THE GOOD JAN KANTY
Among the most remarkable personages of Krakow’s age of glory in the
fifteenth century was a certain scholar-priest by the name of Jan Kanty.
He had been educated at the University of Krakow in the period of late
Scholasticism when the chief teachings were still mere expositions of
the Seven Arts of which Grammar was the king. However, a full life and
much contact with men had made Jan Kanty a well-rounded man. He loved
learning for its own sake, but he honored most of all its precepts and
its application to life, and he gave himself over in his cell-like
quarters on the lower floor of the old University building, now long
since destroyed by fire, to the creation of new points of view on old
subjects, to comments on the conduct and opinions of the masters and
doctors of the university at the great church councils of Europe, and to
an intellectual chronicle of his age.
His life was saintly and his cell was as much visited, perhaps, as is
his shrine in the magnificent old university library to-day. The
peasants loved him especially, and this was rather curious since the men
from the farms rarely sought the advice of the men of the university;
they were, in fact, somewhat shy of the dispensers of higher learning.
They were not shy of Jan Kanty, however. They came to Krakow to ask his
opinion on the weather in the seasons of grains and vegetables, they
called upon him for decisions in disputes between landowners, they
consulted him concerning the proper kind of food for their live stock,
they questioned him on all problems having to do with morals or
religion, and they accepted his rulings with as much finality and
satisfaction as if they had been the rulings of Heaven.
Therefore his name was one to be reckoned with everywhere, inside the
city and out. He hated above all things cruelty of man against man, or
of man against something helpless, a horse, or a dog, or a child. And
when he saw one man and a woman and a boy of honest features and good
appearance harassed by some hundred men, he did not hesitate but rushed
into the midst of the flying stones without regard to his own safety or
comfort.
“Peace be with you,” he said to Pan Andrew when the crowd had scattered,
“and with you, my daughter,” putting his hand upon the woman’s head.
“What may be the cause of such mischance? You are strangers here?”
“Strangers and worse. Homeless,” said Pan Andrew.
“You are come from a long distance?”
“The Ukraine.”
The kind shoulders rocked in agitation. “My—my—but surely you have
friends in town?”
“I have none. I had a friend here and sought him, but he is dead. My
house is burned by Tartars, my wealth is gone. I am pursued by men who
seek my life and the one possession that I have left.” Here he touched
the pumpkin with his foot.
“But why this accusation of magic?”
Pan Andrew smiled. “A trick it was to raise feelings against me in the
public square and then to despoil me of this possession. I think that he
who raised the storm against me here has followed me many miles across
the border, and I believe that he is the agent of some more powerful
person. There is much to this, my good—my good—— You are a priest?”
[Illustration: _The Court of the University of Krakow, Fifteenth
Century, with Modern Statue of Copernicus, Master of Arts, 1491._]
“Men call me so. I am but a servant of the Father of us all.”
“Then, good father, hear me! I seek to do no man wrong. I am helpless in
a world of plotting and troubles and I seek only a place where I may
this night provide shelter for my good wife and my boy.”
“Come with me then,” said the scholar-priest. “I will at least offer you
the hospitality that my cell affords. . . . Nay—hitch your horses to
the wagon and drive through that lane yonder which leads to the Street
of St. Ann.”
Pan Andrew was already adjusting the harnesses when Joseph tugged at his
sleeve. “Father,” he urged, “father, I know of a place where we can
stay.”
The father looked down at him in astonishment. “You,” he answered, “you?
And how did you find such a place?”
“A scholar and his niece live there. They took me to their house. There
is a space below them at the head of a flight of stairs.”
Jan Kanty interposed. “Come at any rate to my dwelling, and there we can
make plans. If the boy has found a place, and his face and words seem
truthful, then we can talk at better length there at our ease than here
in the busy square.”
A few minutes later they stopped in front of the largest of a number of
buildings which made up the university. On the way there Joseph had
noted that almost every man they passed on the street had doffed his hat
to Jan Kanty, and once a whole company of knights had saluted him with
drawn swords. He seemed to pay but little attention to these courtesies,
however, for his mind was busy with the problem of the present, and when
he alighted from the cart and led the three to his little cell on the
ground floor just at the right of the door, he was still pondering.
Once inside the house, however, Pan Andrew, disregarding Joseph’s
information for the minute, begged an immediate audience with Jan Kanty
alone, and while the boy and his mother were eating some food which the
scholar had placed upon a table in the corridor just outside his cell,
he began to address his host in a low tone.
Their voices buzzed as Joseph and his mother ate. Only once did the boy
catch distinct syllables, and that was when the priest asked Pan Andrew,
“That, then, is the pumpkin that you have brought from the Ukraine?”
Pan Andrew must have nodded, for he made no verbal answer. He had not
dropped the precious vegetable from his hands during the entire
conversation. Joseph heard no more of the talk, for he began at that
moment to tell his mother of his own adventures of the morning.
As he progressed with his story she ceased eating and stared at him.
“Why, this is a very miracle,” she said. “As soon as Pan Andrew has
finished with the good father in the next room, we will go straight
about procuring the lodging of which the scholar told you. . . . And the
poor child—she lost her father and mother in the plague? Indeed, I
think that God must have sent us to her.”
Jan Kanty at the farther end of the cell listened to Pan Andrew’s tale
to the very end. He asked a few questions which the other answered and
then the two began to converse rapidly though in low tones.
At length Jan Kanty passed his hand across his eyes as if thinking very
deeply. Then he said, “It seems to me that there is one course open to
you. You have enemies in the city, you believe, and therefore you must
remain for the present unseen. I advise a change of name, for such
subterfuge is no sin where the end to be gained is righteous. For your
present needs you can obtain money by selling your horses and cart; if
you wish I will send a man with them to the horse market in the plain
below the Wawel. They would be but an encumbrance to you at best, and
moreover they will bring a pretty price since they are of good stock and
well fed.”
“This money will not last me forever,” said Pan Andrew. “I must think of
some employment besides.”
“I have thought of that,” continued Jan Kanty. “I know of employment
which might suit your case even though it be a humble task.”
“It cannot be too humble for me,” answered the other quickly, “provided
it brings enough return for the support of my wife and boy.”
“Good! Excellent!” exclaimed the scholar. “Then I have just the thing.
You were a hunter in the old days, I presume?”
“Why, yes,” said Pan Andrew, wondering.
“And you can sound the horn?”
“That I can. And if I do say it, with more skill than any hunter in the
Eastern Marches.”
“Good! . . . But yet one thing. This news which you have imparted to me
should be for the ears of the King alone. The treasure which you guard
should be returned to him, it should become the property of the
commonwealth. I know not what harm it has already done in the world; I
only hope that it may do no more. Would you leave it with me for
safe-keeping, perhaps?”
“Would that I could. But it was the oath that I took to my father that
it should never leave my hands while life remained—save to one person,
and that person, the King of Poland.”
“Then God be with you. Rest here until the horses are sold and then
after hearing your son’s story we will think of to-morrow.”
He called the mother and boy into his cell. “Why, here,” he said on
hearing the story of Joseph’s adventure from his mother’s lips, “is the
thing arranged to perfection. I know the place you mention and I know
the scholar Kreutz as well. A curious man, and of certain strange
disposition, but honest and sincere and a seeker after light. He is, I
think, feared by the common people as are also many dwellers in the next
street which has been since olden times inhabited by sorcerers and their
ilk, and the court of his house is but little frequented. They tell
strange tales of him, sometimes, most of which I know to be false. But
it is just the place for your dwelling at present, since there is little
likelihood of your being disturbed there.”
At this so great a feeling of thankfulness came upon Joseph’s mother
that she would have fallen to her knees and asked the good father for
his blessing, but he restrained her.
“Nay, daughter,” he said, “it is I who need thy blessing, since I know
what fortitude and courage thy kind heart possesses.”
She kissed his hand nevertheless, as did Joseph immediately afterward,
and Pan Andrew turned away quickly lest they should see that his eyes
were moist, for there is such power in kindness well bestowed that it
touches the wells of human feeling. There was, too, something in this
scholar-priest that went at once to the heart, some fine quality of
feeling and spirituality that set him apart, though ever so sweetly and
gently, from other men.
A servant of the university was dispatched to sell the horses and cart,
and Joseph with his father and mother sat down to await the man’s
return.
While they were waiting, there came a knocking upon the outside door.
Jan Kanty went to it at once. A woman stood there, with a baby in her
arms, not in the attitude of one asking for alms but of one seeking
advice. She came, it seemed, from the Black Village and was suffering
much from pains that took her legs and arms and neck.
Jan Kanty questioned her quietly. “Where do you sleep?” he asked.
“On the floor, reverend sir,” she answered. “And the aches and pains are
so strong that I can stand them no longer. It is certain that a devil
possesses me and I would that you should pray him away.”
“Is the floor made of stones?”
“It is.”
“Are the stones ever wet?”
“No, reverend sir, except in spring.”
“Is the earth damp beneath the stones?”
“Why—yes—perhaps,” she said. “Sometimes when the well water is not
much used it overflows, for there is a source there, and sometimes when
they have been drawing water carelessly the overflow leaks down beneath
the stones.”
“Then take heed to what I say and the aches and pains will pass. Take
stones and build a low wall between the well and the side of your
cottage. Make this waterproof and then dig a drain that will carry the
water away from your house. Hang your bedclothes often in the sun and be
sure that they are always dry. Change every week the boughs upon which
you lie; thus will the pains go away.”
She kissed his hand and departed.
Then came a peasant who complained that worms were coming up from the
ground and were destroying the young shoots of his plants.
“Could you but say a prayer, father,” the man supplicated, “the worms
will cease.”
“It is for you to prevent them,” said Jan Kanty. “Sprinkle all the earth
about the plants with ashes which you take from your stove. If this does
not prevent the worms, then rise early in the morning and pour water
about the plants. The worms will then come to the top where the water is
and you may kill them.”
Then stooping over a high desk he began to write upon a long scroll of
parchment, the end of which hung far over the desk almost to the floor.
He used for writing the quill of a pigeon thrust into a piece of oak
wood.
Joseph curled up on a bench that ran along beneath the windows and
closed his eyes. What a day it had been! And what might the future hold?
His thoughts, which at first had begun to run slowly, suddenly became
brisk and grew fantastic. He seemed to see himself bearing armor, a
shield, and a sword, fighting desperately with a great dark-browed
Tartar who had instead of a head a huge yellow pumpkin. Then the Tartar
suddenly took off his head, and carrying it in his arms, climbed up a
steep ladder to a room that seemed to hang from the stars. Out of it
came lightning and flashes of strangely colored light, and suddenly the
Tartar emerged, now with the head of a dog, and the pumpkin floating
along beside him as if it were but a ball of feathers in the wind. The
scratching of Jan Kanty’s quill grew fainter and fainter, and the
fantastic world dimmed slowly in blackness.
Joseph was fast asleep.
When he awoke the room was no longer filled with sunshine. A single
candle lantern was burning at the farther end of the cell and by its
light he could see his father, Jan Kanty, and his mother busied with
something that lay in front of them upon the table. He rubbed his eyes
to make sure that he was awake—yes, it was the mysterious pumpkin from
which his father was slicing away the outer rind with a huge knife. It
was a curious pumpkin, that vegetable—the rind was so hard and brittle
that the knife scraped on it as if it were cutting or whittling away a
piece of board. Joseph, fascinated, watched the process, almost afraid
to breathe. Little by little the hard pieces dropped to the floor like
bits of shell as the blade cut them through.
“I think,” the father was saying in a low voice, “that I hold here in my
hand the reason for the attack on my house in the Ukraine, and that the
man who has hounded us to-day knew very well what this pumpkin shell
contained. He had been told that I had it in my possession; he knew the
exact size of my property, and he quickly put two and two together when
he saw this pumpkin, and only this pumpkin, in my wagon. The reason that
I made no effort to conceal it was, of course, to allay any suspicion
concerning it.”
“But,” interrupted Jan Kanty, “a pumpkin at this time of year is likely
to create some curiosity among those who give the matter a second
thought. This is a late pumpkin, and I suppose that in all Poland it
would be hard to find another such in midsummer.”
“True,” replied Pan Andrew, “but I had to risk that. Long ago when I was
worried over this sacred charge and feared lest some enemy might
discover its existence and attempt to rob me, there came to me the idea
of a shell like this as an excellent means of concealment. Since that
day there has never been a time, summer or winter, when there was not a
pumpkin shell in readiness for an emergency, and many an experiment was
I obliged to make, indeed, before I was able to preserve a shell in the
good condition of this one.”
At this moment he cut away the last piece of the rind.
The room was suddenly filled with the light of a thousand candles.
Colors of the rainbow fell upon the walls—a huge center of radiance
like the sun in the heavens blazed into being at the very place where
the pumpkin shell had been but a moment before. Flickering, dancing
flecks of light leaped about the room and transformed its gloom into the
brilliancy of day—and then there was again but the light of the little
lantern, for the father had placed that which the pumpkin contained in a
bag furnished by Jan Kanty, and was busy tying up the open side when
Joseph came rushing up to the table.
“Father,” he cried, “what was it? What was the light which came from
that which you took from the pumpkin?”
The father’s voice was kindly but firm. “In time, Joseph, you shall
know. It would be but a care to you, a matter of more worry than you
suspect, if you knew what responsibility we are carrying here. If it is
mere curiosity, be assured that knowledge will bring nothing but pain.
If it is real interest, I will tell you plainly that in due time you
shall be informed of all that has passed. Just now—it has cost me so
much that I have not the heart to burden your young life with its
secrets.”
He broke off, and, after a short silence, changed the subject.
“We will go now to that place which you have found for us. While you
slept the reverend father and I have been to see your friends. He has
seen to it that the rooms have been made comfortable, and there we shall
stay, at least for the present.”