mountain, and was mightily fond of teasing people, but would also do
them great kindnesses now and then. Thus a poor maiden was once picking
up wood in the forest, at the mouth of the cave, on a cold winter’s
day, when she met a tiny man with a crown upon his head, and he said to
her: “Kind maiden, I pray thee, pick me up and put me in thy basket; it
snows, and I am so cold and tired, and have no shelter. Have pity on
me, and take me to thy cottage.” The maid had never seen the dwarf-king
before; but as he begged so earnestly, she picked him up, put him in
her basket, covered him over with her apron to keep the snow off, and
turned homewards. But on the way the little man grew so heavy that
she could hardly stagger along under the weight, and had much ado to
get her basket home. She put it down by the fire, and whipped off the
apron, crying: “Let us see what thou art made of, little man, to weigh
so much!” But what were her surprise and joy to find the little man
gone, and in his place a great lump of solid silver!
“That is an easy way enough to get rich,” said another miner, taking
the pipe from his mouth. He was a native of the Hartz Mountains, and
was looked upon with suspicion for having left his own province to
seek for work so far away. “But every one does not come off so well
as that. There is plenty of treasure hidden in our mountains too; and
there is one spot I mind, near to where I was working, not so long ago,
that I can tell a strange tale of. ’Twas hard by a copper-mine, and
the owners of the works were very rich. But one night the works, the
owners, their house and all, disappeared; all that was left was a great
heap of slack. People said their money was buried beneath it; and not
long after, we began to notice that a blue flame would flicker up from
the slack every night between eleven and twelve. And there was a tall,
black man’s figure, too,” he continued, lowering his voice, “that would
stand over the flame, and try to keep it in till twelve o’clock. That
should have been enough to keep folk from meddling with the place; but
there was a man from Sonan, who declared he had lifted many a treasure,
and was going to have a try for this. And he talked over my brother
and some other men, poor fools, into giving him a helping hand. It was
settled they were to meet at sunset--for that was the right time--by
the slack-heap. ‘Only be sure,’ said the leader, ‘not to speak a single
word while we are at the job, whatever chances, or all is lost.’ At the
appointed hour the work began, and sure enough, after a short time,
they came upon a great pot, brimming over with golden ducats. Now it
had to be lifted. The levers were soon at hand, and up, up, it came. It
was almost on a level with the ground, when a wild shouting and yelping
of dogs were heard; and the workmen turned, resting for a moment upon
their poles, to see what it was. Then behold! from the shadow of the
woods, the Wild Huntsman and his train swept forth, flying through
the air, and followed by their baying hounds. Every one has heard of
the Wild Huntsman, but it is given to few to see him. He went by so
fast, my brother said, that it was as the passing of a shadow across
the sun; yet they could see he wore the dress of a forester, and his
mantle fluttering in the breeze looked like the beating of a huge
wing. Not one of the men spoke as he passed--’tis bad luck to do that;
and besides, they remembered their leader’s words; but they swore he
looked back at them as if angered at getting no answer to his loud
hunting-cry: ‘Hoi-hoi!’ that he shouts as he goes. But no sooner had he
passed than another sight was seen--a queer little man humped together
in a common kneading-trough, who came sliding and pushing along in the
track of the wild train, shouting as he went: ‘If I could but catch
them up! if I could but catch them up!’ Now at this laughable sight the
men forgot both fear and prudence; they shouted with merriment, and one
cried: ‘He will have a hard job to do that!’ And there! as he spoke,
the pot of gold was gone, and all their efforts to find it were in
vain! The men went home with long faces, and well they might, for their
hair presently turned grey with fretting over the lost treasure, and
every one of them died not long after.”
“Well,” began one of the Schneeberg men after a short silence, “’tis
true enough that the gift of holding his tongue is needful to him who
has dealings with the mountain-spirits. See the case of poor Hans
of Donat. He was always bemoaning his poverty, and on the look-out
for treasure; and the mountain-dwarf gave him riches, too, but only
on condition that he should hold his tongue about the business, and
bring him a penny loaf and a penny dip, every time he went on duty in
the mine; for Hans was a miner. All went well for a bit, and Hans had
plenty of money and to spare; but one day, at the ale-house, drink
unloosed his tongue, and he let the great secret out. And not many days
after, when his comrades were waiting at the mouth of the shaft for him
to give the signal to haul the bucket up, he kept them there a long
time, and then there was a mighty pull on the rope, and a bright light
flashed up the shaft. They hauled as fast as they might, but when the
bucket got to the top, there lay poor Hans in it, dead, and all round
the edge of the bucket penny dips were burning, and the last loaf he
had taken to the dwarf lay untouched on his breast So it was easy to
see who had given him his death-stroke. Poor Hans--to think he bought
his own funeral tapers, too!”
“Come now,” another of the Schneeberg men rejoined: “all the stories
of treasure-seekers aren’t as dismal as these. Look at the story of
Jahnsbach. Jahn was a poverty-stricken fellow, tramping about after
work; and one night, as he was wandering in the forest near the
Greifenstein, having lost his way, he too met a dwarf, that stood
beckoning to him. He followed, not without fears, and the dwarf led him
into a dark, narrow-mouthed cavern; but no sooner were they within,
than it broadened out into a stately hall, with walls of silver and
chairs and tables of gold, all lit up as bright as day by thousands
of wax-candles in crystal candlesticks. At one table sat twelve men
of noble mien, each wearing the stately dress of a knight. The dwarf
invited the astonished Jahn to sit down and eat with them, and he
obeyed, for hunger gets the better of shyness. He had never before had
such a meal, and he felt refreshed after it, and in excellent spirits.
The twelve men seemed to enjoy his company, and bade the dwarf fill up
his wallet. Jahn took leave of them with hearty thanks, and the dwarf
led him out of the cavern, showed him the road he was in search of,
and then disappeared. When Jahn unpacked the wallet, which was very
heavy, he found that the kindly spirits had filled it with bars of gold
and silver. In his joy and gratitude, he vowed that he would make a
good use of it; and so he built, not far from Thum, a little group of
houses, which he gave rent-free to the poor; and they say he did much
good besides, to the sick and needy. And I never heard that any harm
happened to him. Ye may prove the truth of the tale, for the village of
_Jahnsbach_, which grew up round that knot of houses, is called after
him.”
“It seems to me,” said a young man, who, sitting by the fire in deep
study over a roll of paper, had not yet spoken, “that in these tales
of yours, only those came to harm who themselves sought after money,
greedily, and merely for their own use. But methinks, after all, the
best and safest way of getting wealth is to work for it. I, too, hope
to find a pot of gold in the earth, but not by your manner of seeking.”
The men turned and looked at him, with more dislike and suspicion in
their faces than they had shown to the Hartz miner.
“Yea, by witchcraft,” muttered one of them under his breath, in
response to the young fellow’s words. For Christopher Schürer, also,
was no native of these mountains, and, besides, his doings were
too strange, in the eyes of the rough mining-folk, to be regarded
as anything but uncanny. He had fled from his native province of
Westphalia to escape religious persecution; and his knowledge of
chemistry, and general cleverness, had quickly won him a high position
in the works. Here was already food for jealousy; but, besides this,
he had lately taken to shutting himself up in a little workshop of
his own, and busying himself with experiments, by which, if the truth
were known, he one day hoped to turn the hateful ‘blind ore’ to good
account, and build up the fortunes of Schneeberg and its people. But
this was a deep secret; all his fellow-workmen knew was that he kept
his “smelting-hut” carefully locked, and would tell no one what he
was doing. “And what could that mean save one thing?” said they. Had
they known as well, that he had raised his eyes to Master Ran’s lovely
Gretchen, and that his love was returned, their feeling against him
would have been yet more bitter.
“Well,” resumed the Hartzman, a bold fellow, who had been heard
to declare that he would stake body and soul on winning beautiful
Gretchen, “I say again, there is danger in ‘gold-lifting,’ but I am
not the one to give up happiness and wealth for that. Danger or no, I
am off to seek for gold, away from this poverty-stricken place; and it
is back to my own mountains I shall go. That is the place for hidden
treasure. But I think Mistress Gretchen’s suitors should play fair; one
must not sneak in before another; so, if there be any here bent on the
same quest, let them stand forth, and agree with me to fix a time when
we shall all meet again, ready to go before Master Ran and show which
has won the wager.”
“That is but right,” answered the men; and two of them stood up and
announced that they meant to join in the contest One was a strapping
young fellow, bold and careless, fond of the dice and the bottle, and
well known to be one of Mistress Gretchen’s most desperate admirers.
The other was a pale, red-haired man, with a shifty glance; it was
plain he could never hope to get any girl except by tempting her with
gold.
“What, only three of us!” cried the Hartzman; “only three to contend
for the winning of so fair a flower?”
“The stakes are too high for common men to take a hand,” replied one
of the Schneebergers, laughing awkwardly: “perhaps when ye have all
failed, there will be a chance for humbler and less daring folk.”
“Well, so be it,” rejoined the Hartzman; “I have no fear of failure,
and six months is enough for me, but that I must have, for my goal lies
far off. Say, comrades, shall we meet here again this day six months,
and report our success?”
“There is one more would join you,” spoke a quiet voice from the
chimney-corner, and Christopher Schürer rose and came towards them.
“I do not mean to dig for pots of gold, or to follow dwarfs into dark
caverns, but if I get the needful wealth, I suppose I may contend with
the rest?”
He spoke with a somewhat scornful smile, for he marked the look of
dislike upon his comrades’ faces.
“We cannot gainsay thee,” said Fritz, the tall young Schneeberger,
after some hesitation, “for there is nothing to keep any man from
taking part in this contest--but methinks thy trouble will be in vain,”
he added, with a self-satisfied air.
“Unless the devil help him!” growled the Hartzman, who looked more like
a comrade of the devil’s himself, as he glared from under his heavy
brows at his rival. “But let be--fair means or foul are alike to me,”
he muttered low to himself, “so I do but keep your smug face out of
this fight.”
So the four parted, and next day the tale was all over Schneeberg,
and Mistress Gretchen was sorely teased by all the wives and maidens
among her friends, on the subject of the event that was to decide her
fate. Master Ran bit his lip and frowned angrily, when his old friends
upbraided him with his indifference to his daughter’s happiness and
said that such wealth as her suitors had been driven to seek for
would never bring luck; but he stood firm, even against his daughter’s
prayers--the richest man should have her, and no other. “Who knows,”
people began to say, “what his own secret troubles may be, or what
money he needs to cover his own ill doings?”
Gretchen had indeed implored her father to withdraw his rash promise to
the gold-seekers, and had sworn she would be bought by no man to wife,
for a pot of ill-gotten money; yet his obstinacy did not seem to cause
her as much uneasiness as might have been expected. Perhaps she knew
what was going on in Christopher’s little smelting-hut, or perhaps he
found words wherewith to comfort her, during their stolen interviews
and walks in the lonely pinewoods far up the mountain. He, at any
rate, did not believe in the likelihood of the seekers finding hidden
treasure.
Fritz had gone forth on his wanderings alone, and alone, too, the
Hartzman had departed to his native mountains; but Master Red-hair
had taken a friend with him on his journey, and Christopher, as has
been said, remained quietly at home in his workshop. Time sped on, and
as the six months drew to their close, Gretchen began to look more
anxious, and Christopher more careworn and pale, and overworked.
At last the great day arrived, and all the men gathered eagerly
together at the ale-house, where Master Ran, too, was to be seen
looking out for his would-be sons-in-law. It was known that not one
of the wanderers had as yet turned up in Schneeberg, and Christopher
Schürer, too, seemed to have forgotten the day, for he had not left his
hut since morning.
It was summer, and still quite light, for the men had assembled
early. Now, as they sat at the tavern door, looking anxiously down
all the roads, there appeared on the edge of the forest, to the left,
the form of a man staggering along with a heavy burden upon his back.
Expectation rose to the highest pitch; but what was the horror and
dismay of the company, when it was seen that the man was that friend
whom Red-hair had taken away with him on his quest, and that the burden
he bore was the body of his unfortunate comrade! With awe-struck faces
they carried the dead man into an inner room, and then supplied the
weary bearer of this sad burden with food and refreshment. When he was
able to speak, he told the story of Red-hair’s ill-omened journey:--
“We sought for many weeks,” he said, “far and near, following up any
clue we could get about buried treasures; but we never found anything,
nor could we even get enough information to make a trial, until a
week or two ago, when we were returning homewards in despair, and
learnt that in a cliff, about a day’s journey from here, there was
a ‘treasure-chamber,’ where gold and silver lay in heaps. More than
one of the villagers swore to having peeped in and seen it, but none
had dared venture farther, because there was said to be a wild beast
in the cave, whose growlings could be heard outside. Master Red-hair
had much ado, methinks, to muster up courage for the venture, but one
day, towards evening, after he had been drinking deep at the tavern,
he armed himself with a stout stick and a knife, and called me to
climb the cliff with him. The climb in the hot afternoon sun brought
the blood to my cheeks, but he grew paler the higher we got, and when
at last we stood at the mouth of the cave, he stammered: ‘See here,
comrade, thou art a stronger man than I, and art not troubled with such
a fluttering heart; what if thou shouldst first step in and see how the
land lies? I will join thee at thy first call, and--thou shalt have
half the treasure.’
“‘Nay, nay, comrade,’ I answered; ‘each man for himself. I agreed to
come with thee for company, and to give thee a helping hand in case of
need, but this is not my venture, and I never said I would risk _my_
skin to win thee a bride. As for treasure--I have wife and babes at
home, ’tis true, yet I warrant we would all rather be there together,
in poverty, but with whole skins, than risk life and limb for a pot of
gold that had a curse upon it.’ This did not seem to cheer him much,
and I saw I had gone the wrong way about to hearten him up. ‘Yet I
see nothing greatly to fear in the look of the case,’ I continued,
‘and a step within is not much to venture, to win a bride that is so
beloved’--for I had often heard him call on Gretchen’s name in his
dreams--‘and for that matter, I will come _with_ thee fast enough;
only mind, thou wilt have but half the treasure if I do!’ This seemed
to decide him, and he said he would venture in if I promised to stand
by the mouth of the cave and run to his help at his first cry. This I
promised to do, and saw him disappear into the darkness. The mouth of
the cave was wide, but it narrowed immediately within, and what was my
horror when I saw, as I stood watching it, that it was beginning slowly
to close--and yet Red-hair had given no sign! As I saw the opening grow
smaller, I shouted to him to return, and would have gone in search of
him but that I could not push my way along the narrow windings of the
path. But at that moment I heard his voice answering with terrified
cries to mine, and mingled with them, the sound of an angry growl. I
thrust my hand through the opening and groped about, for I felt sure he
was not far off. In another instant I had, indeed, grasped him by the
arm, and with much ado, dragged him through the chinks of the rock to
the outer air. He was torn, bleeding--and empty-handed.
“When he could speak, he told me that it had at first been light in the
cavern, and that at the farther end of it he had found, sure enough,
a great chest full of gold. He was busy filling a sack he had brought
with him, when he heard my call, and turning, saw that the front of the
cavern was growing quite dark, and closing up. In horror, he started
towards it, dragging his half-filled sack; but before he could reach
the cave’s mouth, a huge black form, like that of a monstrous dog,
dashed upon him out of the shadow and struck the sack of gold from his
hand. He fell fainting to the earth, and never knew, he said, how he
reached the spot from which my hand dragged him forth. I carried him to
the village; but when the folk who lived there heard where he had been,
they would have nothing to say to him, and we were fain to take refuge
in a lonely hut, where I cared for his wounds as best I could. But he
never held up his head again, and died yesterday. There was nothing
left for me to do, since none would help me, but to carry him home as
ye have seen.”
The man stopped speaking, and an awe-struck silence fell on the
company. The first to break it was a stranger, who had joined them,
unheeded in the common excitement.
“I fear,” said he, “that ye miss yet another of your countrymen from
among you to-night, and though I am no friend of his, yet I, too, felt
it was all I could do to come hither and bring you tidings of him--sad
ones though they be. One Fritz of Schneeberg took up his quarters in
our village, many long miles from here, a few weeks back. He, too, told
us he had been wandering in search of adventure, and asked if there
were no hidden treasures in our land. Well, to be sure, we told him of
the Güss, a deep lake that lies in one of our valleys. It is said that
a rich and prosperous farm once stood there, of which the owners were
as wicked as they were rich. So one night, thus the tale runs, this
lake rose suddenly from the depths of the earth, and swallowed up the
farmhouse and all it contained, yet the gold belonging to those wicked
men is still lying down below there, for any bold diver who has a mind
to go and try for it. No one in our village has ever tried, within the
memory of man; but this Fritz declared he was at home in the water and
did not fear to make the venture. He was a bold fellow. Many of us
tried to dissuade him--yes, some of our maidens amongst the number,”
he added with a half-smile; “but no one succeeded, and the tale went
through the country-side that a stranger was going to dive to the
bottom of the Güss for the treasure. Fritz spent some time every day
swimming and diving in the lake, and soon got to know its deeps and
shallows, and the exact spot where the house stands, for on clear days
one can plainly see from a boat the shadow that it casts. At length
the day came on which he had promised to make the trial; and a great
crowd of people, among whom were some very wealthy noblemen from a
neighbouring castle, assembled to see it. Fritz dived once, and it was
a long time before he reappeared; ye could have heard a pin drop in
the crowd while we waited. But he came up again, and told us he had
seen the house, as plain as he saw the boat we were awaiting him in.
The roof had fallen in, and in one of the top chambers he had seen the
promised heap of gold. Every one gaped, except those grand gentlemen,
for they, one could see, didn’t believe him.
“‘I am ready to go again,’ cried Fritz, standing up on the boat’s edge.
‘I will have that gold yet!’
“The noble gentlemen looked scornful, yet one seemed half convinced,
and said--
“‘Thou’rt a bold lad. Do but bring me one of yon pieces of gold, and I
will add a thousand golden crowns to it!’
“The unlucky lad needed no other spur; in he leapt, and we waited,
hopefully at first, but all in vain. Fritz never came to the top again,
and we tried without success even to drag the lake for his body.”
This second dismal tale was received with lamentations, for Fritz had
been a popular lad, and had left a widowed mother behind him. Some one
was heard to say that Mistress Gretchen stood a poor chance of getting
any husband at all, since her father’s greed had been the means of
bringing ill luck to so many poor fellows--for the Hartzman had not
turned up either, and doubtless he too had come to a bad end. “Ah!”
said another bystander, “Christopher Schürer was right, and it had been
better to have worked for their wealth like other men.”
“Schürer, indeed!” echoed Master Ran, trying to put a bold face on it,
despite the dismay which he, too, secretly felt: “And where, prithee,
is he? Did he, too, not promise to show himself on this evening?”
“Thou wilt not see him, Master Ran,” replied the sheriff of the town,
coming forward from among the crowd, where he had hitherto stood
concealed, “till I give my men leave to open his door. I have had my
eye on yon fellow for many months, for ye all know that he has long
been suspected of witchcraft and sorcery; but what no one knows is,
that the Hartzman, before he left this place, gave me further and more
telling proofs of Schürer’s evil doings, which he had noticed unawares.
Only he prayed me not to denounce him--except he should try to fly from
the town--until this day arrived. I have kept my word, but Schürer has
been a prisoner in his smelting-hut since this noon; and if ye will, we
can now go there, and judge of his doings for ourselves.”
No sooner said than done. The sheriff, Master Ran, and the whole
company turned their steps to the little hut on the hill, followed,
I dare swear, at a short distance, by the trembling Gretchen. As the
bolt which the sheriff had had fastened across the door was withdrawn,
a joyful exclamation greeted the startled officers of justice, and
Schürer came towards them with a glowing face, holding in his hand a
trough full of a blue powder of beautiful colour.
“Welcome, my masters!” he cried, without noticing their black looks.
“Are ye come that I may prove to you the sooner how I have kept my
word?”
“Not so fast, Master Schürer,” interrupted the sheriff; “keep thy
welcome till thou seest how far it is due. We have come to charge thee
with witchcraft and sorcery. What hast thou to say against that?”
Christopher’s face darkened, but he showed no dejection. “I say,” he
answered, “that ye should prove before you condemn; and here now I
have the proof to give. A few days past it might have gone harder with
me, for I could not have convinced you of the sincerity of my aim;
but within the last few hours, thank Heaven, the work of long months
has been successful, and I can bring the ‘pot of gold’--or what is as
good--that I promised to produce to-night, as the price of Mistress
Gretchen’s hand.” His eyes sought those of some one in the crowd, and
seemingly found what they sought, for he continued with a joyful smile:
“See this powder; it is prepared, by an invention of my own, from that
ore which you think worthless, and cast away out of the mines; and if
I mistake not, it will be of great use, and bring work and wealth back
amongst our people.”
He then showed them how the powder was made, and what its use was, and
soon convinced even those who would most willingly have continued to
suspect him, that he was free from the charge they had made against
him. Master Ran, too, presently saw that the discovery of the beautiful
blue powder, which the people at first called the “blue wonder,” but
which was afterwards named smalt, would be as good as many a pot of
gold to Christopher, and so he ended by giving him his daughter with a
good grace, all the more that he saw well enough the young people would
never suffer to be parted. The wedding feast was clouded only by the
memory of the unhappy suitors who had fallen victims to their own folly
and Ran’s greed.