird. She let it creep about on

her hand, between the mountains and valleys of her fingers, until it

came to the tip of her little-finger and flew away.

"What a tale he'll have to tell about where he has been!" thought Amrei.

"A little creature like that is well off indeed--wherever it flies, it

is at home. How the larks are singing! They, too, are well off--they do

not have to think what they ought to say and do. Yonder the butcher,

with his dog, is driving a calf out of the village. The dog's voice is

quite different from the lark's--but then a lark's singing would never

drive a calf along."

"Where's the colt going?" Coaly Mathew called out of his window to a

young lad who was leading a fine colt away by a halter.

"Farmer Rodel has sold it," was the reply; and presently the colt was

heard neighing farther down the valley. Amrei, who had heard this,

again reflected:

"Yes, a creature like that can be sold away from its mother, and the

mother hardly knows of it; and whoever pays for it, to him it belongs.

But a person cannot be sold, and he who is unwilling cannot be led away

by a halter. Yonder comes Farmer Rodel and his horses, with a large colt

frisking beside them. You will be put in harness soon, colt, and perhaps

you, too, will be sold. A man cannot be bought--he merely hires himself

out. An animal for its work gets nothing more than its food and drink,

while a person gets money as a reward. Yes, I can be a maid now, and

with my wages I can apprentice Damie--he wants to be a mason. But when

we are at uncle's, Damie won't be as much mine as he is now. Hark! the

starling is flying home to the house which father made for him--he's

singing merrily again. Father made the house for him out of old planks.

I remember his saying that a starling won't go into a house if it's made

of new wood, and I feel just the same. 'You, tree,--now I know--if you

rustle as long as I stay here, I shall remain.'" And Amrei listened

intently; soon it seemed to her as if the tree were rustling, but again

when she looked up at the branches they were quite still, and she did

not know what it was she heard.

Something was now coming along the road with a great cackling and with a

cloud of dust flying before it. It was a flock of geese returning from

the pasture on the Holderwasen. Amrei abstractedly imitated their

cackling for a long time. Then her eyes closed and she fell asleep.

An entire spring-array of blossoms had burst forth in this young soul.

The budding trees in the valley, as they drank in the evening dew, shed

forth their fragrance over the child who had fallen asleep on her native

soil, from which she could not tear herself.

It had long been dark when she awoke, and a voice was crying:

"Amrei, where are you?"

She sat up, but did not answer. She looked wonderingly at the

stars,--it seemed to her as if the voice had come from Heaven. Not until

the call was repeated did she recognize the voice of Black Marianne, and

then she answered:

"Here I am!"

Black Marianne now came up and said:

"Oh, it's good that I have found you! They are like mad all through the

village; one says he saw you in the wood, another that he met you in the

fields, that you were running along, crying, and would listen to no

call. I began to fear that you had jumped into the pond. You need not be

afraid, dear child, you need not run away; nobody can compel you to go

with your uncle."

"And who said that I did not want to go?" But suddenly a gust of wind

rustled loudly through the branches of the tree. "But I shall certainly

not go!" Amrei cried, holding fast to the tree with her hand.

"Come home--there's a severe storm coming up, and the wind will blow it

here directly," urged Marianne.

And so Amrei walked, almost staggered, back to the village with Black

Marianne. What did it mean--that people had seen her running through

field and forest? Or was it only Black Marianne's fancy?

The night was pitch dark, but now and then bright flashes of lightning

illuminated the houses, revealing them in a dazzling glare, which

blinded their eyes and compelled them to stand still. And when the

lightning disappeared, nothing more could be seen. In their own native

village the two seemed as if they were lost, as if they were in a

strange place, and they hastened onward with an uncertain step. The dust

whirled up in eddies, so that at times they could scarcely make any

progress; then, wet with perspiration, they struggled on again, until at

last they reached the shelter of their home, just as the first heavy

drops of rain began to fall. A gust of wind blew open the door, and

Amrei cried:

"Open, door!"

She was very likely thinking of a fairy tale, in which a magic door

opens at a mysterious word.

CHAPTER V

ON THE HOLDERWASEN

Accordingly, when her uncle came the next morning, Amrei declared that

she would remain where she was. There was a strange mixture of

bitterness and benevolence in her uncle's reply:

"Yes, you certainly take after your mother--she would never have

anything to do with us. But I couldn't take Damie alone along with me,

even if he wanted to go; for a long time he wouldn't be able to do

anything but eat bread, whereas you would have been able to earn it

too."

Amrei replied that she preferred to do that here at home for the

present, but that if her uncle remained in the same mind, she and her

brother would come to him at some future time. Indeed, the interest her

uncle now expressed for the children, for a moment, almost made her

waver in her resolution, but in her characteristic way she did not

venture to show any signs of it. She merely said:

"Give my love to your children, and tell them I feel very sorry about

never having seen my nearest relatives; and especially now that they are

going across the seas, since perhaps I shall never see them in my life."

Then her uncle stood up quickly, and commissioned Amrei to give his love

to Damie, for he himself had no time to wait to bid him farewell. And

with that he went away.

When Damie came soon afterward and heard of his uncle's departure, he

wanted to run after him, and even Amrei felt a similar impulse. But she

restrained herself and did not yield to it. She spoke and acted as if

she were obeying some one's command in every word she said and in every

movement she made; and yet her thoughts were wandering along the road by

which her uncle had gone. She walked through the village, leading her

brother by the hand, and nodded to all the people she met. She felt just

as if she had been away and was now returning to them all. Her uncle

had wanted to tear her away, and she thought that everybody else must be

as glad that she had not gone, as she was herself. But she soon found

out that they would not only have been glad to let her go, but that they

were positively angry with her because she had not gone. Crappy Zachy

opened his eyes wide at her and said:

"Child, you have an obstinate head of your own--the whole village is

angry with you for spurning your good fortune. Still, who knows whether

it would have been good fortune? But they call it so now, at any rate,

and everybody that looks at you casts it up to you how much you receive

from the parish. So make haste and get yourself off the public charity

lists."

"But what am I to do?"

"Farmer Rodel's wife would like to have you in her service, but the old

man won't listen to it."

Amrei very likely felt that henceforward she would have to be doubly

brave, in order to escape the reproaches of her own conscience, as well

as those of others; and so she asked again:

"Don't you know of anything at all?"

"Yes, certainly; but you must not be ashamed of anything--except

begging. Have you not heard that foolish Fridolin yesterday killed two

geese belonging to a farmer's wife? The goosekeeper's place is vacant,

and I advise you to take it."

It was soon done. That very noon Amrei drove the geese out to the

Holderwasen, as the pasture on the little hill by the King's Well was

called. Damie loyally helped his sister in doing it.

Black Marianne, however, was very much put out about this new service,

and declared, not without reason:

"It's something that's remembered against a person an entire lifetime to

have had such a place. People never forget it, and always refer to it;

and later on every one will think twice about taking you into their

service, because they will say: 'Why, that's the goose-girl!' And if any

one does take you, out of compassion, you'll get low wages and bad

treatment, and they'll always say: 'Oh, that's good enough for a

goose-girl.'"

"I won't mind that," replied Amrei; "and you have told me hundreds of

times about how a goose-girl became a queen."

"That was in olden times. But who knows?--you belong to the old world.

Sometimes it seems to me that you are not a child at all, and who knows,

you old-fashioned soul, if a wonder won't happen in your case?"

This hint that she had not yet stood upon the lowest round of the ladder

of honor, but that there was a possibility of her descending even lower

that she was, startled Amrei. For herself she thought nothing of it, but

from that time forth she would not allow Damie to keep the geese with

her. He was a man--or was to be one--and it might do him harm if it were

said of him, later on, that he had kept geese. But, to save her soul,

she could not make this clear to him, and he refused to listen to her.

For it is always thus; at the point where mutual understanding ends,

vexation begins; the inward helplessness translates itself into a

feeling of outward injustice and injury.

Amrei, nevertheless, was almost glad that Damie could remain angry with

her for so many days; for it showed that he was learning how to stand up

against the world and to assert his own will.

Damie, however, soon got a place for himself. He was employed by his

guardian, Farmer Rodel, in the capacity of scarecrow, an occupation

which required him to swing a rattle in the farmer's orchard all day

long, for the purpose of frightening the sparrows away from the early

cherries and vegetable-beds. At first this duty appealed to him as

sport, but he soon grew tired of it and gave it up.

It was a pleasant, but at the same time a laborious office that Amrei

had undertaken. And it often seemed especially hard to her that she

could do nothing to attach the creatures to her; indeed, they were

hardly to be distinguished from one another. And it was not at all an

idle remark that Black Marianne made to her one day when she returned

from Mossbrook Wood:

"Animals that live in flocks and herds," she said, "if you take each one

separately, are always stupid."

"I think so, too," replied Amrei. "These geese are stupid because they

know how to do too many different things. They can swim, and run, and

fly, but they are not really at home either in the water, or on land, or

in the air. That's what makes them stupid."

"I still maintain," replied Marianne, "that there's the making of an old

hermit in you."

The Holderwasen was not one of those lonely, sequestered spots which the

world of fiction seems to select for its gleaming, glittering legends.

Through the centre of the Holderwasen ran a road to Endringen, and not

far from it stood the many-colored boundary-stakes with the

coats-of-arms of the two sovereign princes whose dominions came together

here. In rustic vehicles of all kinds the peasants used to drive past,

and men, women, and children kept passing to and fro with hoe, scythe,

and sickle. The _gardes-champêtres_ of the two dominions also used to

pass by often, the barrels of their muskets shining as they approached

and gleaming long after they had passed. Amrei was almost always

accosted by the _garde-champêtre_ of Endringen as she sat by the

roadside, and he often made inquiries of her as to whether this or that

person had passed by. But she was never able to give the desired

information--or perhaps she kept it from him on purpose, on account of

the instinctive aversion the people, and especially the children, of a

village have for these men, whom they invariably look upon as the armed

enemies of the human race, going to and fro in search of some one to

devour.

Theisles Manz, who used to sit by the road breaking stones, hardly spoke

a word to Amrei; he would go sulkily from stone-heap to stone-heap, and

his knocking was more incessant than the tapping of the woodpecker in

Mossbrook Wood, and more regular than the piping and chirping of the

grasshoppers in the neighboring meadows and cloverfields.

[And so Amrei spent day after day at Holderwasen, watching the geese and

the passers-by, studying the birds and the flowers and the trees,

dreaming of her father and mother, and wondering what was in store for

Damie and herself. There was a trough of clear, fresh water by the

roadside, and Amrei used to bring a jug with her in order to offer it to

thirsty people who had nothing to drink out of.]

One day a little Bernese wagon, drawn by two handsome white horses, came

rattling along the road; a stout, upland farmer took up almost the

entire seat, which was meant for two. He drew up by the roadside and

asked:

"Girlie, have you anything one can drink out of?"

"Yes, certainly--I'll get it for you." And she went off briskly to fetch

her pitcher, which she filled with water.

"Ah!" said the farmer, stopping to take breath after a long draught; and

with the water running down his chin, he continued, talking half into

the jug: "There's after all no water like this in all the world." And

again he raised the jug to his lips, and motioned to Amrei to keep still

while he took a second long, thirsty draught. For it is extremely

disagreeable to be addressed when you are drinking; you swallow

hurriedly and feel an oppression afterward.

The child seemed to realize this, for not until the farmer had handed

back the jug did she say:

"Yes, this is good, wholesome water; and if you would like to water your

horses, it is especially good for them--it won't give them cramps."

"My horses are warm and must not drink now. Do you come from

Haldenbrunn, my girl?"

"Yes indeed."

"And what is your name?"

"Amrei."

"And to whom do you belong?"

[Illustration: AMREI BRISKLY BROUGHT HER PITCHER FILLED WITH WATER]

"To nobody now--my father was Josenhans."

"What! Josenhans, who served at Farmer Rodel's?"

"Yes."

"I knew him well. It was too bad that he died so soon. Wait, child--I'll

give you something." He drew a large leather bag out of his pocket,

groped about in it for a long time, and said at last: "There, take

this."

"No, thank you--I don't accept presents--I'll take nothing."

"Take it--you can accept it from me all right. Is Farmer Rodel your

guardian?"

"Yes."

"He might have done something better than make a goose-girl of you.

Well, God keep you."

Away rolled the wagon, and Amrei found herself alone with a coin in her

hand.

"'You can accept it from me all right.'--Who was he that he could say

that? And why didn't he make himself known? Why, it's a groschen, and

there's a bird on it. Well, it won't make him poor, nor me rich."

The rest of that day Amrei did not offer her pitcher to any one else;

she was afraid of having something given to her again. When she got home

in the evening, Black Marianne told her that Farmer Rodel had sent for

her, and that she was to go over to him directly.

Amrei hastened to his house, and as she entered, Farmer Rodel called out

to her:

"What have you been saying to Farmer Landfried?"

"I don't know any Farmer Landfried."

"He was with you at the Holderwasen today, and gave you something."

"I did not know who he was--and here's his money still."

"I've nothing to do with that. Now, say frankly and honestly, you

tiresome child, did I persuade you to be a goose-keeper? If you don't

give it up this very day, I'm no guardian of yours. I won't have such

things said of me!"

"I'll let everybody know that it was not your fault--but give it up is

something I can't do. I must stick to it, at any rate for the rest of

the summer--I must finish what I have begun."

"You're a crabbed creature," said the farmer; and he walked out of the

room. But his wife, who was lying ill in bed, called out:

"You're quite right--stay just as you are. I prophesy that it will go

well with you. A hundred years from now they will be saying in this

village of one who has done well: 'He has the fortune of Brosi's Severin

and of Josenhans' Amrei.' Your dry bread will fall into the honey-pot

yet."

Farmer Rodel's sick wife was looked upon as crazy; and, as if frightened

by a specter, Amrei hurried away without a word of reply.

Amrei told Black Marianne that a wonder had happened to her; Farmer

Landfried, whose wife she so often thought about, had spoken to her and

had taken her part in a talk with Farmer Rodel, and had given her

something. She then displayed the piece of money, and Marianne called

out, laughing:

"Yes, I might have guessed myself that it was Farmer Landfried. That's

just like him--to give a poor child a bad groschen!"

"Why is it bad?" asked Amrei; and the tears came into her eyes.

"Why, that's a bird groschen--they're not worth full value--they're

worth only a kreutzer and a half."

"Then he intended to give me only a kreutzer and a half," said Amrei

decidedly.

And here for the first time an inward contrast showed itself between

Amrei and Black Marianne. The latter almost rejoiced at every bad thing

she heard about people, whereas Amrei put a good construction on

everything. She was always happy, and no matter how frequently in her

solitude she burst into tears, she never expected anything, and hence

everything that she received was a surprise to her, and she was all the

more thankful for it.

[Amrei hoped that her meeting with Farmer Landfried would result in his

coming to take her to live with him, but she hoped in vain, for she

watched the geese all summer long, and did not see or hear of him

again.]

CHAPTER VI

THE WOMAN WHO BAKED HER OWN BREAD

A woman who leads a solitary, isolated life and bakes bread for herself

quite alone, is called an "Eigenbrötlerin" (a woman who bakes her own

bread), and such a woman, as a rule, has all kinds of peculiarities. No

one had more right or more inclination to be an "Eigenbrötlerin" than

did Black Marianne, although she never had anything to bake; for oatmeal

and potatoes and potatoes and oatmeal were the only things she ever ate.

She always lived by herself, and did not like to associate with other

people. Only along toward autumn did she become restless and impatient;

about that time of the year she would talk to herself a great deal, and

would often accost people of her own accord, especially strangers who

happened to be passing through the village. For she was anxious to find

out whether the masons from this or that place had yet returned home for

the winter, and whether they had brought news of her John. While she was

once more boiling and washing the linen she had been bleaching all

summer long, for which purpose she remained up all night, she would

always be muttering to herself. No one could understand exactly what she

said, but the burden of it was intelligible, for it was always: "That is

for me, and that is for thee." She was in the habit of saying twelve

Paternosters daily for her John, but on this particular washing-night

they became innumerable. When the first snow fell she was always

especially cheerful; for then there could be no more outdoor work, and

then he would be most likely to come home. At these times she would

often talk to a white hen which she kept in a coop, telling it that it

would have to be killed when John came. She had repeated these

proceedings for many years, and people never ceased telling her that

she was foolish to be thus continually thinking of the return of her

John.

This autumn it would be eighteen years since John had gone away, and

every year John Michael Winkler was reported in the paper as missing,

which would be done until his fiftieth year--he was now in his

thirty-sixth. The story circulated in the village that John had gone

among the gipsies. Once, indeed, his mother had mistaken a young gipsy

for him; he was a man who bore a striking resemblance to her missing

son, in that he was small of stature and had the same dark complexion;

and he had seemed rather pleased at being taken for John. But the mother

had put him to the proof, for she still had John's hymn-book and his

confirmation verse; and, inasmuch as the stranger did not know this

verse and could not tell who were his sponsors, or what had happened to

him on the day when Brosi's Severin arrived with his English wife, and

later on when the new well was dug at the town-hall--inasmuch as he did

not satisfy these and other proofs, he could not be the right man. And

yet Marianne used to give the gipsy a lodging whenever he came to the

village, and the children in the streets used to cry "John!" after him.

John was advertised as being liable to military duty and as a deserter;

and although his mother declared that he would have slipped through

under the measuring-stick as "too short," she knew that he would not

escape punishment if he returned, and inferred that this was the reason

why he did not return. And it was very strange to hear her praying,

almost in the same breath, for the welfare of her son and the death of

the reigning prince; for she had been told that when the sovereign died,

his successor would proclaim a general amnesty for all past offenses.

Every year Marianne used to ask the schoolmaster to give her the page in

the newspaper in which her John was advertised for, and she always put

it with his hymn-book. But this year it was a good thing that Marianne

could not read, so that the schoolmaster could send her another page in

place of the one she wanted. For a strange rumor was going through the

whole village; whenever two people stood together talking, they would be

saying:

"Black Marianne must not be told anything about it. It would kill

her--it would drive her crazy."

For a report, coming from the Ambassador in Paris, had passed through a

number of higher and lower officers, until it reached the Village

Council; it stated that, according to a communication received from

Algiers, John Winkler of Haldenbrunn had perished in that colony during

an outpost skirmish. There was much talk in the village of the singular

fact that so many in high departments should have concerned themselves

so much about the dead John. But this stream of well-confirmed

information was arrested before it had reached the end of its course.

At a meeting of the Village, Council it was determined that nothing at

all should be said to Black Marianne about it. It would be wrong, they

said, to embitter the last few years of her life by taking her one

comfort away from her.

But instead of keeping the report secret, the first thing the members of

the Council did was to talk of it in their homes, and it was not long

before the whole village knew about it, excepting only Black Marianne.

Every one, afraid of betraying the secret to her, looked at her with

strange glances; no one addressed her, and even her greetings were

scarcely returned. It was only Marianne's peculiar disposition that

prevented her from noticing this. And indeed, if any one did speak to

her and was drawn on to say anything about John's death, it was done in

the conjectural and soothing way to which she had been accustomed for

years; and Marianne did not believe it now any more than she had

formerly, because nobody ever said anything definite about the report of

his decease.

It would have been better if Amrei had known nothing about it, but there

was a strange, seductive charm in getting as close as possible to a

subject that was forbidden. Accordingly every one spoke to Amrei of the

mournful event, warned her not to tell Black Marianne anything about

it, and asked if the mother had no presentiments or dreams of her son's

death--if his spirit did not haunt the house. After she heard of it

Amrei was always trembling and quaking in secret; for she alone was

always near Black Marianne, and it was terrible to know something which

she was obliged to conceal from her. Even the people in whose house

Black Marianne had rented a small room could no longer bear to have her

near them, and they showed their sympathy by giving her notice to quit.

But how strangely things are associated in this life! As a result of

this very thing Amrei experienced joy as well as grief--for it opened up

her parents' home to her again. Black Marianne went to live there, and

Amrei, who at first trembled as she went back and forth in the house,

carrying water or making a fire, always thinking that now her father and

mother must come, afterward began gradually to feel quite at home in it.

She sat spinning day and night, until she had earned enough money to buy

back her parents' cuckoo-clock from Coaly Mathew. Now she had at least

one household article of her own! But the cuckoo had fared badly among

strangers; it had lost half of its voice, and the other half seemed to

stick in its throat--it could only cry "cook"--and as often as it did

that, Amrei would involuntarily add the missing "oo."

* * * * *

Black Marianne could not bear to hear the clock cuckoo and fixed the

pendulum so that it would not work, saying that she always had the time

in her head. And it was indeed wonderful how true this was--at any

minute she could tell what time it was, although it was of very little

consequence to her. In fact, this waiting, expectant woman possessed a

remarkable degree of alertness, for as she was always listening to hear

her son coming, she was naturally wide-awake all the time. And, although

she never visited anybody in the village, and spoke to nobody, she knew

everybody, and all about the most secret things that went on in the

place. She could infer a great deal from the manner in which people met

one another, and from words she overheard here and there. And because

this seemed very wonderful, she was feared and avoided. She often used

to describe herself, according to a local expression, as an

"old-experienced" woman, and yet she was exceedingly active. Every day,

year in and year out, she ate a few juniper berries, and people said

that was the reason why she was so vigorous and showed her sixty-six

years so little. The fact that the two sixes stood together caused her,

according to an old country saying[3] (which, however, was not

universally believed in) to be regarded as a witch. It was said that she

sometimes milked her black goat for hours at a time, and that this goat

gave an astonishing quantity of milk, but that in milking this goat she

was in reality drawing the milk out of the udders of the cows belonging

to persons she hated, and that she had an especial grudge against Farmer

Rodel's cattle. Moreover, Marianne's successful poultry-keeping was also

looked upon as witchcraft; for where did she get the food, and how was

it that she always had chickens and eggs to sell? It is true that in

the summer she was often seen collecting cock-chafers, grasshoppers, and

all kinds of worms, and on moonless nights she was seen gliding like a

will-o'-the-wisp among the graves in the churchyard, where she would be

carrying a burning torch and collecting the large black worms that crept

out, all the time muttering to herself. It was even said that in the

quiet winter nights she held wonderful conversations with her goat and

with her fowls, which she housed in her room during the winter. The

entire wild army of tales of witchcraft and sorcery, banished by school

education, came back and attached itself to Black Marianne.

Amrei sometimes felt afraid in the long, silent winter nights, when she

sat spinning by Black Marianne, and nothing was heard but an occasional

sleepy clucking from the fowls, or a dreamy bleat from the goat. And it

seemed truly magical how fast Marianne spun! She even said once:

"I think my John is helping me to spin." And then again she complained

that this winter, for the first time, she had not thought wholly and

solely of her John. She took her self to task for it and called herself

a bad mother, and complained that it seemed all the time as if the

features of her John were slowly vanishing before her--as if she were

forgetting what he had done at such and such a time, how he had laughed,

sung, and wept, and how he had climbed the tree and jumped into the

ditch.

* * * * *

But however cheerfully and brightly Marianne might begin to speak, she

always ended by relapsing into gloomy complaint and mourning; and she

who professed to like to be alone and to think of nothing and to love

nothing, only lived to think about her son and to love him. Consequently

Amrei made up her mind to release herself from this uncanny position of

being alone with Black Marianne; she demanded that Damie should be taken

into the house. At first Marianne opposed it vehemently, but when Amrei

threatened to leave the house herself, and then coaxed her in such a

childlike way and tried so hard to do whatever would best please her,

the old woman at last consented.

Damie, who had learned from Crappy Zachy to knit wool, now sat beneath

the parental roof again; and at night, when the brother and sister were

asleep in the garret, each one of them would wake the other when they

heard Black Marianne down stairs, running to and fro and muttering to

herself. But Damie's transmigration to Black Marianne's was the cause of

new trouble. Damie was exceedingly discontented at having been compelled

to learn a miserable trade that was fit only for a cripple. He wanted to

be a mason, and although Amrei was very much opposed to it, for she

predicted that he would not keep at it, Black Marianne supported him in

it. She would have liked to make all the young lads masons, and then to

have sent them out on their travels that they might bring back news of

her John.

Black Marianne seldom went to church, but she always liked to have

anybody else borrow her hymn-book and take it to church--it seemed to

give her a kind of pleasure to have it there. She was especially pleased

when any strange workman, who happened to be employed in the village,

borrowed the hymn-book which John had left behind him for that purpose;

for it seemed to her as if John himself were praying in his native

church, when the words were spoken and sung out of his book. And now

Damie was obliged to go to church twice every Sunday with John's

hymn-book.

While Marianne did not go to church herself, she was always to be seen

at every solemn ceremony in the village or in any of the surrounding

villages. There was never a funeral which Marianne did not attend as one

of the mourners; and at the funeral sermon, and the blessing spoken over

the grave, even of a little child, she always wept so violently that one

would have thought she was the nearest relative. On the way home,

however, she was always especially cheerful, for this weeping seemed to

be a kind of relief to her; all the year round she had to suppress so

much secret sorrow, that she felt thankful for an opportunity to give

vent to her feelings.

Could people be blamed if they shunned her as an uncanny person,

especially as they were keeping a secret from her? The habit of avoiding

Black Marianne was partly extended to Amrei herself; in several houses

where the girl called to offer help or sympathy she was made to see

distinctly that her presence was not desired, especially as she herself

was beginning to show certain eccentricities which astonished the whole

village; for example, except on the coldest winter days she used to go

barefoot, and people said that she must know some secret method to

prevent herself from catching cold and dying.

Only in the house of Farmer Rodel were they glad to have her, for the

farmer was her guardian. His wife, who had always taken Amrei's part and

who had one day promised to take her into her service when she was

older, was prevented from carrying out this plan. She herself was taken

by another--Death. The heaviness of life is generally felt in later

years, when one friend after another has been called away, and only a

name and a memory remains. But it was Amrei's lot to experience this in

her youth; and it was she and Black Marianne who wept more bitterly than

any of the others at the funeral of Farmer Rodel's wife.

Farmer Rodel was always complaining about how hard it was that he should

have to give up his property so soon, although not one of his three

children was yet married. But hardly a year had passed, and Damie had

not yet worked a full year in the quarry, when the celebration of a

double wedding was announced in the village; for Farmer Rodel's eldest

daughter and his only son were to be married on the same day. On this

day Farmer Rodel was to give over his property to his son, and at this

wedding it was fated that Amrei should acquire a new name and be

introduced into a new life.

In the space before the large dancing-floor the children were assembled,

and while the grown-up people were dancing and enjoying themselves

within, the children were imitating them outside. But, strange to say,

no boy and no girl would dance with Amrei. No one knew who said it

first, but a voice was heard to call out:

"No one will dance with you--you're Little Barefoot!" and "Barefoot!

Barefoot! Barefoot!" was echoed on all sides. Amrei was ready to weep;

but here again she quickly made use of the power which enabled her to

ignore insult and injury. Suppressing her tears, she seized her apron by

the two ends and danced around by herself so gracefully and prettily,

that all the children stopped to look at her. And presently the grown-up

people were nodding to one another, and a circle of men and women was

formed around Amrei. Farmer Rodel, in particular, who on this day was

eating and drinking with double relish, snapped his fingers and whistled

the waltz the musicians were playing, while Amrei went on dancing and

seemed to know no weariness. When at last the music ceased, Farmer Rodel

took Amrei by the hand and said:

"You clever girl, who taught you to do that so well?"

"Nobody."

"Why don't you dance with any one?"

"It is better to dance alone--then one does not have to wait for

anybody, and has one's partner always at hand."

"Have you had anything from the wedding yet?" asked Farmer Rodel, with a

complacent smile.

"No."

"Then come in and eat," said the proud farmer; and he led the poor girl

into the house and sat her down at the wedding table, at which feasting

was going on all day long. Amrei did not eat much. Farmer Rodel, for a

jest, wanted to make the child tipsy, but Amrei said bravely:

"If I drink more, I shall have to be led and shall not be able to walk

alone; and Marianne says 'alone' is the best conveyance, for then the

horses are always harnessed."

All were astonished at the child's wisdom.

Young Farmer Rodel came in with his wife and asked the child, to tease

her:

"Have you brought us a wedding present? For if one eats so, one ought to

bring a wedding present."

The father-in-law, moved by an incomprehensible impulse of generosity,

secretly slipped a sixpenny piece into the child's hand. Amrei held the

coin fast in her palm, nodded to the old man, and said to the young

couple:

"I have the promise and an earnest of payment; your deceased mother

always promised me that I should serve her, and that no one else should

be nurse to her first grand-child."

"Yes, my wife always wished it," said the old farmer approvingly. And

what he had refused to do for his wife while she was alive, for fear of

having to provide for an orphan, he now did, now that he could no longer

please her with it, in order to make it appear before the people that

he was doing it out of respect for her memory. But even now he did it

not from kindness, but in the correct calculation that the orphan would

be serviceable to him, the deposed farmer who was her guardian; and the

burden of her maintenance, which would amount to more than her wages,

would fall on others and not on him.

The young couple looked at each other, and the man said:

"Bring your bundle to our house tomorrow--you can live with us."

"Very well," said Amrei, "tomorrow I will bring my bundle. But now I

should like to take my bundle with me; give me a bottle of wine, and

this meat I will wrap up and take to Marianne and my Damie."

They let Amrei have her way; but old Farmer Rodel said to her secretly:

"Give me back my sixpence--I thought you were going to give it up."

"I'll keep that as an earnest from you," answered Amrei slyly; "you

shall see, I will give you value for it." Farmer Rodel laughed to

himself half angrily, and Amrei went back to Black Marianne with money,

wine, and meat.

The house was locked; and there was a great contrast between the loud

music and noise and feasting at the wedding house, and the silence and

solitude here. Amrei knew where to wait for Marianne on her way home,

for the old woman very often went to the stone-quarry and sat there

behind a hedge for a long time, listening to the tapping of chisels and

mallets. It seemed to her like a melody, carrying her back to the times

when her John used to work there too; and so she often sat there,

listening and watching.

Sure enough, Amrei found Black Marianne there, and half an hour before

quitting time she called Damie up out of the quarry. And here among the

rocks a wedding feast was held, more merry than the one amid the noise

and music. Damie was especially joyful, and Marianne, too, was

unusually cheerful. But she would not drink a drop of the wine, for she

had declared that no wine should moisten her lips until she drank it at

her John's wedding. When Amrei told with glee how she had got a place at

young Farmer Rodel's, and was going there tomorrow, Black Marianne

started up in furious anger; picking up a stone and pressing it to her

bosom, she said:

"It would be better a thousand times that I had this in me, a stone like

this, than a living heart! Why cannot I be alone? Why did I ever allow

myself to like anybody again? But now it's all over forever! You false,

faithless child! Hardly are you able to raise your wings, than off you

fly! But it is well. I am alone, and my John shall be alone, too, when

he comes--and what I have wished would come to pass, shall never be!"

With that she ran off toward the village.

"She's a witch, after all," said Damie when she had disappeared. "I

won't drink the wine--who knows if she has not bewitched it?"

"You can drink it--she's only a strict Eigenbrötlerin and she has a

heavy cross to bear. I know how to win her back again," said Amrei,

consolingly.

CHAPTER VII

THE SISTER OF MERCY

During the next year there was plenty of life in Farmer Rodel's house.

"Barefoot," for so Amrei was now called, was handy in every way, and

knew how to make herself liked by everybody; she could tell the young

farmer's wife, who had come to the place as a stranger, what the customs

of the village were; she studied the habits and characters of those

around her and learned to adapt herself to them. She managed to do all

sorts of kindnesses to old Farmer Rodel, who could not get over his

chagrin at having had to retire so early, and grumbled all day long

about it. She told what a good girl his daughter-in-law was, only that

she did not know how to show it. And when, after scarcely a year, the

first child came, Amrei evinced so much joy at the event, and was so

handy at everything that had to be done, that all in the house were full

of her praise; but according to the fashion of such people they were

more ready to scold her for any trifling omission than to praise her

openly. But Amrei did not expect any praise. She knew so well how to

carry the little baby to its grandfather, and just when to take it away

again, that it pleased and surprised everybody. And when the baby's

first tooth came, and Amrei exhibited it to the grandfather, the old man

said:

"I will give you a sixpence for the pleasure you have given me. But do

you remember the one you stole from me at the wedding--now you may keep

it honestly."

Meanwhile Black Marianne was not forgotten. It was certainly a difficult

task to regain her favor. At first Marianne would have nothing to say to

Barefoot, whose new mistress would not allow her to go to Marianne's,

especially not with the child, as it was always feared that the witch

might do the baby some mischief. Great patience and perseverance were

required to overcome this prejudice, but it was accomplished at last.

Indeed, Little Barefoot brought matters to such a pass that Farmer Rodel

himself several times paid a visit to Black Marianne, a thing which

astonished the entire village. These visits, however, were soon

discontinued, for Marianne once said:

"I am nearly seventy years old and have got on until now without the

friendship of a farmer; and it's not worth while to make a change now."

Naturally enough Damie was often with his sister. But young Farmer Rodel

objected to this, alleging, not without reason, that it would result in

his having to feed the big boy; for in a large house like his one could

not see whether a servant was not giving him all kinds of things to eat.

He therefore forbade Damie to come to the house, except on Sunday

afternoons.

Damie, however, had already seen too much of the comfort of living in a

wealthy farmer's house; his mouth watered for the flesh-pots, and he

wanted to stay there, if only as a servant. Stone-chipping was such a

hungry life. But Barefoot had many objections to make. She told him to

remember that he was already learning a second trade, and that he ought

to keep at it; that it was a mistake to be always wanting to begin

something new, and then to suppose that one could be happy in that way.

She said that one must be happy in the place where one was, if one was

ever to be happy at all. Damie allowed himself to be persuaded for a

time. And so great was the acknowledged authority of Little Barefoot

already, and so natural did it seem that she should dictate to her

brother, that he was always called "Barefoot's Damie," as if he were not

her brother, but her son. And yet he was a head taller than she, and did

not act as if he were subordinate to her. Indeed, he often expressed his

annoyance that he was not considered as good as she, merely because he

did not have a tongue like hers in his head. His discontent with himself

and with his trade he always vented first on his sister. She bore it

patiently, and because he showed before the world that she was obliged

to give him his way, she really gained more influence and power through

this very publicity. For everybody said that it was very good of Amrei

to do what she did for her brother, and she rose in the public

estimation by letting him treat her thus unkindly, while she in turn

cared for him like a mother. She washed and darned for him at night so

steadily, that he was one of the neatest boys in the village; and

instead of taking two stout pairs of shoes, which she received as part

of her wages every half year, she always paid the shoemaker a little

extra money to make two pairs for Damie, while she herself went

barefoot; it was only on Sunday, when she went to church, that she was

seen wearing shoes at all.

Little Barefoot was exceedingly annoyed to find that Damie, though no

one knew why, had become the general butt of all the joking and teasing

in the village. She took him sharply to task for it, and told him he

ought not to tolerate it; but he retorted that she ought to speak to the

people about it, and not to him, for he could not stand up against it.

But that was not to be done--in fact, Damie was secretly not

particularly annoyed by being teased everywhere he went. Sometimes,

indeed, it hurt him to have everybody laugh at him, and to have boys

much younger than himself take liberties with him, but it annoyed him a

great deal more to have people take no notice of him at all, and he

would then try to make a fool of himself and expose himself to insult.

Barefoot, on the other hand, was certainly in some danger of developing

into the hermit Marianne had always professed to recognize in her. She

had once attached herself to one single companion, the daughter of Coaly

Mathew; but this girl had been away for years, working in a factory in

Alsace, and nothing was ever heard of her now. Barefoot lived so

entirely by herself that she was not reckoned at all among the young

people of the village; she was friendly and sociable with those of her

own age, but her only real playmate was Black Marianne. And just because

Barefoot lived so much by herself, she had no influence upon the

behavior of Damie, who, however much he might be teased and tormented,

always had to have the company of others, and could never be alone like

his sister.

But now Damie suddenly emancipated himself; one fine Sunday he exhibited

to his sister some money he had received as an earnest from

Scheckennarre, of Hirlingen, to whom he had hired himself out as a

farmhand.

"If you had spoken to me about it first," said Barefoot, "I could have

told you of a better place. I would have given you a letter to Farmer

Landfried's wife in Allgau; and there you would have been treated like a

son of the family."

"Oh, don't talk to me about her!" said Damie crossly. "She has owed me a

pair of leather breeches she promised me for nearly thirteen years.

Don't you remember?--when we were little, and thought we had only to

knock, and mother and father would open the door. Don't talk to me of

Dame Landfried! Who knows whether she ever thinks of us, or indeed if

she is still alive?"

"Yes, she's alive--she's related to the family which I serve, and they

often speak of her. And all her children are married, except one son,

who is to have the farm."

"Now you want to make me feel dissatisfied with my new place," said

Damie complainingly, "and you go and tell me that I might have had a

better one. Is that right?" And his voice faltered.

"Oh, don't be so soft-hearted all the time!" said Barefoot. "Is what I

said going to take away any of your good fortune? You are always acting

as if the geese were biting you. And now I will only tell you one thing,

and that is, that you should hold fast to what you have, and remain

where you are. It's no use to be like a cuckoo, sleeping on a different

tree every night. I, too, could get other places, but I won't; I have

brought it about that I am well off here. Look you, he who is every

minute running to another place will always be treated like a

stranger--people know that tomorrow he perhaps won't belong to the

house, and so they don't make him at home in it today."

"I don't need your preaching," said Damie, and he started to go away in

anger. "You are always scolding me, and toward everybody else in the

world you are good-natured."

"That's because you are my brother," said Barefoot, laughing and

caressing the angry boy.

In truth, a strange difference had developed itself between brother and

sister; Damie had a certain begging propensity, and then again the next

minute showed a kind of pride; Barefoot, on the other hand, was always

good-natured and yielding, but was nevertheless supported by a certain

self-respect, which was never detracted from by her willingness to work

and oblige.

She now succeeded in pacifying her brother, and said:

"Look, I have an idea. But first you must be good, for the coat must not

lie on an angry heart. Farmer Rodel still has in his possession our dear

father's clothes; you are tall now, and they will just fit you. Now it

will give you a good appearance if you arrive at the farm in such

respectable clothes; then your fellow-servants will see where you come

from, and what worthy parents you had."

Damie saw that this was sensible, and Barefoot induced old Farmer

Rodel--with considerable difficulty, for he did not want to give up the

clothes so soon--to hand the garments over to Damie. Barefoot at once

took him up to her room and made him put on his father's coat and vest

then and there. He objected, but when Amrei had set her heart on a

thing, it had to be done. The hat, alone, Damie could not be induced to

wear; when he had put on the coat, Amrei laid her hand on his shoulder

and said:

"There, now you are my brother and my father, and now the coat is going

to be worn again with a new man in it. Look, Damie,--you have there the

finest coat of honor in the world; hold it in honor, and be as worthy

and honest in it as our dear father was."

She could say no more. She laid her head on her brother's shoulder, and

tears fell upon the paternal coat which had once more been brought to

light.

"You say that I am soft-hearted," said Damie, "and you are much worse

yourself."

And Barefoot was indeed deeply and quickly moved by anything; but she

was strong and light-hearted like a child. It was true of her, what

Marianne had observed when she went to sleep for the first time in the

old woman's house; she was waking and sleeping, laughing and weeping,

almost all at the same time. Every occurrence and every emotion affected

her very strongly, but she soon got over it and recovered her balance.

She continued to weep.

"You make one's heart so heavy," said Damie complainingly.

[Illustration: TEARS FELL UPON THE PATERNAL COAT]

"It's hard enough to have to go away from one's home and live among

strangers. You ought rather to cheer me up, than to be so--so--."

"Right thinking is the best cheer," replied Amrei. "It does not weigh

upon the heart at all. But you are right--you have enough to bear; a

single pound added to the load might crush you. I am foolish after all.

But come--let us see now what the sun has to say, when father walks out

in its light once more. No, I didn't mean to say that. Come, you

yourself surely know where we must go, and what you must take leave of;

for even if you are going only a couple of miles away, still you are

going away from the village, and you must bid it good-by. It's hard

enough for me that I am not to have you with me any longer--no, I mean

that I am not to be with you any longer, for I don't want to rule over

you, as people say I do. Yes, yes,--old Marianne was right; _alone_ is a

great word; one can't possibly learn all that it means. As long as you

were living on the other side of the street, even if I did not see you

for a week at a time, it did not matter; for I could have you at any

moment, and that was as good as living together. But now--well, it's not

out of the world, after all. But remember, don't try to lift too much,

or hurt yourself in your work. And when any of your things are torn,

send them to me--I'll mend them for you, and continue to knit for you.

And now, come, let us go to the churchyard."

Damie objected to this plan, making the plea that he felt the parting

heavy enough, and did not want to make it any heavier. His sister gave

in. He took off his father's clothes again, and Barefoot packed them in

the sack she had once worn as a cloak in the days when she kept the

geese. This sack still bore her father's name upon it, and she charged

Damie specially to send her back the sack at the first opportunity.

The brother and sister went out together. A cart belonging to Hirlingen

was passing through the village; Damie hailed it, and quickly loaded his

possessions on it. Then he walked with his sister, hand in hand, out of

the village, and Barefoot sought to cheer him up by saying:

"Do you remember the riddle I asked you there by the oven?"

"No."

"Think: What is best about the oven?"

"No."

"Of the oven this is best, 'tis said,

That it never itself doth eat the bread."

"Yes, you can be cheerful--you're going to stay home."

"But it was your own wish to go away. And you can be cheerful, too, if

you only try hard enough."

In silence she walked on with her brother to the Holderwasen. There,

under the wild pear-tree, she said:

"Here we will say good-by. God bless you, and don't be afraid of

anything!"

They shook hands warmly, and then Damie walked on toward Hirlingen, and

Barefoot turned back toward the village. Not until she got to the foot

of the hill, where Damie could not see her, did she venture to lift up

her apron and wipe away the tears that were running down her cheeks.

[Amrei and Damie were separated for three years. During this time the

girl made herself more and more liked and respected by everybody, not

only on account of her pleasant ways and general helpfulness, but also

on account of her self-sacrificing devotion to her unappreciative

brother. While her going barefoot and having been a goose-girl caused

her to be the victim of more or less raillery, still nobody meant it at

all seriously unless it was Rose, Farmer Rodel's youngest daughter, who

was jealous of Amrei's popularity. One day when Amrei was standing by

her window, she heard the fire-bell ringing.]

"There's a fire at Scheckennarre's, at Hirlingen!" was the cry outside.

The engine was brought out, and Barefoot climbed upon it and rode away

with the firemen.

"My Damie! My Damie!" she kept repeating to herself in great alarm. But

it was day-time, and in the day-time people could not be burned to

death in a fire. And sure enough, when they arrived at Hirlingen, the

house was already in ashes. Beside the road, in an orchard, stood Damie

in the act of tying two piebalds,--fine, handsome horses,--to a tree;

and oxen, bulls, and cows were all running about in confusion.

They stopped the engine to let Barefoot get off, and with a cry of "God

be praised that nothing has happened to you!" she hurried toward her

brother. Damie, however, made no reply, and stood with both hands

resting on the neck of one of the horses.

"What is it? Why don't you speak? Have you hurt yourself?"

"I have not hurt myself, but the fire has hurt me."

"What's the matter?"

"All I have is lost--all my clothes and my little bit of money! I've

nothing now but what's on my back."

"And are father's clothes burnt too?"

"Are they fireproof?" replied Damie, angrily. "Don't ask such stupid

questions!"

Barefoot was ready to cry at this ungracious reception by her brother;

but she quickly remembered, as if by intuition, that misfortune in its

first shock often makes people harsh, unkind, and quarrelsome. So she

merely said:

"Thank God that you have escaped with your life! Father's clothes--to be

sure, in those there's something lost that cannot be replaced--but

sooner or later they would have been worn out anyway."

"All your chattering will do no good," said Damie, still stroking the

horse. "Here I stand like a miserable outcast. If the horses here could

talk, they'd tell a different story. But I am born to misfortune--whatever

I do that's good, is of no use. And yet--" He could say no more; his voice

faltered.

"What has happened?"

"There are the horses, and the cows, and the oxen--not one of them was

burned. Look, that horse over there tore my shirt when I was dragging

him out of the stable. This nigh horse here did me no harm--he knows me.

Eh, Humple, you know me, don't you? We know each other, don't we?" The

horse laid his head across the neck of the other and stared at Damie,

who went on:

"And when I joyfully went to tell the farmer that I had saved all his

cattle, he said: 'You needn't have done it--they were all well insured,

and I would have been paid good money for them.' 'Yes,' thinks I to

myself, 'but to have let the poor beasts die, is that nothing? If a

thing's paid for, is that all?' The farmer must have read in my face

what I was thinking of, for he says to me: 'Of course, you saved your

clothes and your property?' And then I says: 'No, not a stitch. I ran

out to the stable directly.' And then he says: 'You're a noodle!'

'What?' says I, 'You're insured?--Well then, if the cattle would have

been paid for, my clothes shall be paid for--and some of my dead

father's clothes were among them, and fourteen guilders, and my watch,

and my pipe.' And says he: 'Go smoke it! My property is insured, but not

my servant's property.' And I says: 'We'll see about that--I'll take it

to court!' Whereupon he says: 'Now you may go at once. Threatening a

lawsuit is the same as giving notice. I would have given you a few

guilders, but now you shan't have a farthing. And now, hurry up--away

with you!' And so here I am. And I think I ought to take my nigh horse

with me, for I saved his life, and he would be glad to go with me,

wouldn't you? But I have never learned to steal, and I shouldn't know

what to do now. The best thing for me to do is to jump into the water.

For I shall never amount to anything as long as I live, and I have

nothing now."

"But I still have something, and I will help you out."

"No, I won't do that any longer--always depending upon you. You have a

hard enough time earning what you have."

Barefoot tried to comfort her brother, and succeeded so far that he

consented to go home with her. But they had scarcely gone a hundred

paces, when they heard something trotting along behind them. It was the

horse; he had broken loose and had followed Damie, who was obliged to

drive back the creature he was so fond of by flinging stones at it.

Damie was ashamed of his misfortune, and would hardly show his face to

any one; for it is a peculiarity of weak natures that they feel their

strength, not in their own self-respect, but always wish to show how

much they can really do by some visible achievement. Misfortune they

regard as evidence of their own weakness, and if they cannot hide it,

they hide themselves.

Damie would go no farther than the first houses in the village. Black

Marianne gave him a coat that had belonged to her slain husband; Damie

felt a terrible repugnance at putting it on, and Amrei, who had before

spoken of her father's coat as something sacred, now found just as many

arguments to prove that there was nothing in a coat after all, and that

it did not matter in the least who had once worn it.

Coaly Mathew, who lived not far from Black Marianne, took Damie as his

assistant at tree-felling and charcoal-burning. This solitary life

pleased Damie best; for he only wanted to wait until the time came when

he could be a soldier, and then he would enter the army as a substitute

and remain a soldier all his life. For in a soldier's life there is

justice and order, and no one has brothers and sisters, and no one has

his own house, and a man is provided with clothing and meat and drink;

and if there should be a war, why a brave soldier's death is after all

the best.

Such were the sentiments that Damie expressed one Sunday in Mossbrook

Wood, when Barefoot came out to the charcoal-burner's to bring her

brother yeast, and meal, and tobacco. She wanted to show him how--in

addition to the general charcoal-burner's fare, which consists of bread

baked with yeast--he might make the dumplings he prepared for himself

taste better. But Damie would not listen to her; he said he preferred to

have them just as they were--he rather liked to swallow bad food when he

might have had better; and altogether, he derived a kind of satisfaction

from self-neglect, until he should some day be decked out as a soldier.

Barefoot fought against this continual looking forward to a future time,

and this loss of time in the present. She was always wanting to put some

life into Damie, who rather enjoyed being indolent and pitying himself.

Indeed, he seemed to find a sort of satisfaction in his downward course,

for it gave him an opportunity to pity himself to his heart's content,

and did not require him to make any physical exertion. With great

difficulty Barefoot managed to prevail so far that he at least bought an

ax of his own out of his earnings; and it was his father's ax, which

Coaly Mathew had bought at the auction in the old days.

Barefoot often came back out of the Wood in profound despair, but this

state of mind never lasted long. Her inward confidence in herself, and

the natural cheerfulness that was in her, involuntarily burst forth from

her lips in song; and anybody who did not know her, would never have

thought that Barefoot either had a care then, or ever had had one in all

her life.

The satisfaction arising from the feeling that she was sturdily and

untiringly doing her duty, and acting as a Samaritan to Black Marianne

and Damie, impressed an indelible cheerfulness on her countenance; in

the whole house there was no one who could laugh so heartily as

Barefoot. Old Farmer Rodel declared that her laughter sounded like the

song of a quail, and because she was always serviceable and respectful

to him, he gave her to understand that he would remember her in his

will. Barefoot did not pay much attention to this or build much upon it;

she looked only for the wages to which she had a true and honest claim;

and what she did, she did from an inward feeling of benevolence, without

expectation of reward.

CHAPTER VIII

"SACK AND AX"

Scheckennarre's house was duly rebuilt, and in handsomer style than

before; and the winter came, and with it the drawing for recruits. Never

had there been greater lamentation over a "lucky number" than arose when

Damie drew one and was declared exempt. He was in complete despair, and

Barefoot almost shared his grief; for she looked upon this soldiering as

a capital method of setting Damie up, and of breaking him of his

slovenly habits. Still she said to him:

"Take this as a sign that you are to depend upon yourself now, and to be

a man; for you still behave like a little child that can't shift for

itself and has to be fed."

"You're reproaching me now for feeding upon you."

"No, I didn't mean that. Don't be so touchy all the time--always

standing there as if to say: 'Who's going to do anything for me, good or

bad?' Strike about for yourself."

"That's just what I am going to do, and I shall strike with a good

swing," said Damie.

For a long time he would not state what his real intention was; but he

walked through the village with his head singularly erect and spoke

freely to everybody; he worked diligently in the forest with the

woodcutters, having his father's ax and with it almost the bodily

strength of him who had swung it so sturdily in the days that were gone.

One evening in the early part of the spring, when Barefoot met him on

his way back from Mossbrook Wood, he asked, taking the ax from his

shoulder and holding it up before her:

"Where do you think this is going?"

"Into the forest," answered Barefoot. "But it won't go alone--there must

be a chopper."

"You are right; but it's going to its brother--and one will chop on

this side and another will chop on that side, and then the trees crash

and roar like cannons, and still you will hear nothing of it--and yet

_you_ may, if you wish to, but no one else in this place."

"I don't understand one peck of all your bushel," answered Barefoot.

"Speak out--I'm too old to guess riddles now."

"Well, I'm going to uncle in America."

"Indeed? Going to start to-day?" said Barefoot, laughing. "Do you remember

how Martin, the mason's boy, once called up to his mother through the

window: 'Mother, throw me out a clean pocket-handkerchief--I'm going to

America!' Those who were going to fly so quickly are all still here."

"You'll see how much longer I shall be here," said Damie; and without

another word he went into Coaly Mathew's house.

Barefoot felt like laughing at Damie's ridiculous plan, but she could

not; she felt that there was some meaning in it. And that very night,

when everybody was in bed, she went to her brother and declared once for

all that she would not go with him. She thought thus to conquer him; but

Damie replied quickly:

"I'm not tied to you!" and became the more confirmed in his plan.

Then there suddenly welled up in the girl's mind once more all that

flood of reflections that had come upon her once in her childhood; but

this time she did not ask advice of the tree, as if it could have

answered her. All her deliberations brought her to this one conclusion:

"He's right in going, and I'm right, too, in staying here." She felt

inwardly glad that Damie could make such a bold resolve--at any rate, it

showed manly determination. And although she felt a deep sorrow at the

thought of being henceforth alone in the wide world, she nevertheless

thought it right that her brother should thrust forth his hand thus

boldly and independently.

Still, she did not yet quite believe him. The next evening she waited

for him and said:

"Don't tell anybody about your plan to emigrate, or you'll be laughed at

if you don't carry it out."

"You're right," answered Damie; "but it's not for that. I'm not afraid

to bind myself before other people; so surely as I have five fingers on

this hand, so surely shall I go before the cherries are ripe here, if I

have to beg, yes, even to steal, in order to get off. There's only one

thing I'm sorry about--and that is that I must go away without playing

Scheckennarre a trick that he'd remember to the end of his days."

"That's the true braggart's way! That's the real way to ruin!" cried

Barefoot; "to go off and leave a feeling of revenge behind one! Look,

over yonder lie our parents. Come with me--come with me to their graves

and say that again there if you can. Do you know who it is that turns

out to be a no-good?--the boy who lets himself be spoiled! Give up that

ax! You are not worthy to have your hand where father had his hand,

unless you tear that thought out of your mind, root and branch! Give up

that ax! No man shall have that who talks of stealing and of murdering!

Give up that ax, or I don't know what I may do!"

Then Damie, in a frightened tone, replied:

"It was only a thought. Believe me I never intended to do it--I can't do

anything of that kind. But because they always call me "skittle-boy," I

thought I ought for once to threaten and swear and strike as they do.

But you are right; look, if you like, I'll go this very day to

Scheckennarre and tell him that my heart doesn't cherish a single hard

thought against him."

"You need not do that--that would be too much. But because you listen to

reason, I will help you all I can."

"It would be best if you went with me."

"No, I can't do that--I don't know why, but I can't. But I have not

sworn not to go--if you write to me that you are doing well at uncle's,

then I'll come after you. But to go out into the fog, where one knows

nothing--well, I'm not fond of making changes anyway, and after all I'm

doing fairly well here. But now let us consider how you are to get

away."

Damie's savings were very trifling, and Barefoot's were not enough to

make up the deficiency. Damie declared that the parish ought to give him

a handsome contribution; but his sister would not hear of it, saying

that this ought to be the last resource, when everything else had

failed. She did not explain what else she was going to try. Her first

idea, naturally, was to make application to Dame Landfried at

Zumarshofen; but she knew what a bad appearance a begging letter would

make in the eyes of the rich farmer's wife, who perhaps would not have

any ready money anyway. Then she thought of old Farmer Rodel, who had

promised to remember her in his will; could he be induced to give her

now what he intended to give her later on, even if it should be less?

Then again, it occurred to her that perhaps Scheckennarre, who was now

getting on especially well, might be induced to contribute something.

She said nothing to Damie about all this. But when she examined his

wardrobe, and with great difficulty induced Black Marianne to let her

have on credit some of the old woman's heaped-up stores of linen, and

when she began to cut out this linen and sat up at night making shirts

of it--all these steady and active preparations made Damie almost

tremble. To be sure, he had acted all along as if his plan of emigrating

were irrevocably fixed in his mind--and yet now he seemed almost bound

to go, to be under compulsion, as if his sister's strong will were

forcing him to carry out his design. And his sister seemed almost

hard-hearted to him, as if she were thrusting him away to get rid of

him. He did not, indeed, dare to say this openly, but he began to

grumble and complain a good deal about it, and Barefoot looked upon this

as suppressed grief over parting--the feeling that would gladly take

advantage of little obstacles and represent them as hindrances to the

fulfilment of a purpose one would gladly leave unfulfilled.

First of all she went to old Farmer Rodel, and in plain words asked him

to let her have at once the legacy that he had promised her long ago.

The old man replied:

"Why do you press it so? Can't you wait? What's the matter with you?"

"Nothing's the matter with me, but I can't wait."

Then she told him that she was fitting out her brother who was going to

emigrate to America. This was a good chance for old Rodel; he could now

give his natural hardness the appearance of benevolence and prudent

forethought. Accordingly he declared to Barefoot that he would not give

her one farthing now, for he did not want to be responsible for her

ruining herself for that brother of hers.

Barefoot then begged him to be her advocate with Scheckennarre. At last

he was induced to consent to this; and he took great credit to himself

for thus consenting to go begging to a man he did not know on behalf of

a stranger. He kept postponing the fulfilment of his promise from day to

day, but Barefoot did not cease from reminding him of it; and so, at

last, he set forth.

But, as might have been anticipated, he came back empty-handed; for the

first thing Scheckennarre did was to ask how much Farmer Rodel himself

was going to give, and when he heard that Rodel, for the present, was

not going to give anything, his course, too, was clear and he followed

it.

When Barefoot told Black Marianne how hurt she felt at this

hard-heartedness, the old woman said:

"Yes, that's just how people are! If a man were to jump into the water

tomorrow and be taken out dead, they would all say: 'If he had only told

me what was amiss with him, I should have been very glad to help him in

every way and to have given him something. What would I not give now, if

I could restore him to life!' But to keep a man alive, they won't stir a

finger."

Strangely enough, the very fact that the whole weight of things always

fell upon Barefoot made her bear it all more easily. "Yes, one must

always depend upon oneself alone," was her secret motto; and instead of

letting obstacles discourage her, she only strove harder to surmount

them. She scraped together and turned into money whatever of her

possessions she could lay hands on; even the valuable necklace she had

received in the old days from Farmer Landfried's wife went its way to

the widow of the old sexton, a worthy woman who supported herself in her

widowhood by lending money at high interest on security; the ducat, too,

which she had once thrown after Severin in the churchyard, was brought

into requisition. And, marvelous to relate, old Farmer Rodel offered to

obtain a considerable contribution from the Village Council, of which he

was a member; he was fond of doing virtuous and benevolent things with

the public money!

Still it almost frightened Barefoot when he announced to her, after a

few days, that everything had been granted--but upon the one condition,

that Damie should entirely give up his right to live in the village. Of

course, that had been understood from the first--no one had expected

anything else; but still, now that it was an express condition, it

seemed like a very formidable matter to have no home anywhere. Barefoot

said nothing about this thought to Damie, who seemed cheerful and of

good courage. Black Marianne, especially, continued to urge him strongly

to go; for she would have been glad to send the whole village away to

foreign parts, if only she could at last get tidings of her John. And

now she had firmly taken up the notion that he had sailed across the

seas. Crappy Zachy had indeed told her, that the reason she could not

cry any more was because the ocean, the great salty deep, absorbed the

tears which one might be disposed to shed for one who was on the other

shore.

Barefoot received permission from her employers to accompany her brother

when he went to town to conclude the arrangement for his passage with

the agent. Greatly were both of them astonished when they learned, on

arriving at the office, that this had already been done. The Village

Council had already taken the necessary steps, and Damie was to have his

rights and corresponding obligations as one of the village poor. On

board the ship, before it sailed out into the wide ocean, he would have

to sign a paper, attesting his embarkation, and not until then would the

money be paid.

The brother and sister returned sorrowfully to the village. Damie had

been seized with a fit of his old despondency, because a thing had now

to be carried out which he himself had wished. And Barefoot herself felt

deeply grieved at the thought that her brother was, in a way, to be

expelled from his native land. At the boundary-line Damie said aloud to

the sign-post, on which the name of the village and of the district were

painted:

"You there! I don't belong to you any longer, and all the people who

live here are no more to me than you are."

Barefoot started to cry; but she resolved within herself that this

should be the last time until her brother's departure, and until he was

fairly gone. And she kept her word to herself.

The people in the village said that Barefoot had no heart, because her

eyes were not wet when her brother went away. People like to see tears

actually shed--for what do they care about those that are shed in

secret? But Barefoot was calm and brave.

Only during the last days before Damie set out did she for the first

time fail in her duty; for she neglected her work by being with Damie

all the time. She let Rose upbraid her for it, and merely said: "You are

right." But still she ran after her brother everywhere--she did not want

to lose a minute of his company as long as he was there. She very likely

felt that she might be able to do something special for him at any

moment, or say something special that would be of use to him all his

life; and she was vexed with herself for finding nothing but quite

ordinary things to say, and for even quarreling with him sometimes.

Oh, these hours of parting! How they oppress the heart! How all the past

and all the future seem crowded together into one moment, and one knows

not how to set about anything rightly, and only a look or a touch must

tell all that is felt!

Still Amrei found good words to speak. When she counted out her

brother's stock of linen she said:

"These are good, respectable shirts--keep yourself respectable and good

in them."

And when she packed everything into the big sack, on which her father's

name was still to be seen, she said:

"Bring this back full of glittering gold; then you shall see how glad

they will be to give you back the right to live here. And Farmer Rodel's

Rose, if she's still unmarried, will jump over seven houses to get you."

And when she laid their father's ax in the large chest, she said:

"How smooth the handle is! How often it has slipped through our father's

hand. I fancy I can still feel his touch upon it! So now I have a motto

for you--'Sack and Ax.' Working and gathering in, those are the best

things in life--they make one keep cheerful and well and happy. God keep

you! And say to yourself very often--'Sack and Ax.' I shall do the same,

and that shall be our motto, our remembrance, our call to each other

when we are far, far apart, and until you write to me, or come to fetch

me, or do what you can, as God shall will it. 'Sack and Ax'--yes it's

all included in that; so one can treasure up everything--all thoughts

and all that one has earned!"

And when Damie was sitting up in the wagon, and for the last time gave

her his hand, for a long time she would not release it. And when at last

he drove away, she called out after him with a loud voice:

"'Sack and Ax'--don't forget that!"

He looked back, waved his hand to her, and then--he was gone.

[Illustration: HE GAVE HER HIS HAND FOR THE LAST TIME]

CHAPTER IX

AN UNINVITED GUEST

"Glory to America!" the village watchman, to the amusement of all, cried

several nights when he called out the hours, in place of the usual

thanksgiving to God. Crappy Zachy, being a man of no consideration

himself, was fond of speaking evil of the poor when he found himself

among what he called "respectable people," and on Sunday when he came

out of church, or on an afternoon when he sat on the long bench outside

the "Heathcock," he would say:

"Columbus was a real benefactor. From what did he not deliver us? Yes,

America is the pig-trough of the Old World, and into it everything that

can't be used in the kitchen is dumped--cabbage and turnips and all

sorts of things. And for the piggies who live in the castle behind the

house, and understand French--'Oui! Oui!'--there's very good feeding

there."

In the general dearth of interesting subjects, Damie and his emigrating

naturally formed the main topic of conversation for a considerable time,

and the members of the Council praised their own wisdom in having rid

the place of a person who would certainly have come to be a burden on

the community. For a man who goes driving about from one trade to

another is sure to drive himself into ruin eventually.

Of course, there were plenty of good-natured people who reported to

Barefoot all that was said of her brother, and told her how he was made

a laughing-stock. But Barefoot merely smiled. When Damie's first letter

came from Bremen--nobody had ever thought that he could write so

properly--then she exulted before the eyes of men, and read the letter

aloud several times; but in secret she was sorry to have lost such a

brother, probably forever. She reproached herself for not having put him

forward enough, for it was now evident what a sharp lad Damie was, and

so good too! He wanted to take leave of the whole village as he had

taken leave of the post at the boundary-line, and he now filled almost a

whole page with remembrances to different people, calling each one "the

dear" or "the good" or "the worthy." Barefoot reaped a great deal of

praise everywhere she delivered these greetings, and each time pointed

to the precise place, and said:

"See--there it stands!"

For a time Barefoot was silent and abstracted; she seemed to repent of

having let her brother go, or of having refused to go with him. Formerly

she had always been heard singing in the stable and barn, in the kitchen

and chamber, and when she went out with the scythe over her shoulder and

the grass-cloth under her arm; but now she was silent. She seemed to be

making an effort to restrain herself. Still there was one time when she

allowed people to hear her voice again; in the evening, when she put

Farmer Rodel's children to bed, she sang incessantly, even long after

the children were asleep. Then she would hurry over to Black Marianne's

and supply her with wood and water and whatever else the old woman

wanted.

On Sunday afternoons, when everybody was out for a good time, Barefoot

often used to stand quiet and motionless at the door of her house,

looking out into the world and at the sky in dreamy, far-off meditation,

wondering where Damie was now and how he was getting on. And then she

would stand and gaze for a long time at an overturned plow, or watch a

fowl clawing in the sand. When a vehicle passed through the village, she

would look up and say, almost aloud:

"They are driving to somebody. On all the roads of the world there is

nobody coming to me, and no one thinking of me. And do I not belong here

too?"

And then she would make believe to herself that she was expecting

something, and her heart would beat faster, as if for somebody who was

coming. And involuntarily the old song rose to her lips:

All the brooklets in the wide world,

They run their way to the Sea;

But there's no one in this wide world,

Who can open my heart for me.

"I wish I were as old as you," she once said to Black Marianne, after

dreaming in this way.

"Be glad that a wish is but a word," replied the old woman. "When I was

your age I was merry; and down there at the plaster-mill I weighed a

hundred and thirty-two pounds."

"But you are the same at one time as at another, while I am not at

all--even."

"If one wants to be 'even' one had better cut one's nose off, and then

one's face will be even all over. You little simpleton! Don't fret your

young years away, for nobody will give them back to you; and the old

ones will come of their own accord."

Black Marianne did not find it very difficult to comfort Barefoot; only

when she was alone, did a strange anxiety come over her. What did it

mean?

A wonderful rumor was now pervading the village; for many days there had

been talk of a wedding that was to be celebrated at Endringen, with such

festivities as had not been seen in the country within the memory of

man. The eldest daughter of Dominic and Ameile--whom we know, from

Lehnhold--was to marry a rich wood-merchant from the Murg Valley, and it

was said that there would be such merry-making as had never yet been

seen.

The day drew nearer and nearer. Wherever two girls meet, they draw each

other behind a hedge or into the hallway of a house, and there's no end

to their talking, though they declare emphatically that they are in a

particular hurry. It is said that everybody from the Oberland is coming,

and everybody from the Murg Valley for a distance of sixty miles! For it

is a large family. At the Town-hall pump, there the true gossiping goes

on; but not a single girl will own to having a new dress, lest she

should lose the pleasure of seeing the surprise and admiration of her

companions, when the day arrived. In the excitement of asking and

answering questions, the duty of water-carrying is forgotten, and

Barefoot, who arrives last, is the first to leave with her bucketful of

water. What is the dance to her? And yet she feels as if she hears music

everywhere.

The next day Barefoot had much running back and forth to do in the

house; for she was to dress Rose for the great occasion. She received

many an unseen knock while she was plaiting her hair, but bore them in

silence. Rose had a fine head of hair, and she was determined it should

make a fine show. Today she wished to try something new with it; she

wanted to have a Maria-Theresa braid, as a certain artistic arrangement

of fourteen braids is called in those parts. That would create a

sensation as something new. Barefoot succeeded in accomplishing the

difficult task, but she had scarcely finished when Rose tore it all down

in anger; and with her hair hanging down over her brow and face, she

looked wild enough.

But for all that she was handsome and stately, and very plump; her whole

demeanor seemed to say: "There must be not less than four horses in the

house into which I marry." And many farmers' sons were, indeed, courting

her, but she did not seem to care to make up her mind in favor of any

one of them. She now decided to keep to the country fashion of having

two braids, interwoven with red ribbons, hanging down her back and

reaching almost to the ground. At last she stood adorned and ready.

But now she had to have a nosegay. She had allowed her own flowers to

run wild; and in spite of all objections, Barefoot was ultimately

obliged to yield to her importunities and rob her own cherished plants

on her window-sill of almost all their blossoms. Rose also demanded the

little rosemary plant; but Barefoot would rather have torn that in

pieces than give it up. Rose began to jeer and laugh, and then to scold

and mock the stupid goose-girl, who gave herself such obstinate airs,

and who had been taken into the house only out of charity. Barefoot did

not reply; but she turned a glance at Rose which made the girl cast down

her eyes.

And now a red, woolen rose had come loose on Rose's left shoe, and

Barefoot had just knelt down to sew it on carefully, when Rose said,

half ashamed of her own behavior, and yet half jeeringly:

"Barefoot, I will have it so--you must come to the dance today."

"Do not mock so. What do you want of me?"

"I am not mocking," persisted Rose, still in a somewhat jeering tone.

"You, too, ought to dance once, for you are a young girl, and there will

be some of your equals at the wedding--our stable-boy is going, or

perhaps some farmer's son will dance with you. I'll send you some one

who is without a partner."

"Let me be in peace--or I shall prick you."

"My sister-in-law is right," said the young farmer's wife, who, until

now, had sat silent. "I'll never give you a good word again if you don't

go to the dance today. Come--sit down, and I will get you ready."

Barefoot felt herself flushing crimson as she sat there while her

mistress dressed her and brushed her hair away from her face and turned

it all back; and she almost sank from her chair, when the farmer's wife

said:

"I am going to arrange your hair as the Allgau girls wear it. That will

suit you very well, for you look like an Allgau girl yourself--sturdy,

and brown, and round. You look like Dame Landfried's daughter at

Zusmarshofen."

"Why like her daughter? What made you think of her?" asked Barefoot, and

she trembled all over.

How was it that she was just now reminded again of Dame Landfried, who

had been in her mind from childhood, and who had once appeared to her

like the benevolent spirit in a fairy-tale? But Barefoot had no ring

that she could turn and cause her to appear; but mentally she could

conjure her up, and that she often did, almost involuntarily.

"Hold still, or I'll pull your hair," said the farmer's wife; and

Barefoot sat motionless, scarcely daring to breathe. And while her hair

was being parted in the middle, and she sat with her arms folded and

allowed her mistress to do what she liked with her, and while her

mistress, who was expecting a baby very soon, bustled about her, she

really felt as if she had suddenly been bewitched; she did not say a

word for fear of breaking the charm, but sat with her eyes cast down in

modest submission.

"I wish I could dress you thus for your own wedding," said the farmer's

wife, who seemed to be overflowing with kindness today. "I should like

to see you mistress of a respectable farm, and you would not be a bad

bargain for any man; but nowadays such things don't happen, for money

runs after money. Well, do you be contented--so long as I live you shall

not want for anything; and if I die--and I don't know, but I seem to

fear the heavy hour so much this time--look, you will not forsake my

children, but will be a mother to them, will you not?"

"Oh, good heavens! How can you think of such a thing?" cried Barefoot,

and the tears ran down her cheeks. "That is a sin; for one may commit a

sin by letting thoughts enter one's mind that are not right."

"Yes, yes, you may be right," said the farmer's wife. "But wait--sit

still a moment; I will bring you my necklace and put it around your

neck."

"No, pray don't do that! I can wear nothing that is not my own; I should

sink to the ground for shame of myself."

"Yes, but you can't go as you are. Or have you, perhaps, something of

your own?"

Hereupon Barefoot said that she, to be sure, had a necklace which had

been presented to her as a child by Dame Landfried, but that on account

of Damie's emigration it was in pledge with the sexton's widow.

Barefoot was then told to sit still and to promise not to look at

herself in the glass until the farmer's wife returned; and the latter

hurried away to get the ornament, herself being surety for the money

lent upon it.

What a thrill now went through Barefoot's soul as she sat there! She

who had always waited upon others was now being waited upon

herself!--and indeed almost as if under a spell. She was almost afraid

of the dance; for she was now being treated so well, so kindly, and

perhaps at the dance she might be pushed about and ignored, and all her

outward adornment and inward happiness would go for nothing.

"But no," she said to herself. "If I get nothing more out of it than the

thought that I have been happy, that will be enough; if I had to undress

right now and to stay at home, I should still be happy."

The farmer's wife now returned with the necklace, and was as full of

censure for the sexton's wife for having demanded such usurious interest

from a poor girl, as she was full of praise for the ornament itself. She

promised to pay the loan that very day and to deduct it gradually from

Barefoot's wages.

Now at last Barefoot was allowed to look at herself. The mistress

herself held the glass before her, and both of their faces glowed and

gleamed with mutual joy.

"I don't know myself! I don't know myself!" Barefoot kept repeating,

feeling her face with both hands. "Good heavens, if my mother could only

see me now! But she will certainly bless you from heaven for being so

good to me, and she will stand by you in the heavy hour--you need fear

nothing."

"But now you must make another kind of face," said her mistress, "not

such a pitiful one. But that will come when you hear the music."

"I fancy I hear it already," replied Barefoot. "Yes, listen, there it

is!"

And, in truth, a large wagon decorated with green boughs was just

driving through the village. Seated in the wagon were all the musicians;

in the midst of them stood Crappy Zachy blowing his trumpet as if he

were trying to wake the dead.

And now there was no more staying in the village; every one was

hastening to be up and away. Light, Bernese carriages, with one and two

horses, some from the village itself and some from the neighboring

villages, were chasing each other as if they were racing. Rose mounted

to her brother's side on the front seat of their chaise, and Barefoot

climbed up into the basket-seat behind. So long as they were passing

through the village, she kept her eyes looking down--she felt so

ashamed. Only when she passed the house that had been her parents' did

she venture to look up; Black Marianne waved her hand from the window,

the red cock crowed on the wood-pile, and the old tree seemed to nod and

wish her good luck.

Now they drove through the valley where Manz was breaking stones, and

now over the Holderwasen where an old woman was keeping the geese.

Barefoot gave her a friendly nod.

"Good heavens!" she thought. "How does it happen that I sit here so

proudly driving along in festive attire? It is a good hour's ride to

Endringen, and yet it seems as if we had only just started."

The word was now given to alight, and Rose was immediately surrounded by

all kinds of friends. Several of them asked:

"Is that not a sister of your brother's wife?"

"No, she's only our maid," answered Rose.

Several beggars from Haldenbrunn who were here, looked at Barefoot in

astonishment, evidently not recognizing her; and not until they had

stared at her for a long time did they cry out: "Why, it's Little

Barefoot!"

"She is only our maid." That little word "only" smote painfully on the

girl's heart. But she recovered herself quickly and smiled; for a voice

within her said:

"Don't let your pleasure be spoiled by a single word. If you begin

anything new, you are sure to step on thorns at first."

Rose took Barefoot aside and said: "You may go for the present to the

dancing-room, or wherever you like, if you have any acquaintances in the

place. When the music begins I shall want to see you again."

And so Barefoot stood forsaken, as it were, and feeling as if she had

stolen the clothes she had on, and did not belong to the company at all,

as if she were an intruder.

"How comes it that thou goest to such a wedding?" she asked herself; and

she would have liked to go home again. She decided to take a walk

through the village. She passed by the beautiful house built for Brosi,

where there was plenty of life today, too; for the wife of that high

official was spending the summer here with her sons and daughters.

Barefoot turned back toward the village again, looking neither to the

right nor to the left, and yet wishing that somebody would accost her

that she might have a companion. On the outskirts of the village she

encountered a smart-looking young man riding a white horse. He was

attired in farmer's dress, but of a strange kind, and looked very proud.

He pulled up his horse, rested his right hand with the whip in it on his

hip, and patting the animal's neck with his left, called out:

"Good morning, pretty mistress! Tired of dancing already?"

"I'm tired of idle questions already," was the reply.

The horseman rode on. Barefoot sat for a long time behind a hedge, while

many thoughts flitted through her mind. Her cheeks glowed with a flush

caused by anger at herself for having made so sharp a reply to a

harmless question, by bashfulness, and by a strange, inward emotion. And

involuntarily she began to hum the old song:

"There were two lovers in Allgau

Who loved each other so dear."

She had begun the day in expectation of joy, and now she wished that she

were dead. She thought to herself: "How good it would be to fall asleep

here behind this hedge and never to awake again. You are not to have any

joy in this life, why should you run about so long? The grasshoppers

are chirping in the grass, a warm fragrance is rising from the earth, a

linnet is singing incessantly and seems to dive into himself with his

voice and to bring up finer and finer notes, and yet seems to be unable

to say with his whole heart what he has to say. Up in the air the larks,

too, are singing, every one for himself--no one listens to the others or

joins in with the others--and yet everything is--"

Never in her life had Amrei fallen asleep in broad daylight, or if ever,

not in the morning. She had now drawn her handkerchief over her eyes,

and the sunbeams were kissing her closed lips, which, even in sleep,

were pressed together defiantly, and the redness of her chin had become

deeper. She had slept about an hour, when she awoke with a start. The

smart-looking young man on the white horse was riding toward her, and

the horse had just lifted up his fore feet to bring them down on her

chest. It was only a dream, and Amrei gazed around her as if she had

fallen from the sky. She saw with astonishment where she was, and looked

at herself in wonder. But the sound of music from the village soon

aroused the spirit of life within her, and with new strength she walked

back and found that everything had become more lively. She noticed that

she felt more rested after the many things that she had experienced that

day. And now let only the dancing begin! She would dance until the next

morning, and never rest, and never get tired!

The fresh glow following the sleep of childhood was on her face, and

everybody looked at her in astonishment. She went to the dancing-room;

the music was playing, but in an empty room--for no dancers had come

yet. Only the girls who had been hired to wait upon the guests were

dancing with one another. Crappy Zachy looked at Barefoot for a

longtime, and then shook his head; evidently he did not know her. Amrei

crept along close to the wall, and so out of the room again. She ran

across Farmer Dominic, whose face was radiant with joy today.

"Beg pardon," said he; "does the mistress belong to the wedding guests?"

"No, I am only a maid. I came with Farmer Rodel's daughter, Rose."

"Good! Then go out to the kitchen and tell the mistress that I sent you,

and that you are to help her. We can't have hands enough in my house

today."

"Because it's you I'll gladly go," said Amrei, and she set out at once.

On the way she thought how Dominic himself had once been a servant,

and--"Yes, such things happen only once in a century. It cost him many a

pang before he came to the farm--and that's a pity."

Ameile, Dominic's wife, gave a friendly welcome to the new comer, who

offered her services and at the same time took off her jacket, asking if

she might borrow a large apron with a bib on it. But the farmer's wife

insisted that Amrei should satisfy her own hunger and thirst before she

set about serving others. Amrei consented without much ceremony, and won

Ameile's heart by the first words she spoke; for she said:

"I will fall to at once, for I must confess that I am hungry, and I

don't want to put you to the trouble of having to urge me."

Amrei now remained in the kitchen and handed the dishes to the

waitresses in such a knowing way, and managed and arranged everything so

well, that the mistress said:

"You two Amreis, you and my brother's daughter, can manage all this, and

I will stay with the guests."

Amrei of Siebenhofen, who was nicknamed the "Butter Countess," and who

was known far and wide as proud and stubborn, was very friendly with

Barefoot. Once, indeed, the mistress said to the latter:

"It's a pity that you are not a boy; I believe that Amrei would marry

you on the spot, and not send you home, as she does all of her suitors."

"I have a brother who's still single--but he's in America," replied

Barefoot, laughing.

"Let him stay there," said the Butter Countess; "it would be better if

we could send all the men folk away and be here by ourselves."

Amrei did not leave the kitchen until everything had been put back in

its proper place; and when she took off her apron it was still as white

and unruffled as when she had put it on.

"You'll be tired and not able to dance," said the farmer's wife, when

Amrei, with a present, finally took her leave.

"Why should I be tired? This was only play; and, believe me, I feel much

better for having done something today. A whole day devoted to pleasure!

I shouldn't know how to spend it, and I've no doubt that was why I felt

so sad this morning--I felt that something was missing. But now I feel

quite ready for a holiday--quite out of harness. Now I feel just like

dancing, if I could only find partners."

Ameile did not know how to show greater honor to Barefoot than by

leading her about the house, as if she were a wealthy farmer's wife, and

showing her the large chest full of wedding presents in the bridal room.

She opened the tall, blue cabinets, which had the name and the date

painted upon them, and which were crammed full of linen and all sorts of

things, all tied up with ribbons of various colors and decorated with

artificial flowers. In the wardrobe there were at least thirty dresses,

and nearby were the high beds, the cradle, the distaff with its

beautiful spindles, and everywhere children's clothes were hanging,

presents from the bride's former playmates.

"Oh, kind Heaven!" cried Barefoot; "how happy a child of such a house

must be!"

"Are you envious?" said the farmer's wife; and then remembering that she

was showing all these things to a poor girl, she added: "But believe me,

fine clothes are not all; there are many happier who do not get as much

as a stocking from their parents."

"Yes, yes, I know that. I am not envious of the beautiful things, but

rather of the privilege that it gives your child to thank you and so

many good people for the lovely things she has received from them. Such

clothes from one's mother must keep one doubly warm."

The farmer's wife showed her fondness of Barefoot by accompanying the

girl as far as the yard, as she would have done to a visitor who had

eight horses in the stable.

There was already a great crowd of people assembled when Amrei arrived

at the dancing-floor. At first she stood timidly on the threshold. In

the empty courtyard, across which somebody hurried every now and then, a

solitary gendarme was pacing up and down. When he saw Amrei coming along

with a radiant face, he approached her and said:

"Good morning, Amrei! Art thou here too?"

Amrei started and turned quite pale. Had she done anything punishable?

Had she gone into the stable with a naked light? She thought of her past

life and could remember nothing; and yet he had addressed her as

familiarly as if he had already arrested her once. With these thoughts

flitting through her mind, she stood there trembling as if she were a

criminal, and at last answered:

"Thank you. But I don't know why we should call each other 'thou.' Do

you want anything of me?"

"Oh, how proud you are. You can answer me properly. I am not going to

eat you up. Why are you so angry? Eh?"

"I am not angry, and I don't want to harm any one. I am only a foolish

girl."

"Don't pretend to be so submissive--"

"How do you know what I am?"

"Because you flourish about so with that light."

"What? Where? Where have I flourished about with a light? I always take

a lantern when I go out to the stable, but--"

The gendarme laughed and said: "I mean your brown eyes--that's where

the light is. Your eyes are like two balls of fire."

"Then get out of my way, lest you get burnt. You might get blown up with

all that powder in your cartridge-box."

"There's nothing in it," said the gendarme, embarrassed, but wishing to

make some kind of retort. "But you have scorched me already."

"I don't see where--you seem to be all right. But enough! Let me go."

"I'm not keeping you, you little crib-biter. You could lead a man a hard

life, who was fond of you."

"Nobody need be fond of me," said Amrei; and she rushed away as if she

had got loose from a chain.

She stood in the doorway where many spectators were crowded together. A

new dance was just beginning, and she swayed back and forth with the

music. The feeling that she had got the better of some one made her more

cheerful than ever, and she would have taken up arms against the whole

world, as well as against a single gendarme. But her tormentor soon

appeared again; he posted himself behind Amrei and said all kinds of

things to her. She made no answer and pretended not to hear him, every

now and then nodding to the people as they danced by, as if she had been

greeted by them. Only when the gendarme said:

"If I were allowed to marry, I'd take you."

She replied:

"Take me, indeed! But I shouldn't give myself!"

The gendarme was glad to have at least got an answer from her, and

continued:

"And if I were allowed to dance, I would have one with you right now."

"I cannot dance," replied Amrei.

Just then the music ceased. Amrei pushed against the people in front of

her, and made her way in to seek some retired corner. She heard some one

behind her say:

"Why, she can dance better than anybody in this part of the country!"

CHAPTER X

ONLY A SINGLE DANCE

Down from the musicians' platform Crappy Zachy handed a glass to Amrei.

She took a sip, and handed it back; and Crappy Zachy said:

"If you dance, Amrei, I'll play all my instruments so that the angels

will come down from the sky and join in."

"Yes, but unless an angel comes down from the sky and asks me, I shall

not get a partner," said Amrei, half in fun and half in sorrow. And then

she began to wonder why there had to be a gendarme at a dance; but she

did not hold to this thought long, but immediately went on to say to

herself: "After all, he is a man like anybody else, even though he has a

sword on; and before he became a gendarme, he was a lad like the rest.

It must be a plague for him that he can't dance. But what's that to me?

I, too, am obliged to be a mere spectator, and I don't get any money for

it."

For a short time things went on in a much more quiet and moderate manner

in the dancing-room. For the "English woman," as Agy, the wife of

Severin, the building contractor, was still called, had come to the

dance with her children. The rich wood-merchants set the champagne corks

to popping and offered a glass to the English woman; she drank the

health of the young couple and then made each one happy by a gracious

word. A constant and complacent smile was lighting up the face of

everybody. Agy honored many a young fellow who drank to her from the

garlanded glasses, by sipping from hers in return. The old women, who

sat near Barefoot, were loud in their praises of the English woman, and

stood up a long time before she came when they saw her approaching to

speak a few words to them. When Agy had gone away, the rejoicing,

singing, dancing, stamping, and shouting broke out again with renewed

vigor.

Farmer Rodel's foreman now came toward Amrei, and she felt a thrill of

expectation. But the foreman said:

"Here, Barefoot, take care of my pipe for me while I am dancing." And

after that several young girls from her village also came; from one she

received a jacket, from another a cap, or a neckerchief, or a door-key.

She let them hand it all over to her, and stood there with an

ever-increasing load as one dance followed another. All the time she

smiled quietly to herself, but nobody came to ask her to dance. Now a

waltz was being played, so smoothly that one could have swum to it. And

then a wild and furious galop; hurrah! now they are all hopping and

stamping and jumping and panting in supreme delight. And how their eyes

glitter! The old women who are sitting in the corner where Amrei is

standing, complain of the dust and heat; but still, they don't go home.

Then--suddenly Amrei starts; her eyes are fixed upon a handsome young

man who is walking proudly to and fro among the crowd. It is the rider

who had met her that morning, and whom she had snubbed in such a pert

way. All eyes are fastened upon him as he comes forward, his right hand

behind him, and his left holding a silver-mounted pipe. His silver

watch-chain bobs up and down, and how beautiful is his black velvet

jacket, and his loose black velvet trousers, and his red waistcoat! But

more beautiful still is his round head with its curly, brown hair. His

brow is white as snow; but from the eyes down his face is sunburnt, and

a light, full beard covers his chin and cheeks.

"That's a bonny fellow," said one of the old women.

"And what heavenly blue eyes he has!" added another; "they are at once

so roguish and so kind."

"Where can he be from? He's not from this neighborhood," said a third.

And a fourth observed:

"I'll wager he's another suitor for Amrei."

Barefoot started. What did this mean? What was that she said? But she

soon found out the meaning of it, for the first old lady resumed:

"Then I'm sorry for him; for the Butter Countess makes fools of all the

men."

And so the Butter Countess's name was also Amrei.

The young stranger had passed through the room several times, turning

his eyes from one side to the other. Then he suddenly stopped not far

from Barefoot and beckoned to her. A hot flush overspread her face; she

stood riveted to the spot and did not move a muscle. No, he certainly

beckoned to somebody behind you; he cannot mean you. The stranger

pressed forward and Amrei made way for him. He must be looking for some

one else.

"No, it's you I want," said the lad, taking Barefoot's hand. "Will you

dance?"

Amrei could not speak. But what need was there to speak? She threw

everything she had in her arms down into a corner--jackets,

neckerchiefs, caps, pipes, and door-keys--and stood there ready. The

lad threw a dollar up to the musicians; and when Crappy Zachy saw Amrei

on the arm of the stranger, he blew his trumpet until the very walls

trembled. And to the blessed souls above no music can sound more

beautiful than did this to Amrei. She danced she knew not how; she felt

as if she were being carried in the stranger's arms, as if she were

floating in the air, and there seemed to be no one else there. And,

indeed, they both danced so well, that everybody involuntarily stopped

to look at them.

"We are alone," said Amrei during the dance; and then she felt the warm

breath of her partner as he answered:

"Oh that we were alone--alone in the world! Why cannot one go on dancing

thus--on and on to the end of time."

"I feel," said Amrei, "just as if we were two doves flying through the

air. Juhu! away into the heavens!" And "Juhu!" cried the lad gleefully,

"Juhu!" And the sound shot up heavenward like a fiery rocket. "Juhu!"

cried Amrei, rejoicing with him. And on they danced with ever-increasing

joy. Finally Amrei said:

"Tell me--is the music going on? Are the musicians still playing? I

don't hear them any more."

"Of course they are still playing. Don't you hear them?"

"Yes, now I do," said Amrei. And now they stopped, for her partner

probably felt that she was becoming giddy with happiness.

The stranger led Amrei to the table, and gave her wine to drink, and did

not let go her hand. He lifted the Swedish ducat that hung from her

necklace, and said:

"This ducat is in a good place."

"And it came from a good hand," answered Amrei. "That necklace was given

to me when I was a little child."

"By a relative?"

"No, the lady was no relative."

"Dancing agrees with you apparently."

"Oh, indeed it does! You see, I'm obliged to jump around so much all the

year around when nobody is playing for me--and therefore I enjoy it

doubly now."

"You look as round as a ball," said the stranger in jest. "You must live

where the food is good."

Amrei replied quickly:

"It's not the food itself that does it, but the way one enjoys it."

The stranger nodded; and after a pause, he spoke again, half

questioningly:

"You are the daughter of Farmer--"

"No, I am a maid," replied Amrei, looking him full in the face. The

stranger's eyes almost fell; the lids quivered, but he held them open by

force. And this struggle and victory of the bodily eye seemed to be a

symbol of what was going on within him. He felt almost inclined to leave

the girl sitting there; but he resisted and conquered the impulse, and

said:

"Come, let us have another dance."

He held her hand fast, and the pleasure and excitement began again; but

this time it was more quiet and moderate. Both of them seemed to feel

that the sensation of being lifted to the sky was over and past; and

this thought was evidently in Amrei's mind when she said:

"Well, we have been very happy together once, even if we don't see each

other again in all our lives, and even though neither of us knows the

other's name."

The youth nodded and said:

"You are right."

Amrei held the end of her braid between her lips in embarrassment, and

after a pause spoke again:

"The enjoyment one has once had cannot be taken from one; and whoever

you are, you need never repent of having given a poor girl a pleasure

she will remember all her life."

"I don't repent of it," replied her partner. "But I know that you repent

of having answered me so sharply this morning."

"Oh, yes, you are right there!" cried Amrei; and then the stranger said:

"Would you venture to go out into the field with me?"

"Yes."

"And do you trust me?"

"Yes."

"But what will your people say?"

"I have nobody but myself to give account of my actions to; I am an

orphan."

Hand in hand the two went out of the dancing-room. Barefoot heard

several people whispering and tittering behind her, but she kept her

eyes fixed on the ground. She wondered if she had not ventured too far

after all.

In the fields, where the first ears of wheat were beginning to sprout

and still lay half concealed in their green sheaths, the two stopped and

stood looking at each other in silence. For a long time neither said a

word. But finally it was the man who broke the silence, by saying, half

to himself:

"I wonder how it is that one, on first sight, can be so--so--I don't

know--so confidential with a person? How is it one can read what is

written in another's face?" "Now we have set a poor soul free," said

Amrei; "for you know, when two people think the same thought at the same

time, they are said to set a soul free. And I was thinking the very

words you just spoke."

"Indeed? And do you know why?"

"Yes."

"Will you tell me?"

"Why not? Look you; I have been a goose-keeper--"

At these words the stranger started again; but he pretended that

something had fallen into his eye, and began to rub that organ

vigorously, while Barefoot went on, undismayed:

"Look you; when one sits or lies alone out in the fields all day, one

thinks of hundreds of things, and some of them are strange thoughts

indeed. Just try it yourself, and you will certainly find it so. Every

fruit-tree, if you look at it as a whole, has the appearance of the

fruit it bears. Take the apple-tree; does it not look, spread out broad,

and, as it were, in round pieces, like the apple itself? And the same is

true of the pear-tree and the cherry-tree, if only you look at them in

the right way. Look what a long trunk the cherry-tree has--like the stem

of a cherry. And so I think--"

"Well, what do you think?"

"You'll laugh at me; but just as the fruit-trees look like the fruits

they bear, so is it also with people; one can tell what they are at once

by looking at them. But the trees, to be sure, always have honest faces,

while people can dissemble theirs. But I am talking nonsense, am I not?"

"No, you have not kept geese for nothing," said the lad; and there was a

strange mixture of feelings in the tone of his voice. "I like to talk

with you. I should give you a kiss, if I were not afraid of doing what

is wrong."

Barefoot trembled all over. She stooped to break off a flower, but did

not break it. There was a long pause, and then the lad went on: "We

shall most likely never meet again, and so it is best as it is."

Hand in hand the two went back to the dancing-room. There they danced

once more together without saying a word to each other, and when the

dance was over, the young man again led her to the table, and said:

"Now I shall say good-by. But first you must get your breath, and then

drink once more."

He handed her the glass, and when she set it down again, he said:

"You must drain it, for my sake, to the very bottom."

Amrei drank and drank; and when the glass was empty in her hand, she

looked around--the stranger was gone! She went down and stood in front

of the house; and there she saw him again, not far away, riding off on

his white horse; but he did not look back.

The mist hung over the valley like a veil of clouds, and the sun had

already set. Barefoot said to herself, almost aloud:

"I wish tomorrow would never come, but that it would always be

today--always today!" And then she stood still, lost in dreams.

The night came on quickly. The moon, looking like a thin sickle, was

resting on the summits of the dark mountains. One little Bernese wagon

after another drove away. Barefoot went to find her master's chaise, to

which the horses were now being hitched. Then Rose came and told her

brother that she had promised some young people of her village to go

home in company with them. And it was understood as a matter of course

that the farmer could not drive home alone with the maid. And so the

little Bernese wagon went rattling off toward home with a single

occupant. Rose must have seen Barefoot, but she acted as if she were not

there. And so Barefoot once more wandered forth along the road on which

the stranger had departed. Whither could he have gone? How many hundred

villages and hamlets there were along that road, and to which one was

he bound? Barefoot found the place again where he had first accosted her

in the morning; she repeated aloud to herself his salutation, and the

answer she had given him. And once more she sat down behind the hazel

hedge, where in the morning she had slept and dreamt. A yellowhammer sat

on a slender spray, and its six notes sounded just as if it were saying:

"And why art thou still here? And why art thou still here?"

Barefoot had lived through a whole life's history in this one day. Could

it be but a single day? She went back again to the dance, but did not go

up to the room itself. And then she started out homeward alone. She had

gone almost halfway to Haldenbrunn, when she suddenly turned back; she

seemed unable to tear herself away from the place where she had been so

happy. And she said to herself that it was not right for her to go home

alone anyway; she should go in company with the young men and girls from

her village. When she arrived in front of the tavern at Endringen again,

she found several people from her village already assembled there.

"Ah, are you here, too, Barefoot?" was the only greeting she received.

And now there was great confusion; for many who had been the first to

urge going home, were still upstairs dancing. And now some strange lads

came and begged and besought them to stay for just one more dance; and

they got their way. Barefoot, too, went upstairs, but only to look on.

At last the cry was: "Whoever dances now shall be left behind;" and

after a great deal of difficulty and much rushing to and fro, the

Haldenbrunn contingent was finally assembled in front of the house. Some

of the musicians escorted them through the village, and many a sleepy

father came to the window to see what was going on, while now and then a

woman, who had once been one of the merry-makers herself, but who had

married and so culminated her days of frivolity, would appear at a

window and cry: "A pleasant journey home!"

The night was dark, and large pine fagots had been provided for torches;

and the lads who carried them danced about and shouted with joy.

Scarcely had the musicians gone back, and scarcely had the party left

Endringen well behind, when the cry was: "Put out the torches! They only

dazzle us!" And two soldiers in particular, who were then off duty and

had joined the party, made fun of the torches, in proud consciousness of

their sabres. Accordingly the torches were extinguished in a ditch. And

now they began to miss this or that boy, and this or that girl, and when

their comrades called out to them, they would answer from a distance.

Barefoot walked behind the rest, a good distance from those of her own

village. They let her alone, and that was the greatest kindness they

could have done her; she was with the people of her own village, and yet

she was alone. She often looked around at the fields and the woods; how

wonderful it all looked in the night!--so strange and yet so familiar!

The whole world seemed as strange to her as she had become to herself.

And as she went along, step by step, as if she were being pulled or

pushed, without realizing that she was moving, so did her thoughts move,

involuntarily, in her mind; they seemed to be whirling on, and she could

not grasp or control them--she did not know what it meant. Her cheeks

glowed as if every star in the heavens were a heat-radiating sun, and

her very heart burned within her.

And now, just as if she had begun it, as if she herself had struck up

the tune, her companions ahead began to sing the song that had risen to

her lips that morning:

"There were two lovers in Allgau,

Who loved each other so dear;

And the young lad went away to war;

When comest thou home again?

Ah, that I cannot, love, tell thee,

What year, or what day, or what hour!"

And then the "Good Night" song was sung; and Amrei,

in the distance, joined in:

"A fair 'good night' to thee, love, farewell!

When all are sleeping

Then watch I'm keeping,

So wearily.

A fair "good night" to thee, love, farewell!

Now I must leave thee,

And joy be with thee,

Till I come back.

And when I come back, then I'll come to thee,

And then I'll kiss thee,

That tastes so sweetly,--

Love, thou art mine!

Love, thou art mine, and I am thine,

And that doth content me,

And shall not repent thee,

Love, fare thee well!"

At last they came to the village, where one group after another detached

itself. Barefoot paused under the tree by her father's house, and stood

there for a long time in dreamy meditation. She would have liked to go

in and tell Black Marianne everything, but gave up the idea. Why should

she disturb the old woman's rest at night? What good would it do? She

went quietly home, where everybody was asleep. When she finally entered

the house, everything seemed so much more strange to her than it had

outside--so odd, so out of keeping, so out of place. "Why do you come

home? What do you want here?" There seemed to be a strange questioning

in every sound; when the dog barked, when the stairs creaked, when the

cows lowed in the stable--they all seemed to be questioning her: "Who's

that coming home? Who's that?" And when at length she found herself in

her room, she sat down quietly and stared at the light. Suddenly she got

up, seized the lamp, held it up to the glass, and looked at her face;

she felt inclined to ask herself: "Who's that?"--"And thus," she

thought, "he saw me--this is how I looked. He must have been pleased

with something about you, or else why did he look at you so?"

There arose in her a quiet feeling of contentment, which was heightened

by the thought:

"Well, for once you have been looked upon as a person; until now you

have been nothing but a servant, a convenience for others. Good night,

Amrei--this has been a day indeed! But even this day must come to an end

at last."

CHAPTER XI

WHAT THE OLD SONG SAYS

[The memory of the handsome stranger, and of the dance, and of all the

new and wonderful emotions that had filled her heart on that eventful

day, to Amrei was a sacred one indeed; for weeks she thought of it by

day and dreamed of it by night. The jealous, sneering remarks of Rose,

and the half-serious, half-jesting utterances of other people, who had

been present at the wedding, meant nothing to her; she went about her

work all the more diligently and ignored it all. Black Marianne could

offer her no encouragement in her hope that the stranger would some day

appear again and claim her; she had waited all her life for her John,

and would continue to wait until she died.]

Spring had come again. Amrei was standing beside the flowers in her

window when a bee came flying up and began sucking at an open blossom.

"Yes, so it is," thought Barefoot; "a girl is like a plant; she grows up

in one place, and cannot go out into the world and seek--she must wait

until something comes flying to her."

"Were I a little bird,

And had a pair of wings,

I'd fly to thee;

But since I can't do that,

Here must I be.

Though I am far from thee,

In dreams I am with thee,

Thou art mine own;

But when I wake again,

I am alone.

No hour at night doth pass,

But that my heart doth wake,

And think of thee,--"

Thus sang Amrei. It was wonderful how all songs seemed now to apply to

her own life. And how many thousands of people have already sung those

songs from the depths of their souls, and how many thousands more are

yet to sing them!

Ye who yearn and who at last embrace a heart, ye embrace along with it

the love of all those who have ever been, or who ever shall be.

CHAPTER XII

HE IS COME

One Sunday afternoon Barefoot, according to her custom, was leaning

against the door-post of the house and gazing dreamily out before her,

when Coaly Mathew's grandson came running up the street, beckoning to

her from afar and crying:

"He is come, Barefoot! He is come!"

Barefoot felt her knees tremble, and she cried in a broken voice:

"Where is he? Where?"

"At my grandfather's, in Mossbrook Wood!"

"Where? Who? Who sent you?"

"Your Damie--he's down yonder in the woods."

Barefoot was obliged to sit down on the stone bench in front of the

house; but only for a minute. Then she pulled herself together and stood

up stiffly with the words:

"My brother? My Damie?"

"Yes, Barefoot's Damie," said the boy, bluntly; "and he promised that

you would give me a kreutzer if I would run and tell you. So now give me

a kreutzer."

"My Damie will give you three."

"Oh, no!" said the boy, "he's been whimpering to my grandfather because

he hadn't a kreutzer left."

"I haven't one now either," said Barefoot, "but I'll promise you one."

She went quickly into the house and begged the second maid to milk the

cows for her that evening, in case she should not get back, for she had

an errand to do immediately. Then, with a heart now full of anger at

Damie, now full of sorrow for him and his awkwardness, again full of

vexation on account of his coming back, and then again full of

self-reproach that she should be going to meet her only brother in such

a way, Barefoot wended her way out into the fields and down the valley

to Mossbrook Wood.

There was no mistaking the way to Coaly Mathew's, even if one were to

wander off from the foot-path. The smell of burning charcoal led one to

him infallibly.

How the birds are rejoicing in the trees! And beneath them a sad maiden

is passing, thinking how unhappy it must make her brother to see all

these things again, and how badly things must have gone with him, if he

had no other resource but to come home and live upon her earnings.

"Other sisters are helped by their brothers," she thought to herself,

"and I--but I shall show you this time, Damie, that you must stay where

I put you, and that you dare not stir!"

Such were Barefoot's thoughts as she hurried along; and at last she

arrived at Coaly Mathew's. But there she saw only Coaly Mathew himself,

who was sitting by the kiln in front of his log cabin, and holding his

wooden pipe with both hands as he smoked it; for a charcoal-burner is

like a charcoal kiln, in that he is always smoking.

"Has anybody been playing a trick on me?" Barefoot asked herself. "Oh,

that would be shameful! What have I done to people that they should

make a fool of me? But I shall soon find out who did it--and he shall

pay for it."

With clenched fists and a flaming face she stood before Coaly Mathew,

who hardly raised his eyes to her--much less did he speak. As long as

the sun was shining he was almost always mute, and only at night, when

nobody could look into his eyes, did he like to talk, and then he spoke

freely.

Barefoot gazed for a minute at the charcoal-burner's black face, and

then asked impatiently:

"Where is my Damie?"

The old man shook his head. Then Barefoot asked again with a stamp of

her foot:

"Is my Damie with you?"

The old man unfolded his hands and spread them right and left, implying

thereby that he was not there.

"Who was it that sent to me?" asked Barefoot, still more impatiently.

"Can't you speak?"

The charcoal-burner pointed with his right thumb toward the side where a

foot-path wound around the mountain.

"For Heaven's sake, do say something!" cried Barefoot, fairly weeping

with indignation; "only a single word! Is my Damie here, or where is

he?"

At last the old man said:

"He's there--gone to meet you along the path." And then, as if he had

said too much, he pressed his lips together and walked off around the

kiln.

Barefoot now stood there, laughing scornfully and, at the same time,

sadly over her brother's simplicity.

"He sends to me and doesn't stay in the place where I can find him; now

if I go up that way, why should he expect me to come by the foot-path?

That has doubtless occurred to him now, and he'll be going some other

way--so that I shall never find him, and we shall be wandering about

each other as in a fog."

Barefoot sat down quietly on the stump of a tree. There was a fire

within her as within the kiln, only the flames could not leap

forth--the fire could merely smolder within. The birds were singing, the

forest rustling--but what is all that when there is no clear, responsive

note in the heart? Barefoot now remembered, as in a dream, how she had

once cherished thoughts of love. What right had she to let such thoughts

rise within her? Had she not misery enough in herself and in her

brother? And this thought of love seemed to her now like the

remembrance, in winter, of a bright summer's day. One merely remembers

how sunny and warm it was--but that is all. Now she had to learn what it

meant to "wait,"--to "wait" high up on a crag, where there is hardly a

palm's breadth of room. And he who knows what it means, feels all his

old misery--and more.

She went into the charcoal-burner's log cabin, and there lay a cloth

sack, hardly half full, and on the sack was her father's name.

"Oh, how you have been dragged about!" she said, almost aloud. But she

soon got over her excitement in her curiosity to see what Damie had

brought back. "He must at least still have the shirts that I made for

him out of Black Marianne's linen. And perhaps there is also a present

from our uncle in America in it. But if he had anything good, would he

have gone first to Coaly Mathew in the forest? Would he not have shown

himself in the village at once?"

Barefoot had plenty of time to indulge in these reflections; for the

sack had been tied with a cord, which had been knotted in a most

complicated way, and it required all her patience and skill to

disentangle it. She emptied out everything that was in the sack and said

with angry eyes:

"Oh, you good-for-nothing! There's not a decent shirt left! Now you may

have your choice whether you'll be called 'Jack in Tatters' or 'Tattered

Jack.'"

This was not a happy frame of mind in which to greet her brother for the

first time. And Damie seemed to realize this; for he stood at the

entrance of the log cabin and looked on, until Barefoot had put

everything back into the sack. Then he stepped up to her and said:

"God greet you, Amrei! I bring you nothing but dirty clothes, but you

are neat, and will make me--"

"Oh, dear Damie, how you look!" cried Barefoot, and she threw herself on

his neck. But she quickly tore herself away from him, exclaiming:

"For Heaven's sake! You smell of whisky! Have you got so far already?"

"No, Coaly Mathew only gave me a little juniper spirit, for I could not

stand up any longer. Things have gone badly with me, but I have not

taken to drink--you may believe that, though, to be sure, I can't prove

it."

"I believe you, for you surely would not wish to deceive the only one

you have on earth! But oh, how wild and miserable you look! You have a

beard as heavy as a knife-grinder's. I won't allow that--you must shave

it off. But you're in good health? There's nothing the matter with you?"

"I am in good health, and intend to be a soldier."

"What you are, and what you are to be, we'll think about in good time.

But now tell me how things have gone with you."

Damie kicked his foot against a half-burnt log of wood--one of the

spoilt logs, as they were called--and said:

"Look you--I am just like that, not completely turned to coal, and yet

no longer fresh wood."

Barefoot exhorted him to say what he had to say without complaints. And

then Damie went off into a long, long story, setting forth how he had

not been able to bear the life at his uncle's, and how hard-hearted and

selfish that uncle was, and especially how his wife had grudged him

every bit he ate in the house, and how he had got work here and there,

but how in every place he had only experienced a little more of man's

hard-heartedness. "In America," he said, "one can see another person

perishing in misery, and never so much as look around at him."

Barefoot could hardly help laughing when there came again and again, as

the burden of his story,--"And then they turned me out into the street."

She could not help interrupting him with:

"Yes, that's just how you are, and how you used to be, even as a child.

When you once stumbled, you let yourself fall like a log of wood; one

must convert the stumble into a hop, as the old proverb says. Cheer up.

Do you know what one must do, when people try to hurt one?"

"One must keep out of their way."

"No, one must hurt them, if one can--and one hurts them most by standing

up and achieving something. But you always stand there and say to the

world: 'Do what you like to me, good or bad; kiss me or beat me, just as

you will.' That's easy enough; you let people do anything to you, and

then pity yourself. I should like it right well myself, if some one

would place me here and there, and do everything for me. But you must

look out for yourself now. You've let yourself be pushed about quite

enough in the world; now you must play the master for awhile."

Reproof and teaching often seem like hardness and injustice in the eyes

of the unhappy; and Damie took his sister's words as such. It was

dreadful that she did not see that he was the most unhappy creature on

earth. She strongly urged him not to believe that, and said that if he

did not believe it, it would not be so. But it is the most difficult of

all undertakings to inspire a man with confidence in himself; most

people acquire it only after they have succeeded.

Damie declared that he would not tell his heartless sister a word more;

and it was only after some time that she got from him a detailed account

of his travels and fortunes, and of how he had at last come back to the

old world as a stoker on a steamboat. While she reproved him for his

self-tormenting touchiness, she became conscious that she herself was

not entirely free from that fault. For, as a result of her almost

exclusive association with Black Marianne, she had fallen into the habit

of thinking and talking so much about herself, that she had acquired a

desponding way. And now that she was called upon to cheer her brother

up, she unconsciously exerted a similar influence upon herself. For

herein lies the mysterious power of cooperation among men, that when we

help others we are also helping ourselves.

"We have four sound hands," she said in conclusion, "and we'll see if we

cannot fight our way through the world together. And to fight your way

through is a thousand times better than to beg your way through. And

now, Damie, come with me--come home."

Damie did not want to show himself in the village at all; he dreaded the

jeering that would be vented upon him from all sides, and preferred to

remain concealed for the present. But Barefoot said:

"You go with me now--on this bright Sunday; and you must walk right

through the village, and let the people mock at you, let them have their

say, let them point and laugh. Then you'll be through with it, then it

will be over, and you will have swallowed their bitter draught all at

once, and not drop by drop."

Not without long and obstinate resistance, not until Coaly Mathew had

interfered and sided with Barefoot, was Damie induced to comply. And

there was, indeed, a perfect hailstorm of jeering, sometimes coarse,

sometimes satirical, directed at Barefoot's Damie, whom people accused

of having taken merely a pleasure-trip to America at the expense of the

parish.

Black Marianne alone received him kindly; her first question was:

"Have you heard nothing of my John?" But he could give her no

information.

In a double sense Damie was doomed to be scratched that day; for that

very evening Barefoot had the barber come and shave off his wild beard,

and give him the smooth face that was the fashion of the country.

The next morning Damie was summoned to the Courthouse; and inasmuch as

he trembled at the summons, he knew not why, Barefoot promised to

accompany him. And that was good, though it was not of much use; for the

Council declared to Damie that he was to be sent away from the place,

that he had no right to remain there, perhaps to become a burden on the

community once more.

All the members were astonished when Barefoot answered "Yes, you can

send him away--but do you know when? When you can go out to the

churchyard, where our father and mother lie buried, and say to them:

'Up, go away with your child!' Then you can send him away. No one can be

sent away from the place where his parents are buried; for he is more

than at home there. And if it is written a thousand times in your books

there, and a thousand times again,"--and here she pointed to the bound

government registers,--"and wherever else it may be written, it cannot

be done, and you cannot do it."

One of the councilors whispered to the schoolmaster:

"Barefoot has learned to talk in that way from nobody else but Black

Marianne."

And the sexton leaned over to the magistrate and said:

"Why do you allow the Cinderella to make such an outcry? Ring for the

gendarme and have him shut her up in the madhouse."

But the magistrate only smiled, and explained that the community had rid

itself of all burdens that could ever accrue to it through Damie by

paying the greater part of his passage money.

"But where is his home now?" asked Barefoot.

"Wherever they will receive him, but not here--at present nowhere."

"Yes, I have no home," said Damie, who almost enjoyed being made more

and more unhappy; for now nobody could deny that he was the most

unfortunate person in the world.

Barefoot continued to fight, but she soon saw that nothing could be

done; the law was against her. She now declared that she would work her

fingers to the bone rather than take anything more from the parish,

either for herself or for her brother; and she promised to pay back all

that had been received.

"Shall I put that down on the minutes?" asked the clerk of those who sat

around. And Barefoot replied:

"Yes, put it down; for with you nothing counts except what's written."

Barefoot then put her signature to the entry. When this was done, it was

announced that Damie, as a stranger, had permission to remain in the

village for three days, but that if within that time he had not found

some means of subsistence, he would be sent away, and in case of

necessity, would be removed by force across the frontier.

Without another word Barefoot left the Court-house with Damie, who

actually shed tears because she had compelled him to return to the

village to no purpose. It would have been better, he declared, if he had

remained out in the woods and spared himself the jeering, and the

humiliation of hearing himself banished as a stranger from his native

place. Barefoot wanted to reply that it was better to know the worst,

however bitter it might be; but she restrained herself, realizing that

she had need of all her strength to keep up her own courage. She felt as

if she had been banished with her brother, and understood that she had

to fight with a world that had law and might to fall back upon, while

she herself was empty-handed and helpless.

But she bore up more bravely than ever; she did not allow Damie's

weaknesses and adversities to weigh upon her. For that is the way with

people; if any one has a pain of his own which entirely occupies him, he

will bear a second pain--be it ever so severe--more easily than if he

had this second pain alone to bear. And thus while Barefoot had a

feeling of indescribable sorrow against which she could do nothing, she

was able to bear the definite trial against which she could strive, the

more willingly and freely. She allowed herself not a minute more for

dreaming, and went to and fro with stiff arms and clinched fists, as if

to say: "Where is there work to do? Be it ever so hard, I will gladly

undertake it, if only I can get myself and my brother out of this state

of forsaken dependency."

She now cherished the idea of going with Damie to Alsace, and working in

a factory there. It seemed terrible to her that she should have to do

this, but she would force herself to it; as soon as the summer was over,

she would go. And then, "Farewell home," she said, "for we are strangers

even here where we were born."

The one protector the two orphans had had on the Village Council was now

powerless to do anything for them; old Farmer Rodel was taken seriously

ill, and in the night following the stormy meeting he died. Barefoot and

Black Marianne were the two people who wept the most at his burial in

the churchyard. On the way home Black Marianne gave as a special reason

for this fact that old Farmer Rodel had been the last survivor of those

with whom she had danced in her youth. "And now," she said, "my last

partner is dead."

But she soon spoke a very different elegy concerning him; for it

appeared that Farmer Rodel, who had for years been raising Barefoot's

hopes concerning his will, made no mention at all of her in that

document--far less did he leave her anything.

When Black Marianne went on with an endless tirade of scolding and

complaining, Barefoot said:

"It's all coming at once. The sky is cloudy now, and the hail is beating

down upon me from all sides; but the sun will soon be shining again."

The relatives of Farmer Rodel gave Barefoot a few garments that had

belonged to the old man; she would have liked to refuse them, but

realized that it would not do to show a spirit of obstinacy just now. At

first Damie also refused to accept the clothes, but he was finally

obliged to give in; he seemed fated to pass his life in the clothes of

various dead people.

Coaly Mathew took Damie to work with him at the kiln in the forest,

where talebearers kept coming to Damie to tell him that he had only to

begin a lawsuit; they declared that he could not be driven away, for he

had not yet been received at any other place, and that this was always a

tacit condition when any one gave up his right of settlement. These

people seemed to derive a certain satisfaction from the reflection that

the poor orphans had neither time nor money to begin a legal process.

Damie seemed to like the solitude of the forest; it suited him exactly,

the fact that one was not obliged to dress and undress there. And every

Sunday afternoon Barefoot experienced great difficulty in getting him to

clean himself up a little; then she would sit with him and Coaly Mathew.

Little was said, and Barefoot could not prevent her thoughts from

wandering about the world in search of him who had once made her so

happy for a whole day, and had lifted her above the earth. Did he know

nothing more about her? Did he think of her no more? Could people forget

other people with whom they had once been so happy?

It was on a Sunday morning toward the end of May, and everybody was at

church. The day before it had rained, and now a strong, refreshing

breeze was blowing over the mountains and valleys, and the sun was

shining brightly. Barefoot had also intended to go to church, but while

the bells were ringing she had sat as if spell-bound beneath her window,

until it was too late to go. That was a strange thing for her, and it

had never happened before. But now that it was too late, she determined

to stay at home by herself and read her hymn-book. She rummaged through

her drawers, and was surprised to find all sorts of things that belonged

to her. She was sitting on the floor, reading a hymn and humming the

tune of it to herself, when something stirred at the window. She glanced

up; a white dove was sitting on the ledge and looking at her. When the

eyes of the dove and of the girl met, the bird flew away. Barefoot

watched it soar out over the fields and alight again.

This incident, which was a very natural one, filled her heart with

gladness; and she kept nodding to the mountains in the distance, and to

the fields and woods. The rest of that day she was unusually cheerful.

She could not explain to herself why, but it seemed to her as if a

joyous spirit were singing within her, and she knew not whence it came.

And as often as she shook her head, while she leaned against the

door-post, wondering at the strange excitement she felt, the feeling did

not pass away.

"It must be, it must be that some one has been thinking kindly of me,"

she said; "and why should it not be possible that the dove was a silent

messenger who came to tell me so?--Animals, after all, live in the

world, where the thoughts of men are flying about, and who knows if they

do not quietly carry those thoughts away?"

The people who passed by Barefoot could have no idea of the strange life

that was moving within her.

CHAPTER XIII

OUT OF A MOTHER'S HEART

While Barefoot was dreaming and working and worrying in village, field,

and wood, sometimes feeling a strange thrill of joy, at other times

thinking herself completely deserted, two parents were sending their

child forth into the world, in the hope, to be sure, that he would

return to them the richer. Yonder in Allgau, in the large farm-house

known, by the sign over the door, as the "Wild Clearing," sat Farmer

Landfried and his wife, with their youngest son. The farmer was saying:

"Listen, John; it's more than a year since you came back, and I don't

know what's gotten into you. You came home that day like a whipped dog,

and said that you would rather choose a wife here in the

neighborhood--but I don't see any signs of your doing it. If you will

follow my advice once more, then I won't say another word to persuade

you."

"Yes, I will," said the young man, without looking up. "Well then, make

one more trial--one trial is no better than no trial. And I tell you,

you will make me and your mother happy if you choose a wife from our

region. I may say it to your face, wife; there's only one good breed of

women in the world, and they come from our part of the country. Now, you

are a sensible lad, John, and you will be sure to pick out a good one,

and then you'll thank us on your death-bed for sending you to our home

to find a wife. If I could get away, I would go with you--together we

would find the right one surely--but I can't go. I've spoken to our

George, however, and he says he'll go with you if you ask him. Ride

over, and speak to him then."

"If I may say what I think," answered the young man, "when I go again,

I'd rather go alone. You see, it's my way; in such a matter a second

pair of eyes is superfluous--I should not like to consult any one else.

If it were possible, I should even like to make myself invisible while I

am looking around; but if two of us went together, we might as well have

it proclaimed abroad, so that they would all dress themselves up to

receive us."

"As you will," said the father; "you always were a strange fellow. Do

you know what? Suppose you start at once; we want a mate for our white

horse, so do you go out and look for one--but not in the market, of

course. And when you are going about from house to house, you can see

things for yourself; and on your way home you can buy a Bernese

chaise-wagon. Dominic, in Endringen, they say, has three daughters as

straight as organ-pipes; choose one of them--we should like to have a

daughter from that house."

"Yes," the mother observed, "Ameile is sure to have nice daughters."

"And it would be well," continued the father, "if you went to

Siebenhofen and took a look at Amrei, the Butter Count's daughter. She

has a farm of her own that one could easily sell; the farmers of

Siebenhofen have got their eyes on it, for they want to have more land.

But it's a question of cold cash, and none of them can raise it. But

I'll say nothing more, for you have eyes of your own. Come, set out at

once, and I'll fill the money-belt for you--two hundred crowns will be

enough, but if you should have to have more, Dominic will lend you some.

Only make yourself known; I could never understand why you did not tell

people who you were that time at the wedding. Something must have

happened then--but I won't ask any questions."

"Yes, because he won't answer them," said the mother, smiling.

The farmer at once set about filling the money-belt; he broke open two

large paper rouleaux, and it was manifest that he enjoyed counting out

the big coins from one hand into the other. He made twenty piles of ten

dollars each, and counted them over two or three times to be sure that

he had made no mistake.

"Well, I am ready," said the young man, standing up as he spoke.

He is the strange dancer whose acquaintance we made at the wedding in

Endringen. He went out to the stable, and presently returned with the

white horse already saddled. And as he was fastening his valise to the

bolster, a fine, large wolf-hound began jumping up at him and licking

his hands.

"Yes, yes, I'll take you with me," said the lad to the dog; and for the

first time his face looked cheerful, as he called out to his father:

"Father, can I take Lux with me?"

"Yes, if you like," sounded the answer from within, amid the jingling of

coins. The dog seemed to understand the question and the answer, for he

ran around the yard in circles, barking joyously. The young man went

into the house, and, as he was buckling on the money-belt, he said "You

are right, father; I feel better already, now that I am getting myself

out of this aimless way of living. And I don't know--people ought not

to be superstitious--but somehow I was glad when the horse turned around

and neighed to me when I went out into the stable just now--and that the

dog wants to go too. After all, they're good signs, and if we could ask

animals, who knows if they could not give us good advice?"

The mother smiled, but the father said:

"Don't forget to look up Crappy Zachy, and don't go ahead and bind

yourself until you have consulted him. He knows the affairs of all the

people for ten miles around, and is a living information bureau. And

now, God be with you! Take your time--you may stay away as long as ten

days."

Father and son shook hands, and the mother said:

"I'll escort you part of the way."

The young man, leading his horse by the bridle, then walked quietly

beside his mother until they were out in front of the yard, and it was

not until they reached the turn in the road that the mother said,

hesitatingly:

"I should like to give you some good advice."

"Yes, yes, let me have it--I'll listen to it gladly."

The mother then took her son's hand, and began:

"You must stand still--I can't talk while I am walking. Look; that she

should please you is, of course, the first thing--there's no happiness

without love. Well, I am an old woman, and so I may say what I think to

you, may I not?"

"Yes, surely."

"Well, if it doesn't make you happy, if it doesn't make you feel as if

it were a boon from heaven to kiss her, then it's not the right kind of

love. But--why don't you stand still--but that kind of love is not

enough; there may be something else concealed beneath it, believe me."

Here the old woman blushed crimson and hesitated. "Look you," she went

on, "where there is not the right feeling of respect, when a man does

not feel rejoiced that a woman takes a thing in hand in just one way,

and not in another, and does it just in this way, and not in that--it's

a bad sign. And above all things, notice how she treats her servants."

"I'll take what you have to say, and change it into small coin for you;

for talking is hard for you. What you have just said, I understand; she

must not be too proud, and not too familiar."

"That, certainly. But I can tell by looking at a girl's mouth, if that

mouth has used bad words and scolded and stormed, and is fond of doing

it. Yes, if you could see her weeping with vexation, or come upon her

unawares, when she is angry, that would be the best way of knowing what

she is. For then the inward self that we conceal springs out, and often

that self is armed with claws, like a devil. Oh, child, I have had much

experience, and have seen many things. I can tell by the way a woman

puts out a candle what she is, and what kind of a temper she has; she

who puts it out hurriedly as she goes by, regardless of whether it blows

sparks or sputters or not, she is one who prides herself upon her

bustling industry, and who does things only by halves, and has no peace

of mind."

"But, mother, you're making it too hard for me; after all, it's a

lottery, and always will be one."

"Yes, yes, you need not remember all I say--I mean it only in a general

way. If it should come before you, you'll know what I meant. And then

you must notice if she can talk and work at the same time, if she has

something in her hand while she is talking to you, and if she stops

every time she says a word and only pretends to be working. I tell you

that industry is everything in a woman. My mother always used to say: 'A

girl should never go about empty-handed, and should be ready to climb

over three fences to pick up a feather.' And yet she must be calm and

steady in her work, and not rush and rampage about as if she were going

to pull down a piece of the world. And when she speaks and answers you,

notice whether she is either too bashful or too bold. You may not

believe it, but girls are quite different when they see a man's hat

from what they are among themselves. And those who look as if they were

all the time saying, "Don't eat me!" are the worst--but, no--those who

have such sharp tongues, and think that when anybody is in the room

their tongues should never rest, those are worse still."

The lad laughed and said:

"Mother, you ought to go about the world preaching, and give lectures

for girls only."

"Yes, I could do that," replied the mother, also laughing. "But I have

brought out the last part first; you must, of course, notice how she

behaves to her parents and to her brothers and sisters. You are a good

son yourself--I need not tell you anything about that. You know the

Fourth Commandment."

"Yes, mother, you may rest easy there--I look out for a special sign in

regard to that; where they make a big fuss about love for parents, it

means nothing. For filial love is best shown by deeds, and those who

chatter very much about it, when the time comes for deeds, are tired and

weary."

"Why, how wise you are!" cried the mother; and she laid her hand on her

bosom and looked up at her son. "May I tell you something more?"

[Mother and son continue to discuss the qualifications of good wives for

some time, until the son begins to show signs of impatience to be off.]

"Yes, yes," said the mother, "I talk too much, and you need not remember

it all. It's only to remind you, if it should come before you. The gist

of what I say is this: the chief thing is not what a woman has or

inherits, but what she uses. And now, you know that I have always let

you go your own way quietly; so then, open your heart to me, and tell me

what it was that made you come back from the wedding at Endringen like a

man bewitched, and why it is that you have never since then been the

same lad that you were before. Tell me, and perhaps I can help you."

"Oh, mother, you cannot do that--but I will tell you. I saw some one

there who would have been the right one, but she was the wrong one."

"For heaven's sake! You did not fall in love with a married woman?"

"No, but still she was the wrong one. Why should I make many words about

it? She was a servant-girl."

The son drew a deep breath, and for some time both he and his mother

were silent. At last the mother laid her hand on his shoulder, and said:

"Oh, you are good! And I thank God that He has made you so. You did well

to put that out of your mind. Your father would never have consented to

it, and you know what a father's blessing means."

"No, mother, I will not make myself out better than I am. I myself was

annoyed that she was only a servant; I knew it would not do, and

therefore I went away. But it is even harder than I expected to get her

out of my mind--but now it's over, it must be over. I have promised

myself not to make any inquiries about her, not to ask anybody where she

is, or who she is, and, God willing, I shall bring you home a worthy

farmer's daughter."

"Surely you acted fairly by the girl, and did not put any foolish

notions into her head?"

"Mother, there's my hand--I have nothing to reproach myself for."

"I believe you," said the mother, and she pressed his hand repeatedly.

"And now, good luck, and my blessing go with you!"

The son mounted his horse, and his mother looked after him. But suddenly

she called out again:

"Stop--I must tell you something else. I have forgotten the most

important of all."

The son turned his horse around, and when he got back to his mother, he

said, smiling:

"But mother--this is the last, eh?"

"Yes, and the best test of all. Ask the girl about the poor people in

her town, and then listen to what the poor people have to say about her.

A farmer's daughter who has not taken some poor person by the hand to

help her, cannot be a worthy girl--remember that. And now, God keep you,

and ride forth bravely."

As he rode off the mother spoke a prayer to speed him on his way, and

then returned to the farm.

"I ought to have told him to inquire about Josenhans's children, and to

find out what has become of them," said the mother to herself. She felt

strangely moved. And who knows the secret ways through which the soul

wanders, or what currents flow above our wonted course, or deep beneath

it? What made the mother think of these children, who seemed to have

faded from her memory long ago? Was her present pious mood like a

remembrance of long-forgotten emotions? And did it awaken the

circumstances that had accompanied those emotions? Who can understand

the impalpable and invisible elements that wander and float back and

forth from man to man, from memory to memory?

When the mother got back to the farm and found the father, the latter

said:

"No doubt you have given him many directions how to fish out the best

one; but I, too, have been making some arrangements. I have written to

Crappy Zachy--he is sure to lead him to the best houses. He must bring a

girl home who has plenty of good coin."

"Plenty of coin doesn't constitute goodness," replied the mother.

"I know that!" cried the farmer, with a sneer. "But why shouldn't he

bring home one who is good and has plenty of coin into the bargain?"

The mother sat silent for a time, but after awhile she said:

"You've referred him to Crappy Zachy. It was at Crappy Zachy's that

Josenhans's boy was boarded out."

Thus her pronouncing the name aloud showed that her former remembrances

were dawning upon her; and now she became conscious what those

remembrances were. And her mind often reverted to them during the events

that were soon to occur, and which we are about to relate.

"I don't know what you're talking about," said the farmer. "What's the

child to you? Why don't you say that I did the thing wisely?"

"Yes, yes, it was wisely done," the wife acquiesced. But the tardy

praise did not satisfy the old man, and he went out grumbling.

A certain apprehension that things might go wrong with his boy after

all, and that perhaps he had been in too great a hurry, made the farmer

gruff, for the present, toward everybody about him.

CHAPTER XIV

THE RIDER ON THE WHITE HORSE

On the evening of the same day that John had ridden away from

Zumarshofen, Crappy Zachy came to Farmer Rodel's house and sat with the

proprietor in the back room for a long time, reading a letter to him in

a low voice.

"You must give me a hundred crowns if I put this business through, and I

want that down in writing," said Crappy Zachy.

"I should think that fifty would be enough, and even that is a pretty

bit of money."

"No, not a red farthing less than a round hundred, and in saying that I

am making you a present of a hundred. But I am willing to do that much

for you and your sister--in fact, I am always glad to do a kindness to a

fellow-townsman. Why, in Endringen or in Siebenhofen they would gladly

give me double the money. Your Rose is a very respectable girl--nobody

can deny that--but she's nothing extraordinary, and one might ask,

what's the price of a dozen such?"

"Be quiet! I won't have that!"

"Yes, yes, I'll be quiet, and not disturb you while you're writing. Now,

write at once."

Farmer Rodel was obliged to do as Crappy Zachy wished, and when he had

done writing, he said:

"What do you think? Shall I tell Rose about it?"

"Certainly, you must do so. But don't let her show that she knows about

it, nor tell any one in the place; it won't bear being talked about. All

people have their enemies, you and your sister like the rest, you may

believe me. Tell Rose to wear her everyday clothes and milk the cows

when he comes. I shall have him come to your house alone. You read what

Farmer Landfried writes; the boy has a will of his own, and would run

away directly, if he suspected that there was anything being prepared

for him. And you must send this very evening to Lauterbach and have your

brother-in-law's white horse brought over here; then I'll get somebody

to send the suitor over to you in quest of the horse. Don't let him

notice that you know anything about it either."

Crappy Zachy went away, and Farmer Rodel called his sister and his wife

into the little back room. After exacting a promise of secrecy, he

imparted to them that a suitor for Rose was coming the next day, a

prince of a man, who had a first-rate farm--in fact, it was none other

than John, the son of Farmer Landfried of Zumarshofen. He then gave the

further directions which Crappy Zachy had recommended, and enjoined the

strictest secrecy.

After supper, however, Rose could not refrain from asking Barefoot, if,

in case of her marrying, she would not go with her as her maid; she

would give her double wages, and at the same time she would then not

have to cross the Rhine and work in a factory. Barefoot gave an evasive

answer; for she was not inclined to go with Rose, knowing that the

latter had selfish motives for making the proposal. In the first place

she wanted to boast of the fact that she was going to get a husband,

and, indeed, a first-rate one; and in the second place she was anxious

to get Barefoot to manage her household affairs, about which she had

until then scarcely bothered herself at all. Now Barefoot would have

been very glad to do this for a mistress who was kind to her, but not

for Rose. And besides, if she were to leave her present mistress, she

did not intend to be a servant again anyway, but would work for herself,

even if it were in a factory with her brother.

Barefoot was just going to bed, when her mistress called her and

intrusted the secret to her, adding:

"You have always had patience with Rose, and now while her suitor is

here, have double patience, in order that there may be no disturbance in

the house."

"Yes, but I consider it wrong that she wants to milk the cows just this

once; that's deceiving the worthy man, for she can't milk at all."

"You and I cannot alter the world," said the mistress. "I think it's

hard enough for you to bear your own lot--let others do what they will."

Barefoot lay down, mournfully reflecting how people cheat one another

without the least scruple. She did not know who the suitor was who was

going to be deceived, but she was inwardly sorry for the poor young man.

And she was doubly bewildered when she thought: "Who knows, perhaps Rose

will be just as much deceived in him as he in her?"

Quite early in the morning, when Barefoot was looking out of her window,

she suddenly started back as if a bullet had struck her forehead.

"Heavens! What is this?" She passed her hands over her eyes hastily,

then opened them wide, and asked herself as if in a dream: "Why, it's

the stranger of the wedding at Endringen! He has come to the village! He

has come to fetch you! No, he knows nothing of you! But he shall

know!--but no, what are you saying!"

He comes nearer and nearer, but does not look up. A fullblossomed

carnation falls from Barefoot's hand, but lands on the valise behind

him; he does not see it, and it lies there in the road. Barefoot hurries

down and recovers the treacherous token. And now the truth comes over

her like the dawning of a terrible day. This is the suitor for

Rose--this is he of whom she spoke last evening. And is this man to be

deceived?

In the barn, kneeling on the clover which she was going to feed the

cows, Barefoot fervently prayed to Heaven to preserve the stranger from

ever marrying Rose. That he should ever be her own, was a thought she

dared not entertain--and yet she could not bear to banish it.

As soon as she had finished milking, she hurried across to Black

Marianne; she wanted to ask her what she should do. But Black Marianne

was lying grievously ill; furthermore she had grown very deaf, and could

hardly understand connected words. Barefoot did not dare to shout the

secret that she had half confided to her and that the old woman had half

guessed, loudly enough for Marianne to understand it, for people in the

street might hear her. And so she came back, not knowing what to do.

Barefoot had to go out into the fields and stay there the whole day

planting turnips. At every step she hesitated and thought of going home

and telling the stranger everything; but the consciousness of her

subordinate position in the house, as well as a special consideration,

kept her to the duty that she had been called upon to perform.

"If he is foolish and inconsiderate enough," she soliloquized, "to rush

into this affair without a thought, then there's no helping him, and he

deserves no help. And--" she was fain to console herself at last--"and

besides, engaged is not married anyway."

But all day long she was restless and unhappy. In the evening when she

had returned from the fields and was milking the cows, and Rose was

sitting with a full pail beside a cow that had been milked, she heard

the stranger talking with Farmer Rodel in the nearby stable. They were

bargaining about a white horse. But how came the white horse in the

stable?--until then they had had none.

"Who is that singing yonder?" the stranger now asked.

"That's my sister," answered the farmer. And at the word Barefoot joined

in and sang the second voice, powerfully and defiantly, as if she wanted

to compel him to ask who _that_ was over yonder. But her singing had the

disadvantage that it prevented her from hearing whether or not he did

ask. And as Rose went across the yard with her pail, where the white

horse had just been led out for inspection, the farmer said:

"There, that's my sister. Rose, leave your work, and get something ready

for supper. We have a relative for a guest--I'll bring him in

presently."

"And it was the little one yonder, who sang the second voice?" inquired

the stranger. "Is she a sister of yours, too?"

"No--she, in a way, is an adopted child. My father was her guardian."

The farmer knew very well that charity of this kind conduced to the

credit of a house, and he therefore avoided saying outright that

Barefoot was a maid.

Barefoot felt inwardly glad that the stranger knew something about her.

"If he is wise," she reflected, "he will be sure to ask me about Rose.

Then an opportunity will come for me to save him from a misfortune."

Rose brought in the supper, and the stranger was quite surprised to find

that such good fare could be made ready so quickly--he did not know that

it had all been prepared beforehand. Rose apologized by asking him to

make shift with their plain fare, though he was doubtless accustomed to

better things at home. She reckoned, not without acuteness, that the

mention of a well-deserved fame would be gratifying to any one.

Barefoot was told to remain in the kitchen that day, and to give all the

dishes into Rose's hands. She entreated over and over again: "For

goodness sake, tell me who he is! What's his name?"--but Rose gave her

no answer. The mistress, however, at last solved the mystery by saying:

"You can tell her now--it's John, the son of Farmer Landfried of

Zumarshofen. Amrei, you've a keepsake from her, haven't you?"

"Yes, yes," replied Barefoot; and she was obliged to sit down by the

hearth, for her knees trembled under her. How wonderful all this was!

And so he was the son of her first benefactress! "Now he must be told!

If the whole village stones me for it, I shan't bear it!" she said to

herself.

The stranger started to go, and his hosts escorted him to the door; but

on the steps he turned about and said:

"My pipe has gone out--and I like best to light it for myself with a

coal."

He evidently wanted to see how things looked in the kitchen. Rose pushed

in ahead of him and handed him a coal with the tongs, standing, as she

did so, directly in front of Barefoot, who was still sitting on the

hearth by the chimney.

[Late that night Barefoot went out to find somebody whom she could get

to warn the stranger not to marry Rose. She knew of nobody to whom she

dared intrust so delicate a commission; she thought of Damie, but

remembered that he was not allowed to enter the village. Finally, wet

and chilled, as a result of wandering about through the fields barefoot,

she returned home and went to bed.]

CHAPTER XV

BANISHED AND RELEASED

The following morning, when Barefoot awoke, she found the necklace that

she had once received from Dame Landfried lying on her bed, and she had

to think for some time before she remembered that she herself had taken

it out the night before, and had looked at it a long, long time.

[Illustration: WHILE SHE WAS MILKING JOHN ASKED HER ALL KINDS OF

QUESTIONS]

When she started to get up, all her limbs felt numb; and clasping her

hands with difficulty, she moaned:

"For Heaven's sake let me not be ill now! I have no time for it--I

mustn't be ill now"--as if in anger at her bodily weakness.

Determined to overcome it by force, she got up; but how she started back

when she looked at herself in the glass! Her whole face was swollen!

"That's your punishment," she said, half-aloud, "for running about so

last night, and wanting to call upon strangers, even bad people, to help

you!" She beat her disfigured face as if to chastise herself, and then

tied a cloth around it tightly and went about her work.

When the mistress saw her, she wanted to put her to bed again at once.

Rose, on the other hand, scolded, and declared that it was a bit of

spite on Barefoot's part, this being ill just now--she had done it out

of meanness, knowing that she would be wanted. Barefoot made no reply.

When she was out in the cow-shed, putting clover into the mangers, she

heard a clear voice say:

"Good morning! At work so early?"

It was _his_ voice.

"Not very hard," replied Barefoot; and she ground her teeth with

vexation, more on account of the tormenting demon who had disfigured her

face, so that it was impossible that he should recognize her, than

anything else.

Should she make herself known now?--it was better to wait and see.

While she was milking, John asked her all sorts of questions; first he

inquired about the quantity of milk the cows yielded, and whether any of

it was sold, and how; then he wanted to know who made the butter, and if

anybody in the house kept an account of it.

Barefoot trembled. It was now in her power to put her rival out of the

way by declaring what kind of a person she was! But how strangely

involved and tangled are the strings of action! She was ashamed of the

idea of speaking evil of her master's family, though, in truth, she

would have spoken so only of Rose, for the others were good. But she

was aware that it was shameful for a servant to betray the faults of the

inner management of the house. She therefore secured herself from this

by saying to herself:

"It does not become a servant to judge his master. And they are all

good-hearted," she added, prompted by her strong sense of justice. For,

in truth, Rose, too, was good-hearted, in spite of her hot temper and

domineering spirit. And now a good idea occurred to her; if she were to

tell the truth about Rose now, he would go away directly and would

certainly escape from Rose--but then he would be gone. Therefore, with

wonderful good sense, she said:

"You seem to be a prudent man, and your parents have a name for

prudence, too. Now, you know that in one day one cannot get to know even

a horse properly, and so I think you ought to stay here a little while.

Later on we two will get to know each other better, and one word will

bring on another, and if I can be of service to you, I will not fail

you. I don't know, however, why you question me like this--?"

"You are a little rogue--but I like you," said John. Barefoot started so

that the cow winced and almost over-turned the milk-pail.

"And you shall have a good present, too," added John; and he let a

dollar that he already had in his hand, slip back into his pocket.

"I'll tell you something more," Barefoot resumed, moving on to another

cow; "the sexton is an enemy of my master's--I want you to know that in

case he tries to get hold of you."

"Yes, yes, it's evidently worth while to talk with you. But I notice

that you have a swollen face; there's no point in your tying your head

up, if you continue to go about barefoot like that."

"I am used to it," replied Barefoot, "but I will follow your advice.

Thank you."

Footsteps were heard approaching.

"We will talk together again," said the young man, and then he went

away.

"I thank you, swollen cheek," said Barefoot to herself, stroking her

disfigured face; "you have done me a good turn. Through you I can talk

to him as if I were not here; I can speak behind a mask, like a clown on

Shrove Tuesday. Hurrah--that is merry!"

It was wonderful how this inward cheerfulness almost counteracted her

bodily fever. She felt merely tired--indescribably tired; and she was

half-pleased and half-sorry when she saw the foreman greasing the wheels

of the Bernese chaise-wagon, and heard that her master was going to ride

out with the stranger immediately. She hurried into the kitchen, and

there she overheard the farmer saying to John in the parlor:

"If you care to take a ride, John, that would be fine. Then, Rose, you

can sit with me in the Bernese chaise, and you, John, can ride alongside

of us."

"But your wife is going too, isn't she?" inquired John, after a pause.

"I have a child to nurse, and cannot go away," said the farmer's wife.

"And I don't like to be driving about the country on a working-day,"

said Rose.

"Oh nonsense! When a cousin comes, you may take a holiday," urged the

farmer; for he wanted Rose to go with him at once to Farmer Furche's,

that the latter might entertain no hopes for his own daughter. Moreover

he was aware that a little excursion of this kind does more to bring

people together than a week's visit in the house.

John was silent; and the farmer in his urgency nudged him, and said in a

half-whisper:

"Do you speak to her; maybe she will be more apt to do as you say, and

will go with us."

"I think," said John aloud, "that your sister is quite right in

preferring not to be driving about the country in the middle of the

week. I'll harness my white horse with yours, and then we can see how

they pull together. And we shall be back by supper-time, if not before."

Barefoot, who heard all this, bit her lips to keep from laughing.

"You see," she thought to herself, "you have not even got him by the

halter yet, much less by the bridle. He won't let himself be driven

about the country like a betrothed man, and then not be able to get

back."

She felt so warm with joy, that she was obliged to take the handkerchief

from her face.

It was a strange day in the house. Rose repeated half-angrily the

peculiar questions that John had asked her. Barefoot rejoiced inwardly;

for all that he wanted to know--and she knew well why he wanted to know

it--could have been satisfactorily answered by her.

"But what good does it all do?" she asked herself. "He does not know

you, and even if he did know you, you are a poor orphan and a servant,

and nothing could ever come of it. He does not know you, and will not

ask about you."

In the evening, when the two men came back, Barefoot had already been

able to remove the handkerchief from her forehead; but the one she had

tied over her temples and under her chin, she was obliged to keep on

still, drawn tightly around her face. John himself seemed to have

neither tongue nor eyes for her. But his dog was with her in the kitchen

all the time, and she fed the creature and stroked it and talked to it.

"Yes, if you could only tell him everything, you would be sure to tell

him the whole truth." The dog laid its head on Barefoot's lap, and

looked up at her with intelligent eyes; then he seemed to shake his

head, as if to say: "It is too bad, but unfortunately I cannot speak."

Barefoot now went into the bed-room and began singing to the children

again, although they had long been asleep; she sang various songs, but

most of all the waltz to which she had danced with John. John listened

to her as if bewildered, and seemed to be absent-minded when he spoke.

Rose went into the room, and told Barefoot to be quiet.

Late at night, when Barefoot had just drawn some water for Black

Marianne and was returning to her parents' house with the full pail on

her head, John met her as he was going to the tavern. With a suppressed

voice she bade him a "Good evening."

"Oh, it is you!" said John. "Where are you going with that water at this

time?"

"To Black Marianne."

"Who is that?"

"A poor woman, who is sick in bed."

"Why, Rose told me that there were no poor people here."

"Good heavens! there are more than enough. But Rose no doubt said that,

because she thought it would be a disgrace to the village. She's

good-hearted, you may believe me--and she's fond of giving things away."

"You are a loyal friend. But you mustn't stand there with that heavy

pail. May I go with you?"

"Why not?"

"You are right; you are doing a kind deed, and nothing can harm you. And

you need not be afraid of me."

"I am not afraid of anybody, and of you least of all. I saw today that

you are kind."

"When did you see that?"

"When you advised me how to cure my swollen face. Your advice was

good--you see, I have my shoes on now."

"That's a good thing that you are obedient," said John with an approving

glance; and the dog, too, seemed to notice his approval of Barefoot, for

he jumped up at her and licked her free hand.

"Come here, Lux!" cried John.

"No, let him alone," said Barefoot. "We are already good friends--he has

been in the kitchen with me all day long. All dogs are fond of me and of

my brother."

"So you have a brother?"

"Yes, and I wanted to appeal to you very earnestly to take him as a

servant on your farm. You would be doing a very charitable deed, and he

would be sure to serve you faithfully all his life."

"Where is your brother?"

"Down yonder in the woods; just now he is a charcoal-burner."

"Why, we have few trees and no kiln at all. I could more easily find

work for a field-laborer."

"He'd be able to do that work, too. But here is the house."

"I'll wait until you come out," said John. Barefoot went in to put down

the water, and arrange the fire, and make Marianne comfortable in bed.

When she came out John was still standing there and the dog jumped up at

her. For a long time they stood under the parental tree, which rustled

quietly and bowed its branches. They talked of all kinds of things; John

praised her cleverness and her quick mind, and at last said:

"If you should ever want to change your place, you would be the very

person for my mother."

"That is the greatest praise that anybody in the world could give me!"

Barefoot declared. "I still have a keepsake from your mother." And then

she related the incident of their meeting his mother, and both laughed

when Barefoot told how Damie could not forget that Dame Landfried owed

him a pair of leather-breeches.

"And he shall have them," John declared.

They then walked back together as far as the village, and John gave her

his hand when he bade her "Good night." Barefoot wanted to tell him that

he had shaken hands with her once before, but, as if frightened by the

thought, she fled away from him and ran into the house; she did not even

return his "Good night." John, puzzled and thoughtful, returned to his

room at the "Heathcock."

The next morning Barefoot found that the swelling in her face had

vanished as if by magic. And never had she caroled more gaily through

the house and yard, through the stable and barn, than she did today. And

yet today was the day when it was to be decided, the day that John was

to declare himself. Farmer Rodel did not want to have his sister talked

about by any one, in case it should all come to nothing after all.

Nearly the whole day John sat in the room with Rose, who was making a

man's shirt. Toward evening Mistress Rodel's parents came, along with

other relatives. It must be decided one way or the other today.

The roast was sputtering in the kitchen, the pine wood cracking and

snapping, and Barefoot's cheeks were glowing, heated by the fire on the

hearth and the fire that was burning within her. Crappy Zachy walked

back and forth and up and down with an air of great importance, and made

himself very much at home--he even smoked Farmer Rodel's pipe.

"Then it is settled after all," said Barefoot to herself, mournfully.

Night had come. Many lights were burning in the house, and Rose, in

festive attire, was hurrying back and forth between the room and the

kitchen, though she did not know how to give any help. Everything was

ready.

And now the young farmer's wife said to Barefoot:

"Go upstairs and put on your Sunday dress."

"Why?"

"You must wait on the table today, and you'll get a better present."

"I would rather stay in the kitchen."

"No, do as I tell you--and make haste."

Amrei went up to her room and sat down for a moment on her box in order

to get her breath. She was dead tired. If she could only go to sleep now

and never wake up again! But duty called. Hardly had she taken the first

piece of her Sunday dress in her hand, when a feeling of joy came over

her; and the evening sun, sending a red beam into the little attic,

shone upon a pair of glowing cheeks.

"Put on your Sunday dress!" She had but one Sunday dress, and that was

the one she had worn that day at the wedding in Endringen. Every

flutter, every rustle of the dress reminded her of the happiness she had

experienced, and of the waltz she had danced on that eventful day. But

as darkness followed the setting of the sun, so did sorrow follow

gladness; and she said to herself that she was thus adorning herself

only to do honor to John, and to show how much she valued whatever came

from his family, she at last put on the necklace.

Thus, adorned as she had been on the day of the wedding at Endringen,

Amrei came down from her room.

"What is this? What did you dress yourself up like that for?" cried Rose

angrily. She was already anxious and impatient because the visitor was

so long in making his appearance. "Why do you put all your possessions

on? Is that a fit necklace for a servant, with a coin hanging to it? You

take that off directly!"

"No, I shall not do that; for his mother gave it to me when I was a

little child, and I had it on when we danced together at Endringen."

Something was heard to fall on the staircase; but nobody heeded it, for

Rose screamed out:

"What! You good-for-nothing, horrible witch! You would have perished in

rags if we had not taken you up! And now you want to take my betrothed

from me!"

"Don't call him that until he is your betrothed," replied Amrei, with a

strange mixture of feelings in her voice.

"Wait! I'll show you what you've got to do!" shrieked Rose. "Take

that!" and she dragged Barefoot down to the ground and struck her in the

face.

"I'll take my things off! Let me go!" screamed Barefoot.

But Rose let go before she had finished saying it; for, as if he had

risen out of the ground, John was standing before her! He was as pale as

death, and his lips were quivering. He could not speak, but merely

raised his hand to protect Barefoot, who was still kneeling on the

floor.

Barefoot was the first to speak; she cried out:

"Believe me, John, I have never seen her like that before, never in my

whole life! And it was my fault."

"Yes, it was your fault. And, now, come; you shall go with me and be

mine. Will you? I have found you, and I did not seek you. But now you

shall live with me and be my wife. It is God's will."

If any one could have seen Barefoot's eyes then! But no mortal eye has

ever fully seen a flash of lightning in the heavens, for no matter how

firmly we look, our eyes are sure to be dazzled. And there are also

flashes in the human eye which are never fully seen, just as there are

workings in the human heart which are never fully understood. A

momentary flash of joy, such as may brighten the face when the heavens

are opened, darted from Amrei's eyes. She covered her face with both

hands, and the tears ran forth from between her fingers.

John stood with his hand upon her. All the relatives had gathered

around, and were gazing with astonishment at the strange scene.

"What's all this with Barefoot? What's all this?" blustered Farmer

Rodel.

"So, your name is Barefoot?" cried John. He laughed loud and heartily,

and added: "Come, now, will you have me? Say so now, for here we have

witnesses to confirm it. Say 'Yes,' and nothing but death shall part

us!"

"Yes!--and nothing but death shall part us!" cried Barefoot, throwing

herself on his neck.

"Very well--then take her out of this house at once!" roared Farmer

Rodel, foaming with rage.

"Yes, you need not tell me to do that. I thank you for your good

reception, cousin. When you come to us some day, we'll make it quits,"

replied John. He put both hands up to his head, and cried: "Good

heavens! Mother, mother, how glad you will be!"

"Go up, Barefoot, and take your box away at once; for nothing belonging

to you shall remain in my house!" commanded Farmer Rodel.

"Very well," replied John; "but that can be done with less noise. Come,

Barefoot, I'll go with you. But tell me what your real name is."

"Amrei."

"I was once to have married an Amrei--she is the 'Butter Countess!'--you

are my Salt Countess! Hurrah! Now come; I should like to see your room,

where you have lived so long. Now you shall have a large house!"

The dog, with the hairs on his back standing up like bristles, kept

walking around Farmer Rodel; he saw that the latter would have been glad

to choke John. Only when John and Barefoot were at the top of the stairs

did the dog come running after them.

John let the box stand, because he could not take it on his horse. But

they packed Barefoot's possessions into the sack which she had inherited

from her father.

As they were descending the stairs together on their way out, Barefoot

felt somebody quietly press her hand in the dark--it was her mistress

who was thus taking leave of her. At the threshold, with her hand upon

the door-post against which she had so often leaned, she said sadly:

"May God reward this house for all good, and forgive it for all evil!"

They had gone but a few paces when Barefoot called out: "Good heavens! I

have forgotten all my shoes! They are upstairs on the shelf!"

Scarcely had she spoken the words, when the shoes, as if they were

running after their owner, came flying out of the window and down into

the street.

"Run to the devil in them!" cried a voice from the garret window. The

voice sounded masculine, and yet it belonged to Rose.

Barefoot collected the shoes and took them to the tavern with John, who

carried the sack on his back.

The moon was shining brightly, and the whole village was already asleep.

Barefoot would not stay at the tavern.

"Then I should like to go home this very night," said John.

"Before I do anything else," replied Barefoot, "I must go to Black

Marianne. She has filled a mother's place for me, and I have not seen

her today, and have not been able to do anything for her. And besides

that, she's ill. Alas! It is too bad that I shall have to leave her; but

what am I to do? Come, go with me to her."

They went together to the house. When Barefoot opened the inside door a

moonbeam fell upon the angel on the stove, just as a sunbeam had fallen

on that day of long ago. And it seemed to smile and dance more merrily.

Barefoot cried with a loud voice:

"Marianne! Marianne! Wake up, Marianne! Happiness and blessing are here!

Wake up!"

The old woman sat up in bed; the moonlight fell upon her face and neck.

She opened her eyes wide and said:

"What is it? What is it? Who calls?"

"Rejoice! Here I bring you my John!"

"My John!" screamed the old woman, "Good God, my John! How long--how

long--I have thee--I have thee! Oh God, I thank thee a thousand and a

thousand times! Oh, my child, my boy! I see thee with a thousand eyes,

and a thousandfold--No, there--there--thy hand! Come here--there--there

in the chest is thy dowry! Take the cloth! My son! my boy! Yes, yes, she

is thine! John, my son, my son! my--"

The old woman laughed convulsively, and fell back in her bed. Amrei and

John had knelt down beside her, and when they stood up and bent over

her, she had ceased to breathe.

"Oh, heavens! She is dead! Joy killed her!" exclaimed Barefoot. "She

took you for her son. She died happy. Oh, why is it thus in the world,

why is it thus?" She sank down by the bed again, and sobbed bitterly.

At last John raised her up, and Barefoot closed the dead woman's eyes.

For a long time they stood together beside the bed; then Barefoot said:

"Come, I will wake up people who will watch by her body. God has been

very gracious; she would have no one to care for her when I was gone.

And God has given her the greatest joy in the last moment of her life.

How long, oh, how long, she waited for that joy!"

"Yes, but you cannot stay here now," said John. "You must go with me

this very night."

Barefoot woke up the gravedigger's wife, and sent her to Black Marianne.

Her mind was so wonderfully composed that she remembered to tell the

woman that the flowers, which stood on her window-ledge at the farm,

were to be planted on Black Marianne's grave; and especially that she

was not to forget to put Black Marianne's hymn-book under her head, as

she had always wished.

When at last she had arranged everything, she stood up erect and,

stretching out her arms, said:

"Now everything is done. You must forgive me, good man, that I was

obliged to bring you to a house of sorrow; and forgive me, too, if I am

not now as I should wish to be. I see now that all is well, and that God

has ordered it for the best. But still I shake with fear in every

limb--it is a hard thing to die. You cannot imagine how I have almost

puzzled my brains out about it. But now all is well, and I will be

cheerful--for I am the happiest girl in the world!"

"Yes, you are right.--But come, let us go. Will you ride with me on my

horse?" asked John.

"Yes. Is it the white horse that you had at the wedding at Endringen?"

"To be sure!"

"And, oh, that Farmer Rodel! If he didn't send to Lauterbach the night

before you came and have a white horse brought from there, so as to get

you to come to his house. Holloa! white horse, go home again!" she

concluded, almost merrily.

And thus their thoughts and feelings returned to ordinary life, and from

it they learned to appreciate their happiness anew.

CHAPTER XVI

SILVERSTEP

[The two lovers mount the white horse, which Amrei suggests they call

"Silverstep," and start out through the moonlight for John's home. As

they ride along they talk and sing and tell stories and enjoy themselves

as only lovers can. At Amrei's request, they stop on the way to see

Damie, who is with Coaly Mathew in the forest; Amrei tells him all that

has happened, and John promises to make him an independent herdsman, and

gives him a silver-mounted pipe. Damie, inwardly rejoiced, but, as

usual, not over-appreciative, reminds him of the "pair of leather

breeches," a debt which John also promises to pay. Damie then displays

unexpected cleverness by performing a mock-ceremony, in which he compels

John to ask him, as his sister's only living relative, for Amrei's hand.

Damie surprises his sister by doing this with considerable histrionic

success, so that the two lovers start out again more merry than ever.]

CHAPTER XVII

OVER HILL AND VALE

The day had dawned when the two lovers reached the town; and already

long before, when they encountered the first early-riser, they had

alighted. They felt that they must have a strange appearance, and

regarded this first person they met as a herald who had come to remind

them of the fact that they must adapt themselves to the order of human

conventionalities. So they dismounted, and John led the horse with one

hand and held Amrei with the other. Thus they went on in silence, and as

often as they looked at each other, their faces shone like those of

children newly waked from sleep; but as often as they looked down, they

became thoughtful and anxious about the immediate future.

Amrei, as if she had already been discussing the subject with John, and

in complete confidence that his mind must have been dwelling on the same

thoughts, now said:

"To be sure, it would have been more sensible if we had done the thing

in a more normal way. You should have gone home first, and meanwhile I

should have stayed somewhere--at Coaly Mathew's in the forest, if we

could have done no better. Then you could have come with your mother to

fetch me, or could have written to me, and I could have come to you with

my Damie. But do you know what I think?"

"Not everything you think."

"I think that regret is the most stupid feeling one can possibly

cherish. Do what you will, you cannot make yesterday into today. What we

did, in the midst of our rejoicing, that was right, and must remain

right. Now that our minds have been become more sober again, we can't

waste any time reproving ourselves. What we have to think of now is, how

shall we do everything right in the future? But you are such a

right-minded man that you will know what is right. And you can tell me

everything you think, only tell me honestly; if you say what you mean,

you won't hurt me, but if you keep anything back from me, you will hurt

me. But you don't regret it, do you?"

"Can you answer a riddle?" asked John.

"Yes, as a child I used to be able to do that well."

"Then tell me what this is--it is a simple, plain word: Take away the

first letter, and you're ready to tear your hair out; put it back again,

and all is firm and sure?"

"That's easy," said Barefoot, "easy as anything; it's Truth and Ruth."

At the first inn by the gate they stopped off; and Amrei, when she and

John were alone in the room, and the latter had ordered some good

coffee, said:

"How splendidly the world is arranged! These people have provided a

house, and tables, and benches, and chairs, and a kitchen, in which the

fire is burning, and they have coffee, and milk and sugar, and fine

dishes, and it is all ready for us as if we had ordered it. And when we

go farther on we find more people and more houses, with all we want in

them. It's like it is in the fairy-tale, 'Table, be covered!'"

"But you have to have the 'Loaf, come out of the bag!' too," said John,

and he reached into his pocket and drew forth a handful of money.

"Without that you'll get nothing."

"Yes, to be sure," said Amrei; "whoever has those wheels can roll

through the world. But tell me, John--did coffee ever taste to you in

your whole life like this? And the fresh white bread! Only you have

ordered too much; we cannot manage all this. The bread I shall take with

me, but it's a pity about the good coffee. How many poor people could be

refreshed by it, and we must let it go to waste. And yet you have to pay

for it just the same."

"That's no matter; one cannot figure so accurately in the world."

"Yes, yes, you are right. You see, I have been accustomed to do with

little. You must not take it amiss if I say things of that kind--I do it

without thinking."

Presently Amrei got up. Her face was glowing, and when she stood before

the glass, she exclaimed:

"Gracious heavens! How can it be? All this seems almost impossible!"

"Well, there are still some hard planks to pierce; but I am not worrying

about that. Now lie down and rest for a short time while I look for a

Bernese chaise-wagon--you can't ride on horseback with me in the

daytime--and we want one anyway."

"I cannot sleep--I have a letter to write to Haldenbrunn. I am away from

there now, and yet I enjoyed a great many good times there. And I have

other matters to settle, besides."

"Very well, do that until I come back."

John went out, and Amrei wrote a long letter to the Magistrate in

Haldenbrunn, thanking the entire community for benefits received, and

promising to adopt a child from the place some day, if it were possible;

and she once more begged to have Black Marianne's hymn-book placed under

the good old woman's head. When she had finished, she sealed the letter

and pressed her lips tight together with the remark:

"So! Now I have done my duty to the people of Haldenbrunn."

But she quickly tore the letter open again, for she considered it her

duty to show John what she had written. But a long time passed and he

did not return. And Amrei blushed when the chatty hostess said:

"I suppose your husband has some business at the Town-hall?"

It seemed to strike her with a strange shock to have John called her

"husband" for the first time.

She could not answer, and the hostess looked at her in wonder. She knew

no other way of escaping from her strange glances than by going out in

front of the house, where she sat on some piled-up boards for a long

time, waiting for John. It was, indeed, a long time before he did come

back; and when at last she caught sight of him, she said:

"When something calls you away like that again, you'll take me with you,

won't you?"

"Oh," he answered, "so you were afraid, were you? Did you think I had

gone off and left you? What would you think if I were to leave you here

and simply ride away?"

Amrei started, and then she said, severely:

"I can't say that you are very witty; in fact to joke about such a thing

as that is miserably stupid. I am sorry that you said that; for you did

something that is bad for you if you realize it, and bad for you if you

don't realize it. You talk about riding away, and think that I am to cry

to amuse you. Do you imagine, perhaps, that because you have a horse and

money, you can do as you please with me? No, your horse carried us away

together, and I came with you. What would you think if I were to say

jokingly: 'How would it be if I left you alone?' I am sorry that you

made such a jest!"

"Yes, yes, I'll say that you are right. But now, forget about it."

"No! I talk of a thing as long as there is anything about it in me, when

I am the offended person, and it is for me to stop talking about it when

I choose. And you offended yourself, too, in this matter--I mean your

real self, the person you are, and ought to be. When any one else says

anything that is not right, I can jump over it, but on you there must

not be a single spot; and believe me, to joke about such a thing as

that, is as if one took the crucifix yonder to play with as a doll."

"Oho, it's not as bad as that! But it seems to me you can't appreciate a

jest."

"I can appreciate one very well, as you shall see, but no such a one as

that. But now, that's enough about it; now I have finished and shall

think nothing more of it."

This little incident showed both of them early that, with all their

mutual devotion, they must be careful with each other. Amrei felt that

she had been too severe, whereas John was made to realize that it did

not behoove him to make jest of Amrei's solitary position, and of her

absolute dependence upon him. They did not say this to each other, but

each of them knew that the other felt it.

The little cloud that had thus come up soon evaporated under the bright

sun that now broke through it. And Amrei rejoiced like a child when a

pretty, green Bernese chaise-wagon came, with a round, padded seat in

it; and before the horse had been hitched to it, she took her seat and

clapped her hands with joy.

"Now you have only to make me fly!" she said to John, who was busy

hitching the horse. "I have ridden horseback with you, and now I am

driving with you; there is nothing left for me to do but fly." [The two

lovers now started out again, and were supremely happy as they rode

along, discussing all sorts of things. They came upon an old woman by

the road-side, and it gave Amrei a thrill of satisfaction she never

before had felt to be able to throw out a pair of shoes to her. John

commended this charitable instinct in her, and then began to tell her

all about his home.]

Was it by a tacit agreement, or was it due to the influence which the

present time exerted upon them, that they spoke not a word of how their

arrival at John's house was to be arranged until toward noon, when they

reached the outskirts of Zumarshofen? Only when they began to meet

people who knew John, and who saluted him with glances of wonder at his

companion, did he declare to Amrei that he had thought of two ways in

which the thing might best be done. Either he would take Amrei to his

sister, who lived a short distance further on--one could see the steeple

of her village peering up from behind a hill--and then go home alone and

explain everything, or else he would take Amrei home at once--that is,

she should get down half a mile before they got there, and enter the

house alone in the character of a maid.

Amrei showed great cleverness in explaining what should guide them in

this matter, and what might come of their adopting either of the two

methods of procedure proposed by John. If she stopped at his sister's,

she would first have to win over to her side a person who would not be

the one with whom the final decision lay, and it might result in all

kinds of complications, the end of which could not be foreseen. And

moreover, it would always be an unpleasant reflection, and there would

be all sorts of remarks made about it--as if she had not dared to go

straight to the house. The second plan seemed to her the better one; but

it went against her very soul to enter the house by means of a

deception. His mother, to be sure, had promised years ago to take her

into her service; but she did not want to go into her service now, and

it would be almost like stealing to try to worm herself into favor with

the old people in that way. And furthermore in such a disguise she would

be sure to do everything clumsily; she would not be able to be natural

and straightforward, and if she had to place a chair for his father, she

would be sure to overturn it, for she would always be thinking: "You are

doing this to deceive him." Moreover, even supposing all this could be

done, how could she afterward appear before the servants, when they

learned that their mistress had been obliged to smuggle herself into the

house as a maid? And she would not be able to speak a single word with

John all the time. She closed her explanation with the words:

"I have told you this only because you wanted to hear my opinion, too,

and if you talk anything over with me, I must speak out freely what is

in my mind. But I tell you, at the same time, whatever you wish, and

whatever you tell me to do, I shall do it. If you say it should be so,

so it shall be. I'll obey you without objection, and whatever you lay

upon me to do, that shall I do as best I can."

"Yes, yes, you are right," said John, absorbed in thought. "They are

both crooked ways, the first the less so. But now that we are so near

home, we must make up our minds quickly. Do you see that bare patch in

the forest yonder on the hill, with the little hut on it? And do you see

the cows, which look as small as beetles? That's our upland pasture,

that's where I intend to put your Damie."

Amrei cried out in amazement:

"Good heavens! To think where men will venture!--But that must be good

pasturing land."

"So it is; but when father gives up the farm to me, I shall introduce

more stall-feeding--it's the better way. But old people are fond of

retaining old customs. But why are we chattering again? And now that we

are so near! If I had only thought about this sooner! My head seems on

fire."

"Only keep calm; we must think it over quietly. I have a vague idea of a

way it can be done, but it doesn't seem quite plain yet."

"Ah! What do you think?"

"No, you think about it too. Perhaps you'll hit upon the right way

yourself. It's a matter for you to arrange, and both of our minds are in

such confusion now, that it will be a relief to us if we both hit upon a

way at once."

"Yes, I have an idea already. In the next village but one there is a

clergyman, whom I know very well, and who will give us the best advice.

But wait! Here is a better way yet. Suppose I stay yonder in the valley

at the miller's, and you go up to the farm and simply tell my parents

the whole story. You'll have my mother on your side directly; and you

are clever, and you'll manage my father in no time so that you can wind

him around your finger. Yes, that is the best way. Then we shan't have

to wait, and we shall have asked no stranger for help. What do you

think? Is that putting too much upon you?"

"That was exactly my idea too. So now there is no more considering to be

done, no more at all. That way shall stand as fast as if it were down in

ink. That's the way it shall be done, and 'quick to work makes the

master.' Oh, you don't know what a dear, good, splendid, honest fellow

you are!"

"No, it's you! But that is all the same now, for we two are but one

honest person, and so we shall remain. Look here--give me your hand;

that yonder is our first field. God greet thee, wifee, for now thou art

at home! And hurrah! there's our stork flying up. Stork! cry 'Welcome;'

this is your new mistress! 'I'll tell you more later!' Now, Amrei, don't

be gone too long, and send some one down to me at the mill as soon as

you can--if the wagoner is at home, you'd best send him, for he can run

like a hare. There, do you see that house yonder, with the stork's nest,

and the two barns on the hillside, to the left of the wood? There's a

linden by the house--do you see it?"

"Yes."

"That's our house. Now, come, get you down. You can't miss your way

now."

John got down and helped Amrei out of the chaise. The girl, holding the

necklace, which she had put into her pocket, like a rosary in her

clasped hands, prayed silently; John also took off his hat, and his lips

moved. The two did not say another word to each other, but Amrei went on

alone. John stood looking after her for a long time, leaning against the

white horse. Once she turned about and tried to coax the dog to return

to his master. But he would not go; he would run aside into the field,

and then start to follow her again; and not until John whistled, did the

creature come back to him.

John drove on to the mill and stopped there. He learned that his father

had been there an hour ago to wait for him, but had gone away again.

John was glad to hear that his father was strong and on his feet again,

and glad because he knew that Amrei would now find both his parents at

home. The people in the mill could not understand why John lingered with

them, and yet would hardly listen to a word they said. He kept going in

and out, and looking up the road toward the farm; for John was very

anxious and restless. He counted the steps that Amrei had to go; now she

would be in the fields, now she would have to go to this, now to that

hedge; now she would be speaking to his parents. And after all he could

not completely satisfy himself as to just what she would be doing.

CHAPTER XVIII

THE FIRST HEARTH-FIRE

Meanwhile Amrei went on, wrapped in thought. Her manner showed the

effect of the self-reliance she had learned to practice in her

childhood. It was not for nothing that she had been accustomed to solve

riddles, and that from day to day she had struggled with life's

difficulties. The whole strength of the character she had acquired was

firmly and securely implanted within her. Without further question, as

a man goes forward to meet a necessity, quiet and self-possessed, so did

she, boldly and of good courage, go on her way.

She had not gone far when she saw a farmer sitting by the wayside, with

a red cane between his legs; and on this cane he was resting his two

hands and his chin.

"God greet you," said Amrei. "Are you enjoying a rest?"

"Yes. Where are you going?"

"Up yonder to the farm. Are you going there too? If so, you may lean on

me."

"Yes, that is the way," said the old man with a grin. "Thirty years ago

I should have cared more about it, if such a pretty girl had said that

to me; I should have jumped like a colt."

"But to those who can jump like colts one doesn't say such things,"

replied Amrei, laughing.

"You are rich," said the old man. He seemed to like to talk, and smiled

as he took a pinch of snuff out of his horn snuff-box.

"How can you tell that I am rich?"

"Your teeth are worth ten thousand guilders. There's many a one would

give ten thousand guilders to have them in his mouth."

"I have no time for jesting. Now, God keep you!"

"Wait a little. I'll go with you--but you must not walk too fast." Amrei

carefully helped the old man to his feet, and he remarked:

"You are strong,"--and in his teasing way he made himself more helpless

and heavier than he actually was. As they walked along, he asked:

"To whom are you going at the farm?"

"To the farmer and his wife."

"What do you want of them?"

"That I shall tell them."

"Well, if you want anything of them, you had better turn back at once.

The mistress would give you something, but she has no authority to, and

the farmer, he's tight--he's got a board on his neck, and a stiff thumb

into the bargain."

"I don't want anything given me--I bring them something," said Amrei.

On the way they met an older man going to the field with his scythe; and

the old farmer walking with Amrei called out to him with a queer blink

in his eyes:

"Do you know if miserly Farmer Landfried is at home?"

"I think so, but I don't know," answered the man with the scythe, and he

turned away into the field.

There was a peculiar twitching in his face. And now, as he walked along,

his shoulders seemed to Amrei to be shaking up and down; he was

evidently laughing. Amrei looked at her companion's face and saw the

roguery in it. Suddenly she recognized in the withered features the face

of the man to whom she had given a jug of water, years ago, on the

Holderwasen. Snapping her fingers softly, she said to herself:

"Stop! Now I know!" And then she added aloud: "It's wrong of you to

speak in that way of the Farmer to a stranger like me, whom you don't

know, and who might be a relative of his. And I'm sure it is not true

what you say. They do say, to be sure, that the Farmer is tight; but

when you come right down to it, I dare say he has an honest heart, and

simply doesn't like to make an outcry about it when he does a good deed.

And a man who has such good children as his are said to be, must be a

good man himself. And perhaps he likes to make himself out bad before

the world, simply because he doesn't care what others think of him; and

I don't think the worse of him for that."

"You have not left your tongue behind you. Where do you come from?"

"Not from this neighborhood--from the Black Forest."

"What's the name of the place?"

"Haldenbrunn."

"Oh! Have you come all the way from there on foot?"

"No, somebody let me ride with him. He's the son of the Farmer yonder--a

good, honest man."

"Ah, at his age I should have let you ride with me too!"

They had now come to the farm, and the old man went with Amrei into the

room and cried:

"Mother, where are you?"

The wife came out of another room, and Amrei's hands trembled; she would

gladly have fallen upon her neck--but she could not--she dared not.

Then the Farmer, bursting into laughter, said:

"Just think, dame! Here's a girl from Haldenbrunn, and she has something

to say to Farmer Landfried and his wife, but she won't tell me what it

is. Now do you tell her what my name is."

"Why, that's the Farmer himself," said the woman; and she welcomed the

old man home by taking his hat from his head and hanging it up on a peg

over the stove.

"Do you see now?" said the old man to Amrei, triumphantly. "Now say what

you like."

"Won't you sit down," said the mother, pointing to a chair.

Amrei drew a deep breath and began:

"You may believe me when I say that no child could have thought more

about you than I have done, long ago, long before these last days. Do

you remember Josenhans, by the pond, where the road turns off to

Endringen?"

"Surely, surely!" said the two old people.

"Well, I am Josenhans's daughter!"

"Why, I thought I knew you!" exclaimed the old woman. "God greet you!"

She held out her hand to Amrei, and said: "You have grown to be a

strong, comely girl. Now tell me what has brought you here."

"She rode part of the way with our John," the Farmer interposed. "He'll

be here directly."

The mother gave a start. She had an inkling of something to come, and

reminded her husband that, when John went away, she had thought of the

Josenhans children.

"And I have a remembrance from both of you," said Amrei, and she brought

out the necklace and the piece of money wrapped in paper. "You gave me

that the last time you were in our village."

"See there--you lied to me, you told me that you had lost it," cried the

Farmer to his wife, reproachfully.

"And here," continued Amrei, holding out to him the groschen in its

paper cover; "here's the piece of money you gave me when I was keeping

geese on the Holderwasen, and gave you a drink from my jug."

"Yes, yes, that's all right! But what does it all mean? What you've had

given you, you may keep," said the Farmer.

Amrei stood up and said:

"I have one thing to ask you. Let me speak quite freely for a few

minutes, may I?"

"Yes, why not?"

"Look--your John wanted to take me with him and bring me here as a maid.

At any other time I would have been glad to serve in your house, indeed,

rather than anywhere else. But now it would have been dishonest; and to

people to whom I want to be honest all my life long, I won't come for

the first time with a lie in my mouth. Now everything must be as open as

the day. In a word, John and I love each other from the bottom of our

hearts, and he wants to have me for his wife."

"Oho!" cried the Farmer, and he stood up so quickly that one could

easily see that his former helplessness had been only feigned. "Oho!" he

called out again, as if one of his horses were running away.

But his wife put out her hand and held him, saying:

"Let her finish what she has to say."

And Amrei went on:

"Believe me, I have sense enough to know that one cannot take a girl,

out of pity, for a daughter-in-law. You can give me something, you can

give me a great deal, but to take me for your daughter-in-law out of

pity, is something you cannot do, and I do not wish you to do it. I

haven't a groschen of money--oh, yes, the groschen you gave me on the

Holderwasen I still have--for nobody would take it for a groschen," she

added, turning to the Farmer, who could not repress a smile. "I have

nothing of my own, nay, worse than that--I have a brother who is strong

and healthy, but for whom I have to provide. I have kept geese, and I

have been the most insignificant person in the village, and all that is

true. But nobody can say the least harm of me, and that, too, is true.

And as far as those things which are really given to people by God are

concerned, I could say to any princess: 'I don't put myself one hair's

breadth behind you, if you have seven golden crowns on your head.' I

would rather have somebody else say these, things for me, for I am not

fond of talking about myself. But all my life I have been obliged to

speak for myself, and today, for the last time, I do it, when life and

death are at stake. By that I mean--don't misunderstand me--if you won't

have me, I shall go quietly away; I shall do myself no harm, I shall not

jump into the water, or hang myself. I shall merely look for a new

position, and thank God that such a good man once wanted to have me for

his wife; and I'll consider that it was not God's will that it should be

so--" Amrei's voice faltered, and her form seemed to dilate. And then

her voice grew stronger again, as she summoned all her firmness and

said, solemnly: "But prove to yourselves--ask yourselves in your deepest

conscience, whether what you do is God's will.--I have nothing more to

say."

Amrei sat down. All three were silent for a time, and then the old man

said:

"Why, you can preach like a clergyman."

But the mother dried her eyes with her apron, and said:

"Why not? Clergymen have not more than one mind and one heart!"

"Yes, that's you!" cried the old man with a sneer. "There's something of

a parson in you, too. If any one comes to you with a few speeches like

that, you're cooked directly!"

"And you talk as if you would not be cooked or softened till you die,"

retorted the wife.

"Oh, indeed!" said the old man bitterly. "Now look you, you saint from

the lowlands; you're bringing a fine sort of peace into my house; you

have managed already to make my wife turn against me--you have captured

her already. Well, I suppose you can wait until death has carried one

off, and then you can do what you please."

"No!" exclaimed Amrei, "I won't have that! Just as little as I wish that

John should take me for his wife without your blessing, just so little

do I wish that the sin should be in our hearts, that we should both be

waiting for you to die. I scarcely knew my parents, I cannot remember

them--I only love them as one loves God, without ever having seen Him.

But I also know what it is to die. Last night I closed Black Marianne's

eyes; I did what she asked me to do all my life long, and yet now that

she is dead, I sometimes think: How often you were impatient and bitter

toward her, and how many a service you might have done her! And now she

is lying there, and it is all over; you can do nothing more for her, and

you can't crave her forgiveness for anything.--I know what it is to die,

and I will not have--"

"But I will!" cried the old man; and he clenched his fists and set his

teeth. "But I will!" he shouted again. "You stay here, and you belong to

us! And now, whosoever likes may come, and let him say what he pleases.

You, and no one but you, shall have my John!"

The mother ran to the old man and embraced him; and he, not being

accustomed to it, called out in surprise:

"What are you doing?"

"Giving you a kiss. You deserve it, for you are a better man than you

make yourself out to be."

The old man, who all this time had a pinch of snuff between his fingers

which he did not want to waste, took it quickly, and then said:

"Well, I don't object," but he added: "But now I shall dismiss you, for

I have much younger lips to kiss, which taste better. Come here, you

disguised parson."

"I'll come, but first you must call me by name."

"Well, what is your name?"

"You need not know that, for you can give me a name yourself--you know

what name I mean."

"You're a clever one! Well, if you like, come here, daughter-in-law.

Does that name suit you?"

In reply Amrei flung herself upon him.

"Am I not to be asked at all?" complained the mother with a radiant

face.

The old man had become quite saucy in his joy. He took Amrei by the

hand, and asked, in a satirical imitation of a clergyman's voice:

"Now I demand of you, honorable Cordula Catherine, called Dame

Landfried, will you take this--" and he whispered to the girl aside:

"What is your Christian name?"

"Amrei."

Then the Farmer continued in the same tone:

"Will you take this Amrei Josenhans, of Haldenbrunn to be your

daughter-in-law, and never let her have a word to say, as you do to your

husband, feed her badly, abuse her, oppress her, and as they say, bully

her generally?"

The old fellow seemed beside himself; some strange revulsion had taken

place within him. And while Amrei hung around the mother's neck, and

would not let her go, the old man struck his red cane on the table and

cried:

"Where's that good-for-nothing, John? Here's a fellow who sends his

bride for us to take care of, and goes wandering about the world

himself! Who ever heard of such a thing?"

Amrei then tore herself away, and said that the wagoner, or some one

else, must be sent at once to the mill to get John, who was waiting

there. The father declared that he ought to be left in suspense in the

mill for at least three hours; that should be his punishment for having

hidden in such a cowardly way behind a petticoat. And when he came

home, he should wear a woman's hood; in fact, he wouldn't have him in

the house, for when John came, he, the father, would have nothing of the

bride at all, and it made him angry already to think of the foolish way

in which they would carry on together.

Meanwhile the mother managed to slip away and send the quick-footed

wagoner to the mill.

And now the mother thought that Amrei ought to have some refreshment.

She wanted to cook an omelette immediately, but Amrei begged to be

allowed to light the first fire in the house that was to prepare

something for herself, and asked that she might cook something for her

parents too. They let her have her way, and the two old people went with

her into the kitchen. She knew how to manage it all so cleverly, seeing

at a glance where everything was, and hardly requiring to ask a single

question, that the old Farmer kept nodding to his wife, and said at

last:

"She can do housekeeping like singing at sight; she can read it all off

from the page, like the new schoolmaster."

The three stood by the fire, which was blazing merrily, when John came

in; and the fire was not blazing more merrily on the hearth than was

inward happiness blazing in the eyes of all three. The hearth and its

fire became a holy altar, surrounded by worshippers, who, however, only

laughed and teased one another.

CHAPTER XIX

SECRET TREASURES

Amrei felt so much at home in the house that, by the second day, she was

acting as if she had been brought up there from childhood. The old man

followed her around and looked on, while she knowingly took things in

hand and accomplished them calmly and steadily, without hurrying or

resting.

There are people who, when they go to get the least thing, a plate or a

jug, disturb the thoughts of everybody in the room, and seem to drag, so

to speak, the attention of all present about with them. Amrei, on the

contrary, knew how to manage and accomplish everything in such a way

that it was restful to watch her work, and people were consequently so

much the more grateful for everything she did for them. How often had

the Farmer complained about the fact that, when the salt was wanted,

some one always had to rise from the table to get it! But now Amrei

herself set the table, and she took care to put the salt-cellar on

immediately after the cloth was spread. When the Farmer praised Amrei

for this, his wife said with a smile:

"You talk as if you had not lived at all until now, and as if you had

always been obliged to eat your food without salt or seasoning!"

And then John told them that Amrei was also called the Salt Countess,

and he related the story of the King and his Daughter.

It was a happy family--in the parlor, in the yard, in the field. The

Farmer often said that his food for years had not tasted so good to him

as it did now; and he used to get Amrei to prepare things for him three

or four times a day, at quite irregular hours. And he made her sit with

him while he ate it.

The wife, with a feeling of proud satisfaction, took Amrei into the

dairy, and then into the store-rooms. In the latter place she opened a

large, gaily-painted chest, full of fine, bleached linen, and said:

"This is your outfit--nothing is lacking but shoes. I am very glad that

you kept the shoes you got with your wages, for I have a superstition

about that."

When Amrei questioned her about the way things had been done in the

house hitherto, she nodded approvingly. She did not, however, express

any approval in words, but the confidential tone in which she discussed

ordinary matters made it quite evident that she felt it. The very

supremity of satisfaction lay in her words. And when she began to

depute certain matters in the household management to Barefoot, she

said:

"Child, let me tell you something; if there is anything about our ways

of doing things in the house that doesn't please you, you needn't be

afraid to alter it so that it suits you. I am not one of those who think

that things must always remain just as they were originally arranged,

and that no changes should be made. You have a perfect right to do as

you think best, and I shall be glad to see a fresh hand at work. Only if

you'll listen to me--I advise you, for your own sake, to do it

gradually."

It was pleasant, indeed, to see old experience and young strength

joining hands, physically and mentally. Amrei declared with heartfelt

sincerity that she found everything capitally arranged, and that she

should be only too glad if one day, when she was old, the household was

in as good order as it was now.

"You look far ahead," said the old woman. "And that is a good thing; for

whosoever thinks of the future thinks of the past as well, and so you

will not forget me when I am gone."

Messengers had been sent out to announce the family event to the sons

and sons-in-law of the house, and to invite them to Zumarshofen the

following Sunday. After that the old man trotted about after Amrei more

than ever; he seemed to have something on his mind which he wanted to

say, but could not express.

There is a saying about buried treasures to the effect that a black

monster squats over them, and that on holy nights a blue flame appears

over the spot where the rich treasures lie buried; furthermore that

children, born on Sunday, can see this flame, and if they remain calm

and unmoved, they can secure the treasure. One would never have thought

that such a treasure was hidden in old Farmer Landfried, and that

squatting over it was black obstinacy and contempt for humankind. But

Amrei saw the little blue flame hovering above him, and knew how to

conduct herself in such a way as to release the treasure.

No one could tell how she produced such an effect upon him that he

manifestly strove to appear particularly good and benevolent in her

eyes--the mere fact that he took any interest in a poor girl at all was

in itself a wonder. This alone was clear to Amrei--that he did not want

his wife alone to appear as the just and amiable one, and himself as the

angry snarler, of whom people must be afraid. Perhaps the fact that

Amrei, even before she knew who he was, had accused him of not thinking

it worth while to appear good and kind before men, had opened his heart.

At all events he had so much to say now, every time he encountered her,

that it seemed as if he had been keeping all his thoughts in a

savings-box, which he was at last opening. And in it there were some

very singular old coins which had declined in value, also some large

medals which were no longer in circulation at all, and again there were

some quite fresh ones, of pure, unalloyed silver. He could not express

his thoughts as well as his wife had done on that day when she had

talked with John--his language was stiff in all its joints--but still he

managed to hit the point, and almost gave himself the appearance of

taking Amrei's part against his wife; nor was it at all amiss when he

said:

"Look you, the Dame is like the 'good hour' itself; but the good hour is

not a good day, a good week, or a good year. She is but a woman, and

with women it is always April weather; for a woman is only half a

person--that I maintain, and nobody can dissuade me from it!"

"You give us fine praise," said Amrei.

"Yes, it is true," said the Farmer, "I am talking to you. But as I was

saying, the Dame is a good soul, only she's too good. Consequently it

annoys her when one doesn't do as she says, because she means well; and

she thinks one doesn't know how good she really is, if one does not obey

her. She can't understand that often one does not obey her because what

she asks is inadvisable, however good her intentions may have been. And

remember this especially; don't ever do anything after her, that is,

just as she does it; do it your own way, the way you think is right--she

likes that much better. She does not like to have it appear that people

are subject to her orders--but you will find all that out yourself. And

if anything should happen, for heaven's sake don't put your husband

between two fires! There is nothing worse than when a husband stands

between his wife and mother, and the mother says: 'I no longer amount to

anything as far as my daughter-in-law is concerned; yes, even my own

children are untrue to me;' and the wife says 'Yes, now I see what kind

of a man you are--you let your wife be trampled on!' I advise you, if

anything should come up that you can't manage by yourself, to tell me

about it quietly, and I'll help you. But; as I say, don't put your

husband between two fires. He has been a bit spoiled by his mother, but

he'll grow more manly now. Just keep on pushing ahead, and think of me

as one of your family, and as your natural protector. For that is true;

on your mother's side I am very distantly related to you."

And now he tried to disentangle a strangely intricate genealogy; but he

was unable to find the right thread, and succeeded only in getting the

different relationships more and more mixed up, like a skein of yarn.

And at last he always concluded by saying:

"You may believe me on my word that we are related; for we _are_

related, although I can't quite figure out how."

And now the time before his end had really come, when he no longer gave

away merely bad grosschens; it did him good to donate at last a part of

his possessions having some real significance and value. For one evening

he called Amrei out behind the house and said to her:

"Look, my girl, you are good and sensible, but you don't know just how it

is with a man. My John has a good heart, but some day it may possibly

annoy him, the thought that you had absolutely nothing of your own. So

then, take this, but don't tell a soul anything about it, or from whom

you got it. Say that you worked hard and saved it up. There--take it!"

He handed her a stocking full of round thalers, and added:

"That was not to have been found until after I was dead; but it is

better so--he'll get it now and think it came from you. This whole

affair is out of the common way, so that it can easily be added that you

had a secret sum of money. But don't forget that there are also

thirty-two feather-thalers in it, which are worth a grosschen each more

than ordinary thalers. Take good care of it--put it in the chest where

your linen is, and always keep the key with you. And on Sunday, when the

entire family is assembled, pour it out on the table."

"I don't like to do that. I think John ought to do that, if it is

necessary to do it at all."

"It is necessary. But if you like, John may do it--but sh! put it out of

sight!--quickly! Hide it in your apron, for I hear John coming! I think

he is jealous." And the two parted in haste.

And that very evening the mother took Amrei up into the attic, and out

of a drawer drew forth a tolerably heavy bag. The cord which held it

together was tied and knotted in a remarkable manner. She said to Amrei:

"There--untie that!"

Amrei tried, but it was hard work.

"Wait! I'll get a pair of shears and we'll cut it open!"

"No," objected Amrei. "I don't like to do that! Just have a little

patience, mother, I'll undo it all right!"

The mother smiled; and Amrei, with great difficulty, but with a skilful

hand, finally got the cord untied. Then the old woman said:

"Good! That's fine! Now look at what's inside of it."

Amrei looked in and saw a quantity of gold and silver coins. Then the

mother went on to say:

"Look you, child, you have wrought a miracle upon the Farmer. Even now

I can't understand how he came to give in--but you have not entirely

converted him yet. My husband is always talking about it, saying what a

pity it is that you have nothing of your own. He can't get over it, and

keeps thinking that you must have a neat little sum tucked away

somewhere, and that you are deceiving us about it, merely to find out if

we are content to take you as you are. He won't let himself be talked

out of that notion, and so I hit upon an idea. God will not impute it to

us as a sin. Look--this is what I have saved during the thirty-six years

my husband and I have kept house together. There was no deception about

it, and some of it I inherited from my mother anyway. But now you take

it and say it is your property. It will make the Farmer very happy,

especially since he was clever enough to suspect it beforehand. Why do

you look at me in such a confused way? Believe me when I tell you that

you may do it--there is no wrong in it, for I have thought it over time

and again. Now, go and hide it, and don't say a word against it--not a

single word. Don't thank me or do anything--for it's the same to me

whether my child gets it now or later, and it will please my husband

while he's yet alive. And now, quick!--tie it up again!"

Early the next morning Amrei told John all about what his parents had

said to her, and what they had given her. And John cried out joyously:

"Lord in heaven, forgive me! I could have believed such a thing of my

mother, but of my father I should never have dreamt it! Why, you must be

a witch! And look you! We will do that--we won't tell either of them

about the other. And the best part of it is, that each wants to deceive

the other, whereas, in reality, both of them will be deceived! Yes, they

must both think that you really had some extra money! Hurrah! That will

be a merry jest for the betrothal party!"

But in the midst of all the joy in the house there were all sorts of

anxieties too!

CHAPTER XX

IN THE FAMILY CIRCLE

It is not morality that rules the world, but a hardened form of it

called "custom." As the world is now disposed, it would rather forgive

an offense against morality than an offense against custom. Happy are

those times and countries in which morality and custom are still one.

Every dispute that arises, on a small scale as well as on a large one,

in general as well as in particular, hinges on the effort to reconcile

the contradiction between these two; and to melt the hardened form of

custom back into the true ore of morality, and stamp the coin anew

according to its value.

Even here, in this little story dealing with people who live apart from

the great tumult of the world, the reflection of this truth is seen.

The mother, who was secretly the most rejoiced over the happy

realization of her hopes, was yet full of peculiar anxiety concerning

the opinion of the world.

"After all," she said, complainingly, to Amrei, "you did a thoughtless

thing to come into the house in the way you did, so that we cannot go

and fetch you to the wedding. It was not good, not customary. If I could

only send you away for a short time, or else John, so that it would all

be more according to rule."

And to John she said plaintively:

"I hear already the talk there'll be if you marry in such a hurry.

People will say: 'Twice asked, the third time persuaded--that's the way

worthless people do it!'"

But she allowed herself to be pacified by both of them, and smiled when

John said:

"Mother, you have studied up everything, like a clergyman. Then tell me,

why should decent people refrain from doing something, simply because

indecent people use it as a cloak? Can any one say anything bad about

me?"

"No,--you have been a good lad all your life."

"Well, then let them have a little confidence in me now, and believe

that a thing may be good, even if it does not look so at first sight. I

have a right to ask that much of them. The way Amrei and I came together

was out of the usual order, to be sure, and the affair has gone on in

its own way from the very beginning. But it wasn't a bad way. Why, it's

like a miracle, if we look at it rightly. And what is it to us if people

refuse to believe in miracles nowadays, and prefer to find all sorts of

badness in these things? One must have courage and not ask the world's

opinion in everything. The clergyman at Hirlingen once said: 'If a

prophet were to rise today, he would first have to pass the government

examination and show that what he wanted was in the regular order.' Now,

mother, when one knows for oneself that something is right, then it is

best to go forward in a straight line and push aside, right and left,

whatever stands in one's way. Let people stare and wonder for a

while--they will think better of it in time."

The mother very likely felt that a thing might be accepted as a miracle

if it came in the form of a sudden, happy event, but that even the most

unusual things later on must gradually conform to the laws of tradition

and of strong, established custom. The wedding might appear as a

miracle, but the marriage, which involved a continuance, would not. She

therefore said:

"With all these people, whom you now look at with proud indifference,

because you know that you are doing right--with all these people you'll

have to live, and you'll expect them, not to look at you askance, but to

give you due respect. Now if they are to do that, you must give and

allow them what they are accustomed to demand. You cannot force them to

make an exception in your case, and you can't run after each one

separately and say: 'If you knew how it all came about, you would say

that I was quite right in doing it.'"

But John rejoined:

"You shall see that nobody will have anything to say against my Amrei,

when he or she has known her a single hour!"

And he resorted to a good way, not only of pacifying his mother, but

also of causing her to rejoice in her innermost soul. He reported to her

how all the warnings she had given him, and all the ways of testing a

girl she had enumerated, had found exact correspondence in Amrei, as if

she had been made to order. And she could not help laughing, when he

concluded:

"You must have had the last in your head upon which the shoes up above

are made; for they fit her who is to run about in them as if they were

made for her." The mother let herself be quieted.

On the Saturday morning previous to the family gathering, Damie made his

appearance; but he was immediately dispatched back to Haldenbrunn to

procure all the necessary papers from the magistrate in the town-hall.

The first Sunday was an anxious day at Farmer Landfried's. The old

people had accepted Amrei, but how would it be with the rest of the

family? It is no easy matter to enter a large family of that kind unless

the way is paved with horses and wagons, and all sorts of furniture and

money, and a number of relatives.

Many wagons arrived that Sunday at Farmer Landfried's from the uplands

and lowlands. There came driving up brothers-in-law and sisters-in-law,

and all their relations.

"John has a wife, and he brought her straight home without her parents,

without a clergyman, and without the authorities having had a word to

say in the matter. She must be a beauty that he found behind a hedge

somewhere!"

This is what all of them were saying.

The horses on the wagons also suffered for what had happened at Farmer

Landfried's. They received many a lash, and when they kicked, they

suffered all the more for it; for whoever was driving whipped them until

his arm was tired. This caused many a wrangle with the wives, who sat

beside the drivers and protested and scolded about such a reckless,

cruel way of driving.

A little fortress of carriages stood in Farmer Landfried's courtyard,

and in the house the entire large family was assembled. There they sat

together in high water-boots, or in clouted laced-boots, and with

three-cornered hats, some worn with the corner, others with the

broadside forward. The women whispered among themselves, and then made

signs to their husbands, or else said to them quietly: "Just let us

alone--we will drive the strange bird out all right." And a bitter,

jeering laugh arose when it was rumored here and there, that Amrei had

been a goose-girl.

At last Amrei entered; but she could not offer, her hand to anybody. For

she was carrying a large bottle of red wine under her arm, and so many

glasses, besides two plates of cake, that it seemed as if she had seven

hands. Every finger-joint appeared to be a hand; but she put everything

so gently and noiselessly on the table, on which her mother-in-law had

spread a white cloth, that everybody looked at her in wonder. Then,

silently and without any signs of trepidation, she filled all the

glasses, and said:

"My parents have given me authority to bid you a hearty welcome! Now

drink!"

"We are not used to it in the morning," said a heavy man, with an

uncommonly large nose; and he spread himself out in his chair. This was

George, John's oldest brother.

"We drink only goose-wine (water)," said one of the women; and a

scarcely-suppressed laugh went around the room.

Amrei felt the taunt, but kept her temper; and John's sister was the

first to take the glass and drink to her. She first clinked her glass

against John's with a "May God bless you!" She only half responded to

Amrei, who also held out her glass. Now, the other women considered it

impolite, even sinful,--for, at the first draught, the so-called

"John's-draught," it is looked upon as sinful to hold back--not to

respond; and the men also let themselves be persuaded, so that for a

time nothing was heard but the clinking and putting down of glasses.

"Father is right," old Dame Landfried at last said to her daughter.

"Amrei looks as if she were your sister, but she resembles still more

Elizabeth, who died."

"Yes; none of you have lost by it. If Elizabeth had lived, the property

would have been smaller by one share anyway," observed the father. And

the mother added:

"But now she has been given back to us again."

The old man had hit the spot where, as a matter of fact, all of them

were sore, although they tried to persuade themselves, and each other,

that they were prejudiced against Amrei because she had come among them

without any relatives of her own. And while Amrei was talking to John's

sister, the old farmer said to his son in a low voice:

"One would never imagine, to look at her, what she has. Just think!--she

has a bag stuffed full of crown thalers! But you must not say anything

to any one about it."

This injunction was so well obeyed, that within a few minutes every

person in the room knew about the bag of thalers, with the exception of

John's sister, who afterward took great credit to herself for having

been so friendly to Amrei, although she thought that Amrei had not a

farthing of her own.

Sure enough! John had gone out, and he was now entering again with a

large bag, on which was written the name "Josenhans of Haldenbrunn;" and

when he poured out the rich contents, which rolled rattling and clinking

over the table, all were dumbfounded. But the most astonished of all

were the father and mother.

So Amrei had really had a secret treasure! For there was much more here

than either one had given her. Amrei did not dare to look up, and every

one praised her for her unexampled humility. And now she succeeded in

winning them all over to her side; and when the numerous members of the

family took their leave in the evening, each one said to her in secret:

"Look you; it was not I who was against you because you had nothing--it

was so-and-so, who was always opposing you. I say now, as I said and

thought before, that even if you had had nothing but the clothes you

wore, you were cut out for our family; and I could not have wished for a

better wife for John, or a better daughter-in-law for the old people."

It was easy to say that now, for they all thought that Amrei had brought

with her a considerable fortune in cash.

In Allgau they talked for years of the wonderful way in which young

Farmer Landfried had brought home his wife, and told how finely he and

his wife had danced together at their wedding, and especially did they

praise a waltz called "Silverstep," the music for which they got from

the lowlands.

And Damie?--he is one of the most noted shepherds in Allgau, and has,

moreover, a lofty name, for he is known in the country as "Vulture

Damie." Why? Because Damie has destroyed the nests of two dangerous

vultures, and thus avenged himself on them for twice having stolen young

lambs from him. If it were the custom to dub men knights nowadays, he

would be called "Damian of Vulturescraig." Moreover, the male side of

the Josenhanses of Vulturescraig will die with him, for he is still a

bachelor. But he is a good uncle--better than the one in America. When

the cattle are brought in at the end of the summer, he has many stories

to tell his sister's children, on winter nights, about life in America,

about Coaly Matthew in Mossbrook Wood, and about shepherds' adventures

in the mountains of Allgau. In particular, he knows a number of funny

stories to tell about a cow which he calls his "herd-cow," and which

wears a deep-sounding bell.

And Damie said once to his sister:

"Dame"--for that is what he always calls her--"Dame, your oldest boy

takes after you, and uses just such words as you used to. What do you

think?--the boy said to me today: 'Uncle, your herd-cow is your

heart-cow too, isn't she?' Yes, the boy is just on your pattern."

Farmer John wanted to have his first little daughter christened

"Barefoot," but it is no longer permissible to create names out of

incidents in daily life. The name was not accepted in the church

register, so that John had the child named "Barbara." But, on his own

authority, he has changed that name to "Barefoot."

* * * * *

JEREMIAS GOTTHELF

* * * * *

ULI, THE FARMHAND

TRANSLATIONS AND SYNOPSES

BY BAYARD QUINCY MORGAN, PH.D.

Instructor in German, University of Wisconsin

CHAPTER I

A MASTER AWAKES; A SERVANT IS AROUSED

A dark night lay upon the earth; still darker was the place where a

subdued voice repeatedly called, "Johannes." It was a tiny chamber in a

large farmhouse; the voice came from the great bed which almost filled

the further end of the room. In it lay a farmer and his wife, and to him

the latter cried "Johannes" until he presently began to grumble and

finally to ask, "What do you want? What is it?"

"You'll have to get up and fodder the stock. It's after half-past four,

and Uli didn't get home till after two and fell downstairs at that when

he tried to get into his room. I should think you'd have waked up, he

made such a noise. He was drunk, and now he won't want to get up; and

anyhow I'd rather he wouldn't take a lantern into the stable while he's

tipsy."

"Servants are a trial nowadays," said the farmer, striking a light and

dressing. "You can hardly get 'em or pay 'em enough, and then you're

supposed to do everything yourself and never say a word about anything.

You're not master in your own house any more, and you can't do enough of

your own errands to keep from quarrels and from being run down."

"But you can't let this go on," said his wife; "it's happening too

often. Only last week he went off on two sprees; you know he drew his

pay before Ash Wednesday. I'm not thinking of you alone, but also of

Uli. If nothing's said to him he'll think he's got a right to go on so,

and will keep on worse and worse, and then we'll have to take it on our

consciences; for masters are masters after all, and let folks say what

they will about the new fashion, that it's nobody's business what the

servants do out of working hours, we're masters in our own house just

the same, and we're responsible to God and men for what we allow in our

house and what we overlook in our servants. Then too I'm thinking of the

children. You must take him into the sitting-room after breakfast, and

read him the riot act."

You must know that there prevails on many farms, especially those which

belong to the real farmer aristocracy--i.e., those which have for a long

time been handed down in the same family, so that family customs have

been established and family respectability is cherished--the very

pleasant custom of causing absolutely no quarrel, no violent scene,

which could attract the neighbors' attention in any way. In proud calm

the house stands amid the green trees; with calm, grave demeanor its

indwellers move about and in it, and over the tree-tops sounds at most

the neighing of the horses, never the voices of men. There is little

noisy rebuke. Man and wife never rebuke each other in public; and

mistakes of the servants they often ignore, or make, as it were in

passing, a remark, let fall merely a word or a hint, which reaches only

the ear for which it is intended. When something unusual occurs or the

measure is full, they call the sinner into the sitting-room as

unostentatiously as possible, or seek him out while he is working alone,

and "read him the riot act," as the saying is; and for this the master

has usually prepared himself carefully. He performs this duty in perfect

calm, quite like a father, keeps nothing from the sinner, not even the

bitterest truth, but gives him a just hearing too, and puts before him

the consequences of his misdoings with respect to his future destiny.

[Illustration: JEREMIAS GOTTHELF]

And when the master is done he is content, and the affair is settled to

this extent, that neither the rebuked one nor his fellows can detect the

least thing in the conduct of the master--no bitterness, nor vehemence,

nor anything else. These reprimands are mostly of good effect by virtue

of the prevailing fatherly tone, the calmness of their delivery, and

their considerately chosen setting. Of the self-control and calm

serenity in such houses one can scarcely form a conception.

When the master was almost through in the stable Uli came along, but in

silence; they spoke no word to each other. When the voice from the

kitchen door called them to breakfast the master went at once to the

well-trough and washed his hands, but Uli stood long undecided. Perhaps

he would not have come to breakfast at all if the mistress herself had

not called him again. He was ashamed to show his face, which was black

and blue and bloody. He did not know that it is better to be ashamed of

a thing before it is done, than afterward. But this he was to learn.

At the table no remark was passed, no question which might have

concerned him; and the two maids did not even venture to show mocking

faces, for the master and mistress wore serious ones. But when they had

eaten and the maids were carrying out the dishes, and Uli, who had

finished last, raised his elbows from the table and put his cap on his

head again, showing that he had prayed and was going out, the master

said, "A word with you," went into the sitting-room and shut the door

behind them. The master sat down at the further end near the little

table; Uli stood still by the door and assumed a sheepish expression

which could as easily be transformed into defiance as into penitence. He

was a tall, handsome lad, not yet twenty years old, powerful in build,

but with something in his face that did not indicate innocence and

moderation, and that by next year could make him look ten years older.

"Listen, Uli," the master began, "things can't go on this way; you're

getting too wild to suit me. You go on night revels and sprees too

often. I won't trust my horses and cows to a man whose head is full of

brandy or wine, and I can't send him into the stable with a lantern,

especially when he smokes as you do. I've seen too many houses burned up

by such carelessness. I don't know what you're thinking of and what you

think is going to come of all this."

He hadn't burned up anything yet, Uli answered; he had always done his

work, no one had needed to do it for him, and nobody had paid for what

he drank; it was nobody's business what he spent on drink, it was his

own money.

"But it's my servant," answered the master, "that's drinking up his

money. When you carry on it comes back on me, and the people say that

you're the Bottom-Farmer's man and that they can't imagine what he's

thinking of to let you carry on so and to have such a servant as you.

You haven't burned up any house yet, but think, Uli, wouldn't once be

too much, and would you ever have a quiet moment again if you thought

you had burned up my house, and if we and the children couldn't get out

and were burned to death? And how about your work? I'd rather have you

lie abed all day long. Why, you fall asleep under the cows you're

milking, and you don't see, hear, or smell anything, and stumble around

the house as if your liver was out of whack. It's terrible to watch

you."

He wouldn't take this, said Uli, and if his work wasn't good enough for

him he'd leave. But it was always so nowadays, you couldn't satisfy a

master any more, even if working all the time; one was worse than the

other. As for pay, they wanted to give less and less, and the food got

worse every day. After awhile one would have to gather fleas, beetles,

and grasshoppers if one wanted to have meat and fat with his vegetables.

"Listen, Uli," said the master, "you're in a bad temper still, and I

oughtn't to have said anything to you. But I'm sorry for you, for you've

been a fine lad and used to be able to work. For awhile I thought you'd

turn out well, and I was glad. But since you began this idling and

night-running, you've become a different fellow. You don't care about

anything any more; you're a sorehead, and when I say the least word to

you either sauce me or sulk for a week. Go now, think it over, and if

you're not willing to change, then in God's name leave me; I don't want

you any longer. Give me your answer in a week."

He'd soon have his mind made up, it wouldn't take a week, Uli growled as

he went out; but the master pretended not to hear.

When the master came out, his wife asked him as usual, "What did you say

to him, and what did he say?"

"I couldn't do anything with him," answered the master. "Uli is still in

a bad temper, for he hasn't slept off his spree yet; it would have been

better to talk to him tomorrow or in the evening, after the natural

seediness of 'the day after' had softened him up a little. Now I've

given him time to think it over, and shall wait and see what comes of

it."

Uli went out in bitter anger, as if the greatest injustice had been done

him. He flung the tools around as though everything was to go to smash

in the one day, and he bawled at the cattle until the master ached in

every bone. But the latter forced himself to be calm, merely saying

once, "Easy, easy!" With the other servants Uli had no dealings, but

scowled at them too. As the master had not reprimanded him before the

others, he did not care to inform them of his disgrace, and because he

did not make common cause with them he considered that they were on the

master's side and his enemies--a state of mind quite in accord with that

deeply truthful saying: "He that is not for me is against me." So there

was no one to put notions into his head, and he had no opportunity to

swear that the devil or what-not might take him if he stayed here an

hour after his time was up.

Little by little the wine and other spirits departed from him, and more

and more sluggish grew his limbs; the previous tension yielded to an

intolerable exhaustion, which affected not only body but mind. And as

every act of the exhausted body is hard and painful to perform, so every

past and potential act seems to the exhausted spirit, which would fain

weep over what it laughed at before; what formerly caused pleasure and

joy now brings only grief and sorrow; the things but yesterday eagerly

grasped now bring a craze that would tear the hair from its head, aye,

even the whole head from its body. When this mood envelops the soul it

is irresistible, and over all a man's thought and ideas it casts its

sickly gleam.

While Uli, as long as the effect of the wine was upon him, had been

angry with the master for his rebuke, now that its force was spent he

became angry at himself for his debauch. He recalled the twenty-three

farthings which he had gone through in one evening, and which would now

take almost a fortnight's work to earn again. He was angry at the work

which he would have to do for this purpose, at the wine which he had

drunk, at the tavern-keeper who had furnished it, and so on. He lost all

sense, forgot everything, did everything wrong. He was uncomfortable,

discontented with himself, hence also with all others, with the whole

world; he had good words for none, and nothing suited him. He imagined

that the mistress was intentionally cooking poor meals and preparing

everything he didn't like; that the master was tormenting him with

needless work; that the horses were all bad-tempered and that the cows

purposely did everything they could to bother him--the stupidest cows

that ever grazed on God's earth.

The farmer and his wife let the lad alone; it seemed as if they paid no

heed to him. But it was not so. The mistress had once or twice remarked

to her husband how wildly Uli was carrying on--she had never known him

to be in such a state before. Had her husband spoken too sharply to him?

But the farmer did not think so; Uli wasn't angry at him alone but at

the whole world, he said--probably chiefly angry at himself and was

letting it out on others.

On Sunday he would talk with him again. Things couldn't go on this way

any longer; Uli would have to mend his ways or go. But he mustn't be too

harsh, said the mistress. After all, Uli wasn't the worst in the world;

they knew what he was, but they didn't know what they might get.