On the ridge where the road forks, and leads to Muehringen on one side
and to Ahldorf on the other, in what is called the "Cherry-copse,"
three lasses were sitting one Sunday afternoon under a blossoming
cherry-tree. All around was quiet: not a plough creaked nor a wagon
rattled. As far as the eye could see, Sunday rested everywhere. From
the opposite hill, where the church of an old monastery is yet
standing, a bell tolled its farewell to the worshippers who were
returning to their homes. In the valley the yellow rape-seed blossomed
among the green rye-fields; and on the right, where the Jewish
graveyard crowns a gentle eminence, the four weeping willows which mark
its corners drooped motionless over the graves of the grandmother,
mother, and five children who were all burned in one house together.
Farther down, amid the blooming trees, was a wooden crucifix, painted
white and red. Every thing else breathed still life. The "beech-wood,"
the only remnant of leaf-forest in the whole neighborhood, was dressed
in its brightest green, and the gladed pine-grove swept along the road
in unruffled calmness. Not a breath stirred. High up in the air the
sky-lark trilled his gladness, and the quail sang deep in the furrows.
The fields seemed to wear their green robes only for their own delight;
for nowhere was man visible to indicate, with his shovel or his hoe,
that he claimed the allegiance of the earth. Here and there a farmer
came along the footpath; sometimes two or three were seen viewing the
progress of their crops. Dressed in their Sunday gear, they seemed to
regard with satisfaction the holiday attire of nature.
[Illustration: The three girls sat motionless.]
The three girls sat motionless, with their hands in their aprons,
singing. Babbett sang the first voice, and Toney (Antonia) and Brigetta
accompanied. The long-drawn sounds floated solemnly and a little sadly
over the mead: as often as they sang, a thistlefinch, perched on a twig
of the cherry-tree, piped with redoubled vigor; and as often as they
paused at the end of a strain, or chatted in a low voice, the finch was
suddenly silent. They sang:--
"Sweet sweetheart, I beg and I beg of you,
Just stay a year longer with me;
And all that you lack, and all that you spend,
My guilders shall keep you free.
"And though your guilders should keep me free,
Yet I cannot do your will;
Far, far o'er the hills and away I must go,
Sweet sweetheart, then think of me still.
"Far over the hills and away when I came,
Sweet sweetheart, she open'd the door;
She laugh'd not, she spoke not, she welcomed me not:
It seem'd that she knew me no more.
"There's never an apple so white and so red
But the kernels are black at its core;
There's never a maid in all Wurtemberg
But plays false when you watch her no more."
Pop! went the report of a fowling-piece. The girls started: the finch
flew away from the cherry-tree. Looking round, they saw the gamekeeper
of Muehringen run into a field of rape-seed, with his dog before him.
He picked up a heron, pulled out one of its feathers and fixed it in
his hat, thrust the bird into his pouch, and hung his gun upon his
shoulder again: he was a fine-looking fellow as he strode through the
green field.