Meredith paused, half closed his book, was evidently pondering for a
minute, and then exclaimed, "I have learned something!"
"Why, so have we all," said his sister. "What now particularly?"
"I have got a hint."
"What about? There is no fortress for you to storm, and you do not want
the treasure."
"I think I should like to have lived in those times," Meredith went on.
"People were in earnest, Mr. Murray."
"Yes. So are some people in these times."
"But not the world generally; or only about making money. _Then_ people
were in earnest about things worth the while."
"It does seem so from these stories," said Mr. Murray; "but, dear
Meredith, you may be equally in earnest about the same things now, and
with as good reason."
"Isn't it more difficult, sir, when nobody else, or only a few here and
there, think and feel with you?"
"Yes, more difficult; or rather, more easy to go to sleep; but so much
the greater need of men who are not asleep. What is your hint? I am
curious, with Miss Flora."
"The way that fellow spent his treasure, sir. I was thinking, wouldn't a
chapel--that is, a little church--a little free church, at Meadow Park
be a good thing? The nearest church is two miles off; we can drive to
it, but the people who have no horses cannot, and the poor people"----
Meredith got a variety of answers to this suggestion. His sister opened
her mouth for an outcry of dismay. Maggie clapped her hands with a burst
of joy. Esther stared; and a smile, very sweet and wise, showed itself
on Mr. Murray's lips.
"Quixotic!--ridiculous!" said Flora. "Isn't it, Mr. Murray? Ditto has
not money enough for everything, either. A church!--and then, I suppose,
a minister!"
"Is it a bad notion, Mr. Murray?" inquired Meredith.
"I should think not very."
"Is it extravagant?"
"Miss Flora thinks so."
"Well, Mr. Murray, think what it would cost!" cried the young lady.
"Not so much as a large evening party--that is, it ought not. I suppose
Meredith is not thinking of stone carvings and painted windows, but of a
neat, pleasant, pretty, plain house, where people can worship God and
hear the words of life."
"That is it exactly," said Meredith.
"Then I should say that one very fine evening entertainment would build
two."
"But the minister! he must be paid," said Flora.
"Yes, and I am not for starving a minister, either," said Mr. Murray.
"But what is Meredith to do with his income, Miss Flora?"
"That's just what I want to know," remarked Meredith in an undertone;
while Flora answered with some irritation--
"He can let it accumulate till he has made up his mind."
"'Riches kept for the owners of them, to their hurt,'" said Mr. Murray.
"Better not, Miss Flora. Remember, Meredith is only a steward. 'The
silver is mine, and the gold is mine,' saith the Lord of hosts."
"Do you mean, Mr. Murray, that we cannot do what we like with our
money?"
"You can do what you like with it, certainly."
"But I mean, isn't it _right_ for us to do what we like with it?"
"I should like to do that," murmured Meredith.
"Miss Flora, the question is, rightly stated,--May a steward use his
lord's money for his own or his lord's pleasure?"
Flora coloured and pouted. "But that makes religion----Why, I never
thought religion was strict like _that_. Then it isn't right to buy
jewels or dresses?"
"Dresses--certainly."
"But I mean, rich dresses--dresses for company. And pictures--and
horses--and books--and"----
"Stop, Miss Flora. The servant himself belongs to his lord; therefore he
must make of himself the very best he can. For this, books will
certainly be needed, and to some degree all the other things you have
named, except jewels and what you call _rich_ dresses. The only question
in each case is--'How can I do the Lord's work best? how can I spend
this money to honour and please Him most?' That will not always be by
the cheapest dress that can be bought, nor by checking the cultivation
of taste and the acquiring of knowledge, nor even by the foregoing of
arts and accomplishments. Only the question comes back at every step,
and must at every step be answered--'What does the Lord want me to do
_here_? Does He wish me to spend this money--or time--on myself, or on
somebody else?'"
"Why it would be _always_ on somebody else," said Flora looking ready to
burst into tears; "and there would be no real living at all--no enjoying
of life."
"A mistake," said Mr. Murray quietly. "The Lord told us long ago--'He
that will save his life shall lose it; and he that loseth his life for
my sake, _the same shall find it_.'"
Flora put up her hand over her eyes, but Meredith's eyes sparkled.
"Then you think well of my plan, Mr. Murray?" he said.
"As far as I understand it."
"How would the Pavilion do, for a skeleton of the church?"
"O Ditto! the dear old Pavilion!" exclaimed Maggie.
"Why not? I do not want to shut myself off from everybody now; and I
have the whole house--more than enough. And the Pavilion stands in a
good place near the road."
Mr. Murray and Meredith went into a discussion of the plan, and Maggie
listened, while Flora after a while resumed her work and went moodily on
with it. At last Mr. Murray remarked--
"This is not so interesting to everybody, Meredith, and we have time
enough to talk it over. Suppose you go on reading."
"Do you like these Saxon stories?" said Meredith pleased.
"Very much."
"There is some more hero about--not Dagefoerde exactly; but that same
fight, which I think you would like perhaps to hear."
"And, Meredith, you did not read us about that minister who was
converted by the catechism," said Maggie.
"No, that is another story--Pastor Gruenhagen. I will read to you first
about the fight at the Huenenburg.
"'The Huenenburg is situated in a deep dell in the midst of the heath
about an hour from Hermannsburg; and I will relate to you what I have
found in the chronicle about it. It is nine hundred years now since a
hard-fought and terrible battle took place here, which was fought
between the Christians and the heathen. At that time the pious and
Christian Kaiser, Otto the Great, ruled in Germany (A.D. 936-973), who
loved the Lord his God with all his heart. He had gone away out of
Germany into Italy, in order to free a captive queen who was kept in
prison there by some godless folk. But he would not leave Germany
without protection; therefore he made over this country to Duke Hermann,
to govern it and to take care of it. In like manner Adaldag, Archbishop
of Hamburg and Bremen, who went with the Kaiser, confided his dominions
to the same guardianship. Now the Wends, who lived on the other side of
the Elbe, especially in Mechlenburg, and had spread themselves abroad on
this side the Elbe also, were at that time still heathen. And now when
the Kaiser was absent, they thought the time was come for marauding and
plundering, hunting the Christians out of their country, or utterly
destroying them. So they summoned up all their warriors, and that so
secretly that the Christians knew nothing of it until they came breaking
into the country. As there was nowhere any preparation for defence
against them, they robbed and plundered all that came in their way,
burned down the churches, killed the priests, and dragged the rest into
captivity for slaves. Duke Hermann was just then in the Bremen
territory, from whence he had expelled the piratical Northmen (the
Danes). There the terrible news found him. In the greatest haste he
collected his warriors to come and save his country. For the Wends had
already penetrated to Lueneburg, as far as this heath, and had laid
everything waste with fire and sword; the Hermannsburg church was
destroyed by them at that time. Here upon this ground they had made a
strong encampment, and surrounded it with ditches and fortifications
like a fortress; they were from fifty to sixty thousand men strong, in
horsemen and footmen, and all of them alive with the same enraged hatred
of the Christians, and determined that every trace of Christianity
should be wiped away from the land. In August of the year 945 Duke
Hermann marched hither out of the Bremen country, over the northern
heights of Liddernhausen and Dohnsen. When he saw himself with his eight
thousand men on foot and two thousand horsemen confronted by the great
host of the Wends, he said to his faithful followers--"We must fight;
whether God will give us the victory, we must leave with Him." Then
stepped up one of his knights before him, who is called in the chronicle
"the brave Conrad," of the now extinct race of them of Haselhorst, and
spoke:--
"'"Let us get a token from God. I will go forward and challenge one of
the enemy to single combat; so will the Lord show us to whom He has
allotted the victory."
"'Duke Hermann gave permission. The knight, followed at some distance by
a hundred men, who were to see that all was done in order, rode alone
into the defile and challenged Mistewoi, the leader of the Wends, to
send one of his people to meet him in single combat. Then stepped
forward Zwentibold, a Wend of giant stature, clad in a dragon skin and
with a shirt of link-mail over it, and on the head of his helmet the
black image of his god Zernebok; behind him also a hundred men to look
on. The Christian knight first called upon God to be his helper and
protection: "Lord remember how Thou gavest strength to Thy servant David
against the giant Goliath who had reviled Thy name; so now to-day
establish Thy glory among the heathen, and show plainly that Thou art
the true God."
"'Upon that, with lances in rest, they charged upon each other; and when
the spears were splintered in that first shock, then it came to a fight
with swords, man against man. Suddenly comes a traitor's arrow from the
Wends flying through the air and kills the Christian's horse. But their
wickedness turns to their own knight's ruin. For as the Wend gallops up
to the fallen Christian, and is about to cut him down with a stroke from
above, up springs the Christian knight and thrusts his sword in under
the other's shoulder, so that he falls dead from his horse. The victory
is won! But hereupon comes new treachery. For now those hundred Wends
charge straight down upon the German knight. As his own attendants
perceive this, they hasten to his help, nothing loath; the armies on
both sides close in, and the fight soon becomes general. It is fought
with the utmost bitterness and bravery on both sides till evening fall.
But the Christians all the while press steadily forward.
"'While the men wielded the sword, the wives of the Christians came out
to the field, drew away the wounded and sucked the blood from their
wounds (because they believed that the arrows of the Wends were
poisoned), bound them up, and encouraged their husbands and sons to make
brave fight. A company of twelve priests carried a banner with a red
cross on a white ground. The priests sang, "Kyrie Eleison!" ("Lord, have
mercy upon us!") "Christe Eleison! Kyrie Eleison!" and the people chimed
in. A terror of God went with them wherever they went and scattered the
Wends from every place where the white banner came. As one of the
heathen leaders with a company was making a determined rush upon the
banner, the peasant of Dagefoerde drove his spear through the chieftain's
coat of mail into his breast. Thereupon the heathen all fled. And all
the Christians fell upon their knees, and all cried out, "Lord God, we
praise Thee!" Then the priests spoke the benediction over the victorious
host. And they left nothing remaining of the enemy's camp, but destroyed
it entirely, because they would not suffer any heathen works upon their
ground. But the name has remained; for Huehnen was the name our
forefathers gave to all heathen; that came from the Huns in the first
place, who fell upon the Christians with such heathenish rage. So that
place is called Huehnenburg until this day.
"'The church at Hermannsburg was rebuilt again after that time. And soon
also Christianity came to the Wends, and the Lord Jesus was conqueror
over them all.'"
"You read part of that before," said Maggie.
"Part of the story; but I thought you would like to have the whole."
"Oh, I do. But I thought it was Zwentibold that Henning of Dagefoerde
killed, when he was trying to get at the white banner."
"Maybe there were two Zwentibolds; or the story got a little confused
among the old chroniclers."
"Then how is one to know which is true?"
"It is difficult, very often, Maggie," her uncle said smiling. "Human
testimony is a strange thing, and very susceptible of getting confused."
"What will you read next, Ditto? About the minister who was converted?"
"Oh, no," said Flora. "Let the catechism alone. Haven't you got some
more Saxon stories, Meredith?"
"Plenty. Which shall it be, Mr. Murray?"
"Saxon, for this time."
"'THE REMMIGA FARM.
"'As in my former narrations I have told of the glorious victory which
with God's help Landolf gained over the old priest Heinrich and his
children, I will tell you now of a third victory which the Lord granted
him. An hour from here was a farm which in the chronicle is called the
Remmiga manor; it was inhabited by a free man named Walo. His wife's
name was Odela, sometimes the chronicle calls her Adela. The name is
one, for the word Adel is often written and spoken as Odel in the old
manuscripts. The pair had a son, who bore his father's name.
"'As owner of a head manor, Walo was at the same time priest of the
community, which dignity always went along with the possession of a
chief manor among the old Saxons. All the councils and courts of the
community were held under his presidency; he brought the sacrifices
thereto pertaining; and it is easy to imagine what consideration on all
these accounts he enjoyed. This consideration was still further
heightened by the fact of his knowledge of the old laws and customs, and
by his incorruptible truth and uprightness. Like Heinrich, he too was at
the beginning a determined enemy of the Christian religion. Landolf
visited him frequently and told him about the Lord Jesus, but Walo's ear
was deaf to the truth of the gospel. He knew from old legends that once
upon a time two brothers, the white and the black Ewald, who had
preached Christianity among the Saxons, had been by them sacrificed to
their idols. And so, with Saxon tenacity holding fast to the old
traditions, he told Landolf to his face that in justice he ought to
suffer the same fate which had fallen upon the two Ewalds; and that it
could not be carried out upon him, simply because the decision of the
people, taken by the national assembly at the stone-houses, once taken
became a law, according to which the free preaching of the gospel was
permitted. Landolf did not allow himself to be daunted by this, but
continued his visits and his teachings; for he observed that Walo, in
spite of all that, always listened with attention when he told about the
Lord Christ.
"'One day Landolf came again to Remmiga. He found Walo sitting in front
of his dwelling, by the place of sacrifice, where the assemblies of the
district were wont to be held, still and sunk in his own thoughts. Near
him stood his wife Odela and his little son, who was perhaps twelve
years old. The boy ran joyously to meet Landolf and said--"It is nice
that you have come. I have just been asking father to let me go away
with you; I would like to hear a great deal about the Lord Jesus; I want
to be His disciple. Mother is glad; and," he whispered softly, "she
loves the Son of God too; but father feels very troubled, and don't like
it; he says he has lost his wife and his son to-day!" Odela gave Landolf
her hand and spoke aloud. "Yes, I love Jesus; I want to be His disciple;
but Walo will have none of it; and so I too will go with you, that I may
hear about Jesus and be baptized."
"'Landolf hardly knew where he stood. Until this time Odela and her son
had listened in silence when he talked about Jesus, but never a word had
they spoken. Now they told him how, while he talked, the Lord Jesus had
so grown in their hearts that they could not get loose from Him again;
and they did not wish to get loose; for they wanted to be saved and to
come into the Christian's heaven, where Jesus is and the holy angels.
"'Then up rose Walo, turned a dark look upon Landolf, and said to him,
"Thou hast led astray my wife and my son with thy words, and now I have
no wife and no son any more. Go out of my grounds; take my wife and my
son with thee; they have no love for me any longer; their love is for
Jesus."
"'"O Walo!" Landolf answered, "seest thou not yet that thy gods are dead
idols? Dost thou not see that Jesus is the true, the living God? Jesus
has won their hearts; thine idols cannot win hearts; thou mayest see
that by thy wife and thy son. Let Jesus gain thy heart too. You shall
all three be saved."
"'Walo shook his head. "He wins not my heart!"
"'"Then," cried the servant of the Lord joyfully, "then shall thy wife
and thy son win thy heart for Jesus. Thy wife and thy son desire to be
baptized. Thou canst not hinder them: they are free; they are noble
born. I am going to baptize them now, this day, in thy presence; for
they believe in Jesus that He is the Son of God. But I know that thy
wife and thy son are dear to thee, and thou art very dear to them, only
Jesus is dearer yet. Let them remain with thee after they are baptized;
do not thrust them out from thy house. And if, when they are baptized,
they love thee still better than formerly, if they are more dutiful to
thee than formerly, wilt thou then believe that Jesus is mightier than
thine idols? Thou hast often told me that Odela is proud and passionate,
though in all else good and noble. Now if when she is baptized she
becomes humble and gentle, wilt thou then believe that Jesus can give
people new hearts?"
"'Walo looked at the glad Landolf with an astonished face. "Odela humble
and gentle!" said he. "Yes, then I will believe that Jesus can make the
heart new; I will believe that He is God, and I will worship Him."
"'"Give me thy right hand, Walo," said Landolf; "I know a Saxon keeps
his word and never tells a lie, and Walo before all others."
"'They shook hands. Landolf did not delay. He went immediately for
Hermann and Heinrich, and fetched them to share in his joy and to act as
the sponsors. And oh, how gladly they came! That same evening Adela and
her son were baptized in the name of the Triune God; and Landolf
joyously reminded them that he had promised Walo his wife and his son
should win his heart for Christ.
"'A year passed away, and on the very day on which Adela and her son had
been baptized, Walo also received baptism; for the Christianised Adela
had become humble and gentle, because Jesus dwelt in her heart; and
after their baptism she and her son had loved the husband and father
still more ardently, and had been more obedient to him than before. Walo
confessed, "they are better than I." Oh, the Christian walk, the
Christian walk! how mighty it is to convert! The walk of Christians is
the living preaching of the living God.
"'And now a Christian chapel was erected by Walo at Remmiga, on the
place of sacrifice; and around the chapel there rose up a Christian
village, which established itself upon his soil and territory; a brook
ran through the new village, which was therefore called Bekedorf, and is
called so at the present day; it lies in the parish of Hermannsburg. The
chapel stood till the Thirty Years' War; it was burnt down then by
Tilly's marauders, and has never been built up again. But there is more
of the story. Walo died old and full of days, in the arms of his wife
and son. Landolf had gone home long before, and so had old Hermann and
Heinrich. But the young Walo had grown to be the most faithful friend of
Hermann's son, who was also named Hermann, and who by Kaiser Otto the
Great was made Duke of Saxony. So then, when Hermann Billing was made
the Kaiser's lieutenant of the kingdom in Northern Germany, upon
occasion of Otto's journey into Italy, Hermann made his faithful Walo a
graf, that is, one of the chief judges of the country; and he travelled
about and wrought justice and righteousness, and was, as the Scripture
says of an upright judge, "for a terror to evil-doers and the praise of
them that did well." He married Odelinde, a noble young lady, who also
loved the Saviour, and had been brought up by the good cloister ladies
at the Quaenenburg. They led a happy and God-fearing life, but they had
no children. When now both of them were old and advanced in years,
Odelinde one day was reminding her husband of the blessing she had
received from the pious training of the cloister ladies; and she asked
him whether, as they had no children, and were rich, they might not
found another cloister with their money, in which noble young girls
should be educated by good cloister sisters. Walo complied with her wish
gladly; for he loved the kingdom of God, and at that time the cloisters
were simply the abodes of piety; they were not yet places of idleness,
but of diligence; not homes of lawlessness, but of modesty; not of
superstition, but of faith.
"'About four miles from his place on the river Boehme lay a wide tract of
meadow land, bordered by a magnificent thick wood of oaks and beeches.
When Walo travelled through the country as graf, he had often been
greatly pleased with this spot; and it had occurred to him that such
beauty ought not to remain any longer given up to wild beasts, but
should become a dwelling-place for men. This thought recurred now
vividly to his mind. His wife desired to see the place too. So they went
to view it, and decided to build a cloister there, around which then
other human dwellings would grow up, but the cloister itself should be
the home of pious ladies whose special business should be the bringing
up of nobly-born young girls. The wood was rooted up' (_roden_ is to
root up); 'and on the _Rode_' (that is, the space cleared) 'the cloister
was built, which thereupon was called _Walo's Rode_; about which later
the village _Walsrode_ was settled, which still later spread itself out
into a little city, having the cloister to thank for its origin. Walo
not only built the cloister at his own expense, but also endowed it for
its support with the tithes of the Bekedorf village, which belonged to
the manor. It is but a little while since the Bekedorfers bought off
these tithes.
"'I must state, however, that in my extracts from the chronicle there
occurs a divergence from the usual dates. That is, I have formerly read
under a picture of Graf Walo in the cloister church at Walsrode the
number of the year 986. In my extracts, on the other hand, it is said
that the cloister was founded by Walo in the year of grace 974, and
consecrated by Bishop Landward of Muenden. The last can be explained by
the fact that the valley of the Oerze belonged to the see of Muenden and
not to the nearer Verden, and therefore Walsrode also being founded from
hence, must be consecrated by the Muenden bishop. But as to the
difference of the two dates, I can do nothing further to clear that up,
since I am no investigator of history, but have singly written down what
I have found.'"