In the little cold alley called the "Knee-Cap" is a little house,
with a stable, a shed, and three windows glazed with paper. At the
dormer-window a shutter dangles by one hinge, threatening every moment
to fall. The patch of garden, small as it is, has a division-line of
leafless thorns to cut it into two equal halves. The premises were
inhabited by two brothers, who had been in constant warfare for
fourteen years. As in the garden, so in the house, all things were
partitioned into halves, from the attic down to the kennel of a cellar.
The trap-door was open, but underneath the domain of each was enclosed
in lattice-work and padlocked. All the other doors were likewise hung
with locks, as if an attack of burglars was looked for every moment.
The stable was the property of one brother, and the shed of another.
Not a word was ever spoken in the house, unless when one of them cursed
or swore for his own edification.
Mike and Conrad--such were their names--were both past the prime of
life and alone in the world. Conrad's wife had died early, and now he
lived by himself; and Mike had never been married.
A blue chest, of the kind called "bench-chests," was the first cause of
the quarrel. After their mother's death all the property should have
been divided between them: their sister, who was married in the
village, had received her share in advance. Conrad claimed the chest as
having been bought by his own money, earned by breaking stones on the
turnpike: he had only lent it to his mother, he said, and it belonged
to him. Mike alleged, on the other hand, that Conrad had eaten his
mother's bread and therefore had no property of his own. After a
violent altercation, the matter came before the squire, and then before
the court; and it was finally decided that, as the brothers could not
agree, every thing in the house, including the chest, should be sold
and the proceeds divided. The house itself was put up at auction; but,
as no purchaser was found, the brothers had nothing to do but to keep
it.
They were now compelled to publicly buy their own chattels,--their
bedding and other furniture. Conrad disliked this greatly. There are
many things in every house which no stranger is rich enough to pay for,
for there are associations connected with them which have no value for
any one but the original possessor. Such things should descend quietly
from generation to generation: this preserves their value unimpaired.
But, when they must be torn from the hands of strangers by the force of
money, a great part of their value is lost: they are thenceforth things
purchased for coin, and have not the more sacred character of an
inheritance. Thoughts like these often made Conrad shake his head when
some old utensil was knocked down to him; and when the velvet-bound
hymn-book of his mother, with the silver studs and buckles, came up,
and a peddler weighed it in his hand to judge of the value of the
silver, Conrad reddened up to his eyes. He bought it at a high price.
The box was sold last. Mike hemmed aloud, and looked at his brother in
defiance: he bid a large sum. Conrad bid a florin more, without looking
up, and pretended to count the buttons on his coat. Mike, looking
saucily around, went still higher. None of the strangers present
interfered, and the brothers were both determined not to give way. Each
comforted himself with the thought that he would only have to pay half
of what he bid, and so they continued to raise the price up to more
than five times its real value,--when it was knocked down to Conrad for
twenty-eight florins.
Then he looked up for the first time, and his face was entirely
changed. Spite and mockery leered out of his glaring eyes, his open
mouth, and his protruding mien. "When you die, I'll make you a present
of the chest to lie in," he said to Mike, trembling with rage: and
those were the last words he had spoken to him for fourteen years.
The story of the chest was an excellent theme for fun and waggery in
the village. Whenever anybody met Conrad, something was said about the
mean way in which Mike had acted toward him; and Conrad talked himself
into a rage against his brother, which increased with every word he
said.
The brothers were of different dispositions in all things, and went
their different ways. Conrad kept a cow, which he would yoke with the
cow of his neighbor Christian to do field-work. When there was nothing
to be done afield, he broke stones on the turnpike for fifteen
creutzers, or about five cents, a day. He was very near-sighted. When
he struck a flint to light his pipe, he always held his face very near
the spunk, to see whether it was lit. All the village called him "blind
Conrad." He was short and thick-set.
Mike was the opposite of all this. He was tall and lank, and walked
with a firm step. He dressed like a farmer, not because he was one,
(for he was not,) but because it was of advantage to him in his
business. He dealt in old horses; and people have great faith in a
horse bought of a man who is dressed in farmers' clothes. Mike was what
is called in Germany a "spoiled blacksmith,"--one who had deserted his
trade and lived by dickering. He rented out and sold his fields, and
lived like a gentleman. He was a person of importance in the whole
country round. In a circuit of twenty miles--in Wurtemberg, in
Sigmaringen and Hechingen, and in Baden--he knew the condition and the
muster of every stable just as accurately as a great statesman knows
the statistics of foreign states and the position of cabinets; and, as
the latter sounds the state of public feeling in the newspapers, so
did Mike in the taverns. In every village he had a scapegrace as
minister-resident, with whom he often held secret conferences, and
who, in cases of importance, would send him couriers,--to wit,
themselves,--asking nothing but a good drink-money, in the strict sense
of the word. Besides these, he had secret agents who would incite
people to revolutions in their stables; and thus his shed, which served
the purpose of a stable, was generally tenanted by some broken-down
hack in the course of preparation for publicity,--_i.e._ for sale on
market-day. He would dye the hair over its eyes and file its teeth;
and, though the poor beast was thereby disabled from eating any thing
but bran, and must starve on any thing else, he cared little, for at
the next market he was sure to sell it again.
He had some curious tricks of the trade. Sometimes he instructed an
understrapper to pretend to be making a trade with him. They would
become very noisy, and at last Mike would say, in a very loud tone of
voice, "I can't trade. I've no feed and no stabling; and, if I must
give the horse away for a ducat, away he must go." Or he would pay some
stupid farmer's lout to ride the horse up and down, and then observe,
"If a man had that horse that knew what to do with it he might make
something out of it. The build is capital: the bones are English. If he
had a little flesh he would be worth his twenty ducats." If a purchaser
turned up, he would undertake to get him the horse, stipulating a
commission for himself for the sale of his own property. What he hated
most was a warranty: rather than sign that he always agreed to throw
off a ducat or two. Nevertheless, he had many a lawsuit, which eat up
the horse and the profit; but the unsettled life he led had such a
charm that he could not think of leaving it, and he always hoped that
the profit on one speculation would compensate for the losses on
another. His principle was never to leave the market without a bargain.
The Jews of the markets were also his accomplices, and he would return
their favors in kind.
[Illustration: He would pass his brother breaking stones on the road.]
Sometimes, in riding out on these excursions, or in coming home, he
would pass his brother breaking stones on the road. He would look at
him half in pity and half in contempt, saying to himself, "This poor
devil works from morning to night for fifteen creutzers; and, if I have
any luck, I clear fifteen florins."
Conrad, seeing a little of these thoughts in spite of his
nearsightedness, would strike the stones until a thousand splinters
flew on every side.
We shall see hereafter whether Mike or Conrad did better in the end.
Mike was what is called "good company." He could tell stories day and
night, knew a thousand tricks, and was acquainted, as the German
proverb has it, with God and the world. Not that his acquaintance with
God was very intimate,--though he went to church now and then, as no
one in the country can avoid doing; but he went, like many others,
without thinking much about what he heard there, or endeavoring to act
accordingly.
Conrad also had his faults, among which perhaps the greatest was his
hatred of his brother and the manner in which he expressed it. When
asked, "How's Mike comin' on?" he would answer, "He'll come to this
some day," passing his hands under his chin as if to tie a knot, and
then lifting them up and stretching out his tongue. Of course people
were not chary in putting the question; and, whenever the standing
answer came, it was the signal for peals of merriment. In other ways,
also, people would try to keep the hatred of the brothers at the
boiling-point, not so much from malice as for fun. Mike never did more
than shrug his shoulders contemptuously when the "poor devil" was
mentioned.
They never remained in the same room. When they met at the inn, or at
their sister's, one of them always went away. No one ever thought of
making peace between them; and whenever people lived at daggers' points
it became proverbial to say, "They live like Mike and Conrad."
When they met at home they never spoke a word, nor even looked at each
other. Yet, when one perceived that the other was lying ill in bed, he
would go all the way to their sister's, who lived away off in Frog
Alley, and say, "Go up: I guess he's poorly:" and then he would make as
little noise as possible while he worked, so as not to disturb the
other.
Out of doors, however, and among the neighbors, they kept up their feud
without blinking; and no one would have thought of finding a spark of
brotherly love in their hearts.
This had now lasted wellnigh fourteen years. Mike, with his traffic and
dickering, had let the money received for his two acres slip through
his fingers,--he scarce knew how. Conrad, on the contrary, had bought
another field from an emigrant, and very nearly paid for it. Mike did a
commission-business, and thought of selling another field to set
himself afloat again.
[Illustration: The new parson was a young man of great zeal.]
"Now, there arose up a new king over Egypt," is a verse of which the
people of the village might have made a peculiar application. The old
parson was dead. He was a good man, but let things go their own way.
The new parson was a young man of great zeal. He was bent upon righting
all things, and did accomplish a great deal, until at last he got into
a declared connection with Lisa, the Lamb Innkeeper's daughter; after
which he ceased to meddle with people's private affairs,--for then he
might have been told to sweep at his own door. But as yet he was in the
full tide of reform.
One Sunday afternoon, when church was over, people sat about on the
lumber brought for the new engine-house which was to be built near the
town-house well. Mike was there too, sitting with his elbows on his
knees and chewing a straw. Peter, Shackerle's John's boy, who was only
five years old, was passing. Somebody cried, "Peter, I'll give you a
handful of nuts if you'll do like Conrad: how does Conrad do?" The
child shook his head, and was going on, for he was afraid of Mike; but
they held him fast, and teased him till at last he did the tying of the
knot, the pulling up, and the stretching out of the tongue. The shouts
of laughter could have been heard through half the village. The boy
called for his nuts, but the contractor was found unable to furnish
them; so Peter kicked at him,--which made them all laugh again.
The new parson, who chanced to be coming down the little hill at the
town-house, had stopped to see the whole transaction. When the boy was
on the point of being pummelled for his indignant dunning, the parson
stepped up quickly and took the boy away. The farmers all arose in
great haste and pulled off their caps. The parson walked on, taking
with him the image-keeper, who happened to be among the crowd. From him
he heard the story of the feud between the brothers.
Next Saturday, as Conrad was breaking stones in the village, he was
summoned to meet the parson next morning after church. He looked
astonished: his pipe went out, and for two seconds the stone under his
plank-soled foot remained unbroken. He was at a loss to think what
could have happened at the parsonage, and would rather have gone there
at once.
Mike received the same invitation as he was "greasing his old nag's
Sunday boots,"--as he termed getting up his hoof's for market. He
whistled a naughty tune, but stopped in the middle of it, for he well
knew what was coming. He was glad of the chance to prepare himself for
a good counter-sermon, a few sentences of which he already mumbled
between his teeth.
On Sunday morning the parson took for his text, "Behold, how good and
how pleasant it is for brethren to dwell together in unity!" (Psalm
cxxxii. 1.) He showed that all the happiness and joy of earth is void
and vapid if not shared between those who have slept in the same
mother's womb; he said that parents can neither be happy here nor at
peace hereafter if their children are sundered by hatred, envy, or
malice; he referred to Cain and Abel, and spoke of fratricide as the
first venomous fruit of the fall. All this was uttered in a full,
resounding voice, of which the farmers said, "It pries the walls
apart." Alas! it is often almost easier to move stone walls than to
soften the hard heart of man. Barbara wept bitter tears over the evil
ways of her brothers; and, although the parson declared again and again
that he did not allude to any one in particular, but desired one and
all to lay their hands on their hearts and ask themselves whether the
true love for their kindred was in them, yet every one was content to
think, "That's for Mike and Conrad: the shoe fits them exactly."
The two latter stood near each other, Mike chewing his cap, which he
held between his teeth, and Conrad listening with open mouth. Once
their eyes met, and then Mike dropped his cap and stooped down quickly
to pick it up.
The hymn at the close had a calm, pacifying influence; but, before the
last sounds had died away, Mike was out of the church, and knocked at
the door of the parsonage. Finding it locked, he went into the garden.
He stood before the beehives, and watched their restless labor.
"They never know when Sunday comes."
And he thought, "I have no Sunday either, with my traffic; but then I
have no real working-day." Again he thought how many hundred brothers
lived together in a beehive, all working like the old folks. He did not
dwell upon such reflections, however. He made up his mind that the
parson should not bridle him; and when he looked at the graveyard he
remembered the last words of Conrad, and his hand clenched.
In the parsonage he found the parson and Conrad in earnest
conversation. The parson appeared to have given up the expectation of
his coming. He offered him a chair; but Michael answered, pointing to
his brother,--
"No offence to your reverence, but I never sit down where he is. Your
reverence hasn't been long in the village yet, and don't know his
tricks. He is a hypocritical doughface, but false and underhanded. All
the children imitate him," he continued, gnashing his teeth: "'How's
Mike coming on?'" and here he gave the well-known pantomime again.
"Your reverence," he went on, trembling with rage, "he is the cause of
all my mishap: he has ruined my peace at home, and so I have sold
myself to the devil for horses. You've prophesied it, you bloodhound!"
he roared at his brother: "I'll hang myself with a halter yet, but your
turn shall come first."
The parson gave the brothers time to vent their wrath, only exerting
his dignity so far as to prevent personal violence. He knew that after
their anger was poured out love must appear also; yet he was half
deceived.
At last the two brothers sat motionless and speechless, though
breathing hard. Then the parson began to speak words of kindness: he
opened all the secret corners of the heart, but in vain; they both
looked at the floor. He depicted the sufferings of their dead parents:
Conrad sighed, but did not look up. The parson gathered up all his
powers; his voice surged like that of an avenging prophet; he told them
how after death they would appear before the Lord's judgment-seat, and
how the Lord would cry, "Woe be unto you, ye hardened of heart! Ye have
lived in hatred, ye have withheld the grasp of a brother's hand from
each other: go, and suffer the torments of hell, riveted together!"
There was silence. Conrad wiped his eyes with his sleeve, got up from
his chair, and said, "Mike!"
The sound had been so long unheard that Mike started and looked up.
Conrad went up to him and said, "Mike, forgive me." The hands of the
brothers were firmly clasped, and the hand of the parson seemed to shed
a blessing on them both.
All the village rejoiced when Mike and Conrad were seen coming down the
little hill by the town-house, hand in hand.
They did not relinquish their grasp until they had reached home: it was
as if they desired to make up for the long privation. But here they
hastened to tear off the padlocks; then, going into the garden, they
tore away the dividing hedge, heedless of the cabbage destroyed in the
operation.
Then they went to their sister's, and sat side by side at the
dinner-table.
In the afternoon they sat in church together, each holding one side of
their mother's hymn-book.
They lived in harmony from that day forth.