About the middle of the fifteenth century there dwelt in the Black
Forest a pretty but unfashionable young maiden named Simprella
Whiskiblote. The first of these names was hers in monopoly; the other
she enjoyed in common with her father. Simprella was the most
beautiful fifteenth-century girl I ever saw. She had coloured eyes, a
complexion, some hair, and two lips very nearly alike, which partially
covered a lot of teeth. She was gifted with the complement of legs
commonly worn at that period, supporting a body to which were loosely
attached, in the manner of her country, as many arms as she had any
use for, inasmuch as she was not required to hold baby. But all these
charms were only so many objective points for the operations of the
paternal cudgel; for this father of hers was a hard, unfeeling man,
who had no bowels of compassion for his bludgeon. He would put it to
work early, and keep it going all day; and when it was worn out with
hard service, instead of rewarding it with steady employment, he would
cruelly throw it aside and get a fresh one. It is scarcely to be
wondered at that a girl harried in this way should be driven to the
insane expedient of falling in love.
Near the neat mud cottage in which Simprella vegetated was a dense
wood, extending for miles in various directions, according to the
point from which it was viewed. By a method readily understood, it had
been so arranged that it was the next easiest thing in the world to
get into it, and the very easiest thing in the world to stay there.
In the centre of this labyrinth was a castle of the early promiscuous
order of architecture--an order which was until recently much employed
in the construction of powder-works, but is now entirely exploded. In
this baronial hall lived an eligible single party--a giant so tall he
used a step-ladder to put on his hat, and could not put his hands into
his pockets without kneeling. He lived entirely alone, and gave
himself up to the practice of iniquity, devising prohibitory liquor
laws, imposing the income tax, and drinking shilling claret. But,
seeing Simprella one day, he bent himself into the form of a
horse-shoe magnet to look into her eyes. Whether it was his magnetic
attitude acting upon a young heart steeled by adversity, or his
chivalric forbearance in not eating her, I know not: I only know that
from that moment she became riotously enamoured of him; and the reader
may accept either the scientific or the popular explanation, according
to the bent of his mind.
She at once asked the giant in marriage, and obtained the consent of
his parents by betraying her father into their hands; explaining to
them, however, that he was not good to eat, but might be drunk on the
premises.
The marriage proved a very happy one, but the household duties of the
bride were extremely irksome. It fatigued her to dress the beeves for
dinner; it nearly broke her back to black her lord's boots without any
scaffolding. It took her all day to perform any kindly little office
for him. But she bore it all uncomplainingly, until one morning he
asked her to part his back hair; then the bent sapling of her spirit
flew up and hit him in the face. She gathered up some French novels,
and retired to a lonely tower to breathe out her soul in unavailing
regrets.
One day she saw below her in the forest a dear gazelle, gladding her
with its soft black eye. She leaned out of the window, and said
_Scat!_ The animal did not move. Then she waved her arms--above
described--and said _Shew!_ This time he did not move as much as he
did before. Simprella decided he must have a bill against her; so she
closed her shutters, drew down the blind, and pinned the curtains
together. A moment later she opened them and peeped out. Then she went
down to examine his collar, that she might order one like it.
When the gazelle saw Simprella approach, he arose, and, beckoning with
his tail, made off slowly into the wood. Then Simprella perceived this
was a supernatural gazelle--a variety now extinct, but which then
pervaded the Schwarzwald in considerable quantity--sent by some good
magician, who owed the giant a grudge, to pilot her out of the forest.
Nothing could exceed her joy at this discovery: she whistled a dirge,
sang a Latin hymn, and preached a funeral discourse all in one breath.
Such were the artless methods by which the full heart in the fifteenth
century was compelled to express its gratitute for benefits; the
advertising columns of the daily papers were not then open to the
benefactor's pen.
[Illustration]
All would now have been well, but for the fact that it was not. In
following her deliverer, Simprella observed that his golden collar was
inscribed with the mystic words--HANDS OFF! She tried hard to obey the
injunction; she did her level best; she--but why amplify? Simprella
was a woman.
No sooner had her fingers touched the slender chain depending from the
magic collar, than the poor animal's eyes emitted twin tears, which
coursed silently but firmly down his nose, vacating it more in sorrow
than in anger. Then he looked up reproachfully into her face. Those
were his first tears--this was his last look. In two minutes by the
watch he was blind as a mole!
There is but little more to tell. The giant ate himself to death; the
castle mouldered and crumbled into pig-pens; empires rose and fell;
kings ascended their thrones, and got down again; mountains grew grey,
and rivers bald-headed; suits in chancery were brought and decided,
and those from the tailor were paid for; the ages came, like maiden
aunts, uninvited, and lingered till they became a bore--and still
Simprella, with the magician's curse upon her, conducted her sightless
guide through the interminable wilderness!
To all others the labyrinth had yielded up its clue. The hunter
threaded its maze; the woodman plunged confidently into its innermost
depths; the peasant child gathered ferns unscared in its sunless
dells. But often the child abandoned his botany in terror, the woodman
bolted for home, and the hunter's heart went down into his boots, at
the sight of a fair young spectre leading a blind phantom through the
silent glades. I saw them there in 1860, while I was gunning. I shot
them.