ALL'S WELL.
The ravens flew over the valley, and flew over the hills, and at last
they flew past a small house, where an old woman was seated at the
window spinning coarse flax, and her tears were falling fast on the
threads as she drew them out. It was Franzl; she had heard the report,
that Lenz and his family were buried in the snow: even from Knuslingen,
people had hurried to the rescue. Franzl would gladly have gone with
them to help if she could, but her tottering limbs could not bear her
thither, and unluckily she had lent her only pair of shoes to a poor
woman, who was obliged to go to the Doctor. In the midst of all her
distress, Franzl often struck her forehead and thought: "Oh! how stupid
I was not to observe when he was here, that something was wrong; but
what use is that now? I had it on the tip of my tongue that day, to beg
him to take timely precautions against the snow. We were twice snowed
up, for a day and a half: every winter we tried to guard against it.
But it's too late to think of that now; my old mistress was right, when
she said a hundred times over: 'Franzl, you can speak sensibly; but
always an hour too late to be of any use.'"
The ravens, who were now flying past, could have told Franzl that she
might dry her tears, as the buried alive were rescued; but men do not
understand ravens, and human beings are some time before they can carry
good news over hill and valley.
It was evening when a sledge came driving along, with a cheerful
ringing of bells. What does the sledge come here for, and stop at this
door?--there is no one at home but old Franzl.
"Who is getting out, is it not Pilgrim?" Franzl wishes to rise to meet
him, but she is unable to stir.
"Franzl, I have come to fetch you;" cried Pilgrim. Franzl rubbed her
eyes: "Is it a dream? what does it mean?" Pilgrim continued: "Lenz is
saved, and all belonging to him, and I have been sent to fetch your
fair Princess Cinderella! Will you entrust your precious person to my
care in the sledge?"
"I have not a single pair of shoes to put on," said Franzl at last.
"I will lend you a pair of fur boots, I have below; they are sure to
fit your small feet, Princess," answered Pilgrim. "And here is the
skin--I mean the fur cloak of Petrowitsch the sorcerer. You must come
with me this very moment, my well-beloved Franzl of Knuslingen! You
must cease spinning your magic threads, and leave your magic wheel
here; unless it thinks fit to walk after us on its wooden legs." So
saying, Pilgrim bowed to Franzl and offered her his arm, as if to lead
her to a banquet.
Franzl was utterly confounded. Luckily her sister-in-law came home at
this moment, and she seemed to have no objections to Franzl being
carried off in a sledge. She assisted to help old Franzl to pack her
things; but the old woman made her leave the room, for she wished above
all to pack up a certain secret shoe carefully.
"I have my own feather bed here," said Franzl, "do you think you could
put it on the sledge?"
"Let Knuslingen sleep on it in peace," answered Pilgrim; "make a
footstool of your pillow, and leave all the rest."
"Must I leave my hens and my geese here too? They are my own, they all
belong to me; and my beautiful gold speckled hen has been laying for
the last six weeks."
The bepraised lady stuck her head out, between the bars of the coop,
and showed her red comb.
Pilgrim said that hens and geese all ran after the veritable Cinderella
of their own accord; and that if these chose to do the same, no one
wished to prevent them, but that they certainly would not be taken in
the sledge.
Franzl now charged her sister-in-law to pay the greatest attention to
the cherished creatures she left behind: she was to take care of them,
to feed them well, and to send them to her when a man came for them.
When Franzl was leaving the room, the hens began to cackle uneasily in
their coop, and even the geese said a friendly word of regret as she
passed them.
It was a fine, bright winter night when Franzl drove off with Pilgrim;
the stars glittered above, and a heaven filled with shining stars arose
within Franzl's soul. She often laid hold of her bundle, and pressed it
till she felt her shoe was safe there; and often, as they dashed along,
she thought it was all a dream.
"Look! there is my little patch of potato ground that I bought," said
Franzl; "it was only a heap of stones, and I have cultivated it so well
during the four years I have had it, that it is worth double, and the
potatoes it grows are like flour."
"Potatoes may be very precious in the sight of the Knuslingers, but you
shall get something better now," answered Pilgrim. He then detailed to
her every particular, with regard to the rescue of the inhabitants of
the house on the Morgenhalde, and told her that they all were now to
live with old Petrowitsch, and that they were the best of friends; the
old miser seemed entirely changed, and Annele's first request was, that
Franzl should be sent for. Franzl sobbed aloud when Pilgrim told her
that Annele's hair was now snow white.
At every house they passed, where lights were visible, Franzl would
fain have stopped and told them the famous news. "There lives so and
so, such good kind people! and they all deplored poor Lenz's fate; and
it is hard that they should go on lamenting, when there is no longer
any occasion for it. And they will jump sky high for joy, when they
hear that the first thing they did was to send for old Franzl; and who
knows if I may ever see them again to say good bye to them?"
Pilgrim, however, drove pitilessly past all these good men, and would
not stop anywhere. When any one opened a window, and looked out at the
sledge, then Franzl called out as loud as she could: "Good bye, and God
bless you!"
And although, from the ringing of the bells, no one heard a word
she said, still she had the satisfaction of having shouted a kind
word to the good souls; for who knows when she might come back to
Knuslingen?--perhaps never!
At the farm where Kathrine lived, Pilgrim was obliged to stop to feed
his horse, but--there is no perfect joy on this earth--Kathrine, alas!
was not at home. As she had no children of her own, she was constantly
taking charge of those of her neighbours; and she was now nursing one
of them in her confinement. Franzl, however, sent her a minute account
of all that had happened, through the sempstress who was sewing in the
house; and she repeated every word twice over, that she might not
forget it.
When she got into the sledge again, she first fully enjoyed her
happiness. "Now," said she, "I feel so much better. It is like sleeping
soundly, but waking up for a moment in the night, and saying to one's
self: Oh! this is famous,--and going sound asleep again."
Pilgrim, however, had nearly destroyed all her delight by a foolish
joke of his.
"Franzl," said he, "you will have but a meagre portion now, I fear, up
yonder."
"Up where?"
"I mean in the other world. You will henceforth live in Paradise; and
those who fare so well in this world, cannot expect to be equally happy
in the next--both would be too much."
"Stop! stop! let me out, I must go home," cried Franzl. "I will have
nothing to do with you; I will not give up my happy life hereafter, for
any thing this world can offer. Stop, or I will jump out."
With a degree of strength no one could have believed she possessed,
Franzl seized the reins and tried to snatch them from Pilgrim's hand,
who had the greatest difficulty in pacifying her, saying, that he saw
she could no longer take a joke. But Franzl said she could make no
allowance for people jesting on such sacred subjects. Pilgrim tried to
persuade her, with the aid of the holy Haspucius--whose words he first
repeated in Greek, and then kindly translated into German, and even
into the Black Forest dialect, for her benefit--that he had distinctly
written, an exception would be made in favour of household servants,
for, however comfortable they may be in this world, their life is hard
enough at best!
Franzl became more composed, and seemed to think that what was said
about servants was true enough. Presently she resumed: "I shall have
such pleasure in seeing my good Lenz's children--for I never saw them;
the boy's name is Wilhelm, is it not? and what is the name of the
little girl?"
"Marie."
"Of course; for that was her grandmother's name."
"I am glad you reminded me of that word grandmother; I had quite
forgotten to say, that the children believe that I have gone to fetch
their grandmother, and that she is to arrive in a sledge. The children
are to remain awake till we arrive, so your Highness of Knuslingen must
be so condescending as to allow the children to call you grandmother."
Franzl, the worthy spinster! pronounced this to be both wrong and
untrue, for it is never right to deceive children. A family name
belongs only to blood relations, and that is a point about which no
jesting should be permitted. She consoled herself, however, by thinking
that she would explain it all herself to the children; she had not the
blessing of being born in Knuslingen for nothing. In the consciousness
that she was the representative of the district of Knuslingen, she was
firm in her duty.
The various episodes on the journey were, however, of some use in
sobering down Franzl; for, first of all, she had persuaded herself that
the whole village would form a procession to receive her on her return,
and to escort her to her new home. She was, however, received only with
a shout of uproarious laughter, and that was by Petrowitsch, who roared
so at the sight of Franzl's costume, that he was obliged to sit down in
a chair; and Bueble played his part also, for, as he could not laugh, he
barked loudly, and snapped at Franzl; and it was certainly rather
unkind in Petrowitsch to call out, "Anton Striegler, your lover, must
have known what you would look like some day, and this was why he threw
you over and married another."
"And the worms will spare you yet a while, till you become tender; for
you are too tough and skinny, even for them, as yet," answered Franzl,
giving a hearty kick to Bueble.
The long cherished hatred of years, and her rage at being twitted with
her unhappy love, inspired her with this bitter answer. Bueble stopped
barking, and Petrowitsch laughing. Both had henceforth a wholesome
horror of Franzl.
Lenz was asleep. Annele was with the children, who, after all, had
fallen asleep, and she had some difficulty in refraining from throwing
her arms round Franzl's neck; but she was ashamed to do so before
Pilgrim and Petrowitsch.
"Look!" said she, "these are our children; give them each a kiss, they
will not wake."
Franzl was to remain in the sitting room, while Annele went to the
kitchen, to get ready something for her to eat. Franzl nodded--"She is
very different from what she used to be." The good old woman could not,
however, stay long in the parlour, and went to join Annele in the
kitchen, who said: "Oh, what a luxury to be able to light a good fire!"
Franzl looked at her in surprise. She could not understand being so
thankful for all the common things of life, which are too often
accepted by us as mere matters of course.
"What do you say to my white hair?" asked Annele.
"I wish I could give you mine, for it is still quite black; and it will
never turn grey, for my mother often told me I had a good head of hair
when I was born."
Annele smiled, and said it had been so ordained; and that it was well
she should bear about with her a lasting token that she had been in the
jaws of death, and must now be doubly good in the world. "You forgive
me, too, don't you, Franzl? I assure you I thought of you at the hour
when death seemed very near."
Franzl burst into tears.
It was indeed wonderful to see the transformation that had taken place
in Annele. When she heard the church bells ringing for the first time,
she took her little girl in her arms, and, making her clasp her hands,
she exclaimed, "Oh, my child, I little thought we should ever hear
these sounds again!" And when Franzl brought in the first pailful of
water, she cried, "Oh, how pure and refreshing spring water is! I thank
our Heavenly Father who gives it to us!"
While the men had almost entirely recovered the awful hours when they
had been momentarily exposed to destruction, Annele seemed to herself
to have risen from the dead; she was now mild and gentle, and every
hasty word went to her heart, so that Franzl often lamented to Pilgrim,
and said, "I fear Annele will not live long, there is something so holy
and unearthly in her look."
The escape of the inhabitants of the house on the Morgenhalde, was the
cause of an event passing almost unperceived, that would otherwise have
been a source of much talk and discussion.
On the second day after Lenz's rescue, the body of a man was found in a
wooded ravine near Knuslingen, buried under the snow frozen. It was
that of Proebler. No one regretted his fate so much as Lenz, for he
could not help thinking that it was his voice he had heard calling him,
the night he left him; and he suspected something more in the death of
the miserable old man than other people imagined, but he kept these
thoughts to himself.
Annele prospered in Petrowitsch's large house, and was soon as fresh
and blooming as ever.
They remained till late in the summer with their old uncle, till their
own house was repaired and restored. Petrowitsch was not unfrequently
rather crabbed. It made him very angry to see little Wilhelm jump on
chairs and sofas, where Bueble, however, might stretch himself at his
ease.
Petrowitsch could not get rid of a bad cough he had got, from being
buried in the snow. The physician advised him to visit some baths, but
he refused to go. He did not say so, but he thought, if he was to die,
he would rather die at home, and then all longing for home would be at
an end. He often went with little Wilhelm to the Spannreute, the hill
behind the house, where a vast number of well-grown larches had been
planted to shelter the house, and deep trenches dug.
One day he said harshly to the boy: "Wilhelm, you are just like Bueble;
you can't go on the straight path, you are not content with that. You
are only happy when rushing about, and jumping over hedges and ditches;
that's your grand pleasure! Yes, Bueble, you are just as bad; you two
are capital playfellows!"
Then little Wilhelm replied: "Uncle, a dog is not a man, and a man is
not a dog."
This simple speech of the child softened the old man's heart so much,
that he begged Lenz, when he again took possession of his own house, to
leave little Wilhelm with him.
It was Annele who chiefly urged a speedy return to their home on the
Morgenhalde. Once she would have considered it Paradise to live in
Petrowitsch's house, to be kind to the old man while he lived, and to
inherit his wealth when he died; but now her sole wish was to pass the
rest of her days, peacefully and frugally, in their solitary home.
The death of her mother, which was concealed from her for some time,
was a heavy blow to her. All her misfortunes seemed to have been
crowded into that one terrible night.
Wilhelm remained with Petrowitsch, who asked Pilgrim also to live with
him. Those who were passing the house, often heard neighing like a
foal, grunting like a pig, whistling like a nightingale, and hooting
like an owlet; and often an old and a young child's head were seen at
the window: it was Pilgrim and his young godson, trying to vie with
each other, to see who could imitate most animals. And then the real
barking of a dog was heard; it was Bueble barking. And last of all, a
loud laugh, interrupted, however, by coughing; it was Petrowitsch, who
was incessantly laughing at the pranks of the old boy and the young
one, till his cough stopped his merriment. He had not left the village
for years, and he maintained that so much laughing was better for his
health than any baths.
It was now the second summer since that eventful night. Lenz was
working busily, and had now three journeymen under him, and all was
going on prosperously.
One day Lenz went to his uncle, and said: "I never yet asked you for
anything."
"But I will ask you something, which is, to be so good as to ask me for
nothing."
"Not for myself, certainly, but for Faller. He was seized with severe
hoarseness in getting us out of the snow. He must go to some Baths."
"Very well; here is money for the purpose. Tell him he must go in my
stead, and float away my cough too. It is very good in you to ask
nothing for yourself. You help yourself; that is always best."
It cost no little trouble to persuade Faller to go to the Baths; but
Annele at last succeeded, through his wife.
Annele had now two friends, certainly very different from each other in
every point. The one was the Doctor's Amanda, and the garden on the
Morgenhalde had a great many cuttings from the Doctor's garden. Annele
took much pleasure now in gardening; she had learned how to tend and
nurse the plants herself. Her second friend was Faller's wife. "You are
more in my own station," said Annele often, "for you too are a
clockmaker's wife." Almost unconsciously, however, the entire
subserviency of Faller's wife gratified her, for she was a combination
of friend and servant.
Faller went to the Baths, where Annele's second sister was, and where
he met an old acquaintance. The bath master was the former Landlord of
the "Golden Lion," who, after the death of his wife, had retired to
this place. He had the same benevolent air, and patronised every one
whom he met. The trials he had endured seemed to have passed very
lightly over him, for he was remarkably cheerful and communicative. He
commissioned Faller to inform the whole village, and the whole country,
that he had been comparatively innocent. He told him that his wife had
misled him, and then affected the most entire ignorance and
unconsciousness; and, even if he had been far more guilty than he
really was, he had done ample penance for his sins in one solitary
hour. He proceeded to detail to Faller, how his wife had denounced and
exposed him on the very morning of his ruin, while, in fact, she was
the one chiefly to blame. It seemed a relief to him to abuse Brazil,
where, he said, no justice was to be found, or he would now, from his
speculations in that country, have been a rich man. He then praised the
Spa, and the good milk, which performed miracles; and if there were
only gaming tables established here, it would be the most fashionable
Spa in the whole country.
Faller came home again; but in the early spring, just as the snow was
again melting, he died.
Shortly after his death, Petrowitsch was also buried. He had often
conquered death; for since autumn his violent cough had become so much
worse, that he constantly expected to choke; and in fact one of those
attacks carried him off at last, quite suddenly.
Just as the Doctor had prophesied, so it was. Petrowitsch possessed
nothing but an annuity, which he had secured by sacrificing the remains
of his capital, for the greater proportion of it had been swallowed by
the gaming tables at Baden-Baden.
Many discrepancies and contradictions in Petrowitsch's conduct, were
thus explained. Above all, the Doctor maintained that the old man had
been angry with the world, because he was angry with himself.
Lenz took one of Faller's sons to live with him, the little girl was
left with her mother, and Kathrine, the farmer's wife, adopted the
twins--she, indeed, only wished to take one, but the children refused
to be separated.
Franzl was proud and thankful to be able to tell her old, kind friend
Kathrine, the present state of the Morgenhalde. "I do not know," said
she, "which Annele spoils the most--her husband or myself. The angels
in heaven must rejoice, when they see how these two live together. You
know I am from Knuslingen: no one can take me in; and though I don't
wish to boast, I am pretty sharp, and see more than most people. At
first they were still a little afraid of each other, like a house that
has been burnt down--the moment you dig in it, the flames are apt to
burst out afresh. They were alarmed lest any thoughtless word should
tear open an old wound, until they by degrees gradually discovered that
each was changed for the better, and mutually loved each other dearly;
and what they used to imagine malice, and ill temper, irritating both
so grievously once upon a time, they found to be only sorrow, at not
having fallen on the right mode of making each other happy. All
thoughts of keeping an inn are at an end with Annele; and I must say my
Lenz has become much more manly and energetic. The Choral Society is
changed into a Polytechnic; and they all say that Lenz appears there to
the greatest advantage, for he is very clever. They have some office
there: I can't quite explain what it means--but it is something to
benefit everybody. My Lenz is the head, and he is called Master of the
Union. When you see the Balancemaker from Knuslingen, he can tell you
all about it better than I can, for he is a member also. Do you know
that my Lenz had a fine silver medal sent to him from England,
because his musical clock won the prize at the Great Exhibition? And
when he showed the medal to Annele, he said: 'I am so happy for your
sake, because it shows you I can do something.' Then she cried, and
said--'That is a shred from our buried life--never wake it again. I
need no testimonial of your merits from others: I can give you the best
myself.'
"When she spoke thus, he looked up to his mother's picture, and said;
'Mother I you may rejoice in heaven, for we are happy!'"
Kathrine heard this good report with sincere pleasure. Franzl, however,
was like a wound-up piece of clockwork. She continued:--"And did you
hear what we inherited from Petrowitsch? Nothing but his dog, who will
neither eat a morsel of potato, nor a bit of bread: he should soon
learn to do so, I can tell him; but my Lenz is far too good to the dog,
and says he saved little Marie's life. So not one kreuzer did we
inherit from our rich uncle. The Doctor, it seems, said so long ago. He
was in some Sickly Insurance, I think they call it, or some such name,
and had nothing but a good annuity. Now it is evident why he was so
hard and tough. And it is also come out that his capital, that he had
scraped together in so many different parts of the world, all went at
the gambling table. Yes; there is no doubt that gamblers are often at
the same time the stupidest, as well as the cleverest men. The Doctor
said so, and what he says is always sure to come true. Won't you stay
here till tomorrow? The Doctor's old mother is to be buried then--the
very last of the old generation. She was not quite seventy-eight. My
Lenz said, when his uncle died, 'I am rather glad that I don't get
anything from him--I shall now help myself, and trust to no one else.'
He intends to take his own son Wilhelm, and young Faller, as
apprentices; but he says they must first leave home and travel."
"And are they good and kind to you?" asked Kathrine, merely to say
something.
"Good Heavens! kind!--they are only too kind. I don't know what use I
am of, that they pretend they could not be happy without me. It is only
a sad pity that I can't help getting old; but my grandmother was
eighty-three when she died, and I dare say she was in reality
ninety-three, for all old people make great mistakes about their age,
never having learnt either to read or to write. I may live to be as
old. I eat and drink well, and sleep like a top. All prospers in our
house. And see! the wood is beginning to grow famously, and it now
belongs to us; and as surely as the wood is now growing as fast as it
can, where God has placed it, and thrives just as it ought, so surely
is everything in our house increasing and prospering. These are fine
shady young trees, are they not? I hope to live to see them large
timber."
Kathrine had not time to wait for that; and when she was on her way
home with the twins, escorted part of the way by Lenz, and Annele, and
Faller's widow, Franzl called out to her from the kitchen--"Kathrine,
be prepared to stand godmother to our next."
* * * * *
This is the story of Lenz and Annele of the Morgenhalde; and now we
know why the young mother has white hair, and why, at the moment of
parting with her son, she begs him to bring her home a plant of
Edelweiss.
When Lenz came home, he found a garland of fresh flowers hung over the
picture of his mother. He nodded gratefully to Annele. She had always
thus cherished the memory of this day. It was now eighteen years since
his mother had been buried. They did not say it to each other, but they
knew in their hearts, that the memory of their admirable mother bloomed
always afresh in their hearts, just as the flowers in the fields, year
after year, bear fresh blossoms.
Faller's widow and her daughter dined with them. On the former
lamenting--"Oh! that my husband had only lived to see our twin sons
setting off together to travel!"--Lenz told her how much she ought to
rejoice, that the twins that Kathrine had adopted years ago, had done
so well in the world. The one, who was a soldier, had become a
corporal; and the other was to inherit his adopted father's property.
Her daughter, a tall slender girl of fifteen, said she had promised to
write to her brother, and to Wilhelm, the first of every month.
After dinner Lenz returned to work as usual. This day eighteen years,
he had soothed a much more excited state of mind by work. It was
invariably his custom to master all his emotions in his workshop.
Annele sat beside him with her needlework. She was no longer restless,
and her eyes no longer flashed with impatience, but had a sweet and
calm expression; and Lenz's work always succeeded better when she was
near. She spoke little, and the whole course of her present thoughts
might be guessed from her saying--"Our Wilhelm has six shirts of that
fine linen, that your excellent mother spun with her own hands."
The places of the two lads were quickly filled, for from all sides
people pressed forwards to place their sons with Lenz.
Franzl was particularly proud and pleased, that Lenz took a grandson of
the Balancemaker in Knuslingen, as an apprentice.
In the evening the Schoolmaster arrived, with a large bundle of papers
under his arm. He laid them down. You could plainly read on them, in
large letters--"Acts of the Clockmakers' Union."
The Schoolmaster begged Lenz, before the Members of the Union
assembled, to walk with him in the wood. Lenz went with him. In the
mean time Annele placed two rows of chairs straight in the room, for
Lenz was Master of the Union.
THE END.
LONDON: PRINTED BY WILLIAM CLOWES AND SONS, STAMFORD STREET,
AND CHARING CROSS.