I
"Ready, father--ready!" shouted the small boy. He was standing on the
top step of a flight of stairs leading to the organ-loft of the
Hofchapel, peering in. His round, stolid face and short, square legs
gave no hint of the excitement that piped in his shrill voice.
The man at the organ looked leisurely around, nodding his big head and
smiling. "Ja, ja, S'bastian--ja," he said placidly. His fingers played
slowly on.
The boy mounted the steps to the organ and rubbed his cheek softly
against the coat sleeve that reached out to the keys. The man smiled
again a big, floating smile, and his hands came to rest.
The boy looked up wistfully. "They'll all get there before we do," he
said quickly. "Come!"
The man looked down absently and kindly. "Nein, S'bastian." He patted
the round head beside him. "There is no need that we should hurry."
They passed out of the chapel, across the courtyard and into the open
road. For half an hour they trudged on in silence, their broad backs
swinging from side to side in the morning light. Across the man's back
was slung a large violin, in its bag; and across the back of the boy
hung a violin like that of the father, only shorter and fatter and
squarer, and on his head was a huge woollen cap. He took it off and
wiped the perspiration from his white forehead.
The man looked down at him once more and halted. "Now, but we will rest
here," he said gently. He removed the violin-bag carefully from his back
and threw himself on the ground and took from his pocket a great pipe.
With a little sigh the boy sat down beside him.
The man nodded good-naturedly. "Ja, that is right." He blew a puff of
smoke toward the morning clouds; "the Bachs do not hurry, my child--no
more does the sun."
The boy smiled proudly. He looked up toward the ball of fire sailing
above them and a change came over his face. "We might miss the choral,"
he said wistfully. "They won't wait, will they?"
The big man shook his head. "We shall not be late. There is my clock."
He nodded toward the golden sun. "And I have yet another here," he
added, placing a comfortable hand on his big stomach.
The boy laughed softly and lay quiet.
The man opened his lips and blew a wreath of smoke.
"There will be more than a hundred Bachs," he said slowly, "and you must
play what I have taught you--not too slow and not too fast." He looked
down at the boy's fat fingers. "Play like a true Bach and no other," he
added.
The boy nodded. "Will Uncle Christoph be there?" he asked after a pause.
"Ja."
"And Uncle Heinrich?"
"Ja, ja!"
The boy gave a quick sigh of contentment.
His father was looking at him shrewdly. "But it is not Uncle Heinrich
that will be making a player of you, and it is not Uncle Christoph. It
is only Johann Sebastian Bach that can make himself a player," he said
sternly.
"Yes, father," replied the boy absently. His eyes were following the
clouds.
The man blew great puffs of smoke toward them. "It is more than a
hundred and twenty years ago that we came from Hungary," he said
proudly.
The boy nestled toward him. "Tell me about it." He had heard the story
many times.
"Ja, ja," said the man musingly.... "He was my great-grandfather, that
man--Veit Bach--and your great-great-grandfather."
The boy nodded.
"And he was a miller----"
He dropped into silence, and a little brook that ran over the stones
near by babbled as it went.
The boy raised his eyes. "And he had a lute," he prompted softly.
"Ja, he had a lute--and while the mill-wheel turned, he played the
lute--sweet, true notes and tunes he played--in that old mill."
The boy smiled contentedly.
"And now we be a hundred Bachs. We make music for all Germany. Come!" He
sprang to his feet. "We will go to the festival, the great Bach
festival. You, my little son, shall play like a true Bach."
As they walked along the road he hummed contentedly to himself, speaking
now and then a word to the boy. "What makes one Bach great, makes all.
Remember, my child, Reinken is great--but he is only one; and Bohm and
Buxtehude, Pachelbel. But we are many--all Bachs--all great." He hummed
gayly a few bars of the choral and stopped, listening.
The boy turned his face back over the road. "They are coming," he said
softly.
"Ja, they are coming."
The next moment a heavy cart came in sight. It was laden to the brim
with Bachs and music; some laughing and some singing and some
playing--on fiddles or flutes or horns--beaming with broad faces.
The man caught up Sebastian by the arm and jumped on to the tail-board
of the cart. And thus--enveloped in a cloud of dust, surrounded by the
laughter of fun-loving men and youths--the boy came into Erfurt, to the
great festival of all the Bachs.