Black Forest Village Stories

After these preliminary operations, the College Chap entered the family council at home, and advocated the teacher's suit of Hedwig with his usual eagerness and impetuosity.

The betrothal of the two lovers was solemnized with the accustomed ceremonies. They plighted their troth to each other in the presence of her father and brother, of the old squire, and of Buchmaier, whom the teacher had invited in lieu of kindred or other friends.

When the transaction was over, Hedwig left her room with the bridegroom-for to that name, in German parlance, he was now entitled-and embraced him for the first time, saying, "I do love you dearly, – dearly!"

They repaired to her grandmother's room, who was lying ill in bed, and knelt down at her bedside.

"He is mine now, forever," said Hedwig. She could not say more. The grandmother laid her hands upon them and muttered a prayer; after which she said, "Get up, and don't kneel here: you mustn't kneel anywhere but before God. Don't I tell you? I am the messenger who is to give them notice in heaven that you have found each other. Teacher, what's your mother's name? I'm going to her the minute I get there, and to your father too; and then I mean to take my Jack Adam, and my brothers and sisters, and my parents with me, and my three grandchildren that are gone, and we'll all sit down together and talk about you and pray for you; and then you must be happy. Hedwig, I leave you my necklace, you'll find it in the closet there. And there's a wreath beside it, from my wedding: take good care of it: it will bring blessings down on you. Let your children smell at it after the christening. And, though you should get married soon after I go, you must have music at your wedding. Do you hear? You sha'n't be grieving for me, and the seven-league dance you must dance for me: I will look down on you with joy, and the whole family up there shall celebrate the wedding too."

The lovers tried to dispel her anticipations of death; but she replied, "I feel just as if somebody was pulling my arm all the time, and saying, 'Make haste: it's time.' But it isn't hard enough yet: it must come harder. You mustn't cry now: don't. I am going into good hands, a'n't I? I thank the Lord for having let me live long enough to see Hedwig get a good husband. Love each other, and honor each other.

"Hedwig, he's a studied man, and they often get kinks into their heads: I know that from my sister. You must have patience with him. These studied men have very different notions from other folks, sometimes, and then they let them out the wrong way and to the wrong person. And you, teacher, when you get my Hedwig, my dear Hedwig-" She could not speak further: the girl lay on her neck, weeping.

The old woman had spoken quite fluently, her cough having disappeared entirely; now, however, she sank upon her pillow exhausted. The lovers stood looking upon her sadly. At last she raised herself again, and said, "Hedwig, go and ask Valentine's Christina to stay with me: I sha'n't die to-day yet. You mustn't come to me again all day. Go, now, both of you, and be in good spirits: promise me to be in good spirits."

The teacher executed the commission she had given to Hedwig, and then both were dismissed from the bedside. Their hearts continued to quiver with sadness until they had seen Buchmaier's Agnes, who managed to enliven them with her usual chat and raillery.

Then they walked in the fields, followed by the white hen. The seed was not yet in the ground, – so that there was no objection to her being at large. The breath of Nature recalled their souls to the full gladness of the occasion. Around them autumn was at work among the yellow leaves; but in their hearts it was all spring.

Next day Hedwig's grandmother called for the Eucharist. The teacher did duty for the sexton, and carried the lantern for the parson: a considerable portion of the congregation assembled at the door and prayed while Maurita was being "served" within. The only reflection occupying the teacher's thoughts during the ceremony was, "Would that all freethinkers could meet death with equal confidence!" Maurita received the sacrament with open, beaming eyes, then turned to the wall and spoke no more. When they looked at her after a time, she was dead.

Maurita was buried with silent and devout sadness, unaccompanied by loud weeping or wailing. The whole village mourned. Even old George the blacksmith said, with a seriousness unusual to him, "I am so sorry she is dead! My turn comes next."

When the teacher returned from the burial, Hedwig embraced him, and said, weeping, "I want you more than ever now: I have no grandmother any more."

The teacher had found another tie to attach him to the village: the corpse of a friend rested in its soil.

Thus we have accompanied the good Maurita to the entrance of the life beyond, and the teacher to the opening of a new life on earth. We cannot follow the good old grandmother to heaven: let us see, a little longer, what happened to the teacher.

His betrothal had given great satisfaction throughout the village. Even the children playing on the site of the fire were sometimes involved in excited discussions, as they endeavored to explain their relationship to Hedwig, and therefore to the teacher. Johnnie had not a great many friends in the village; but this event gave pleasure to all. Everyone whom the teacher met shook hands and wished him much joy and happiness. Every one had something good to tell of Hedwig. Men and women who would otherwise never have thought of conversing with the teacher now chatted like old acquaintances. Mat came to his house, shook his hands warmly, and said, "Ah, I was the one that told you it must come so: don't you remember? You might have given me a farm and you wouldn't have pleased me more. When the old teacher dies you shall have the two fields he farms now: it's good land, and, if you'll let me know, I'll work two or three days for you with pleasure."

The teacher was doubly pleased at this friendly spirit. He saw the good hearts of the villagers; and he also saw how firm a footing he had gained in their affections, and how much he had bettered the prospect of exerting a beneficent influence over them.

Mankind are no longer accustomed to receive benefits emanating from no other motive than the general desire to do them good. They have been betrayed and disappointed so often that now they meet the philanthropist with intuitive suspicion. They think so very general an aspiration must cloak some very particular design. They will permit no one to love them unreservedly but those who are related to them by some special bond of kindred or other relationship.

Winter stalked into the village with rapid strides. The villagers remained at home and enjoyed what their toil had gathered. Threshing, and a little manuring, was the only kind of labor that could be performed. When the grain was threshed, all was silent. Here and there a travelling peddler might be heard crying "Spindles! wives' spindles!" The snow drifted about the street, and all cuddled around the genial tile stove. At such times an evil spirit would walk in the village in broad daylight, – the spirit of idleness. Whomsoever the spirit looked at was doomed to yawn and gossip and quarrel. The time of rest was not a time of recreation, because there had been no exertion to rest from. Young men sat for whole days in the tavern, playing cards; and, though so sorely burdened with excess of time, they never thought of going home till the last stroke of the "police-hour" of eleven had brought in the beadle and the landlord's inevitable notice to quit. Others went to bed early and drowned their time in sleep; while still others soiled it with wickedness.

Idleness is the root of all evil. The industrious alone are intrinsically cheerful, peaceable and well meaning; idlers easily lean to gambling and drunkenness, and are prone to wrangling, quarrels, and treachery. It is for this reason, and this alone, that all the vices love to dwell among the so-called upper classes of society.

While the greater part of the villagers were thus vegetating, the teacher had awakened to a double existence. It sometimes happens that a man who has had a violent fever rises from his bed an inch or two taller than before. Thus our friend, while his flying pulses studied Hedwig's life and being, had made wonderful progress in the understanding of the people's character. As he had formerly "sipped the intellectual breath of beauty" from the productions of inanimate nature, leaving to others the task of turning into use her treasures, so now he recognised the presence of a higher principle in every living intelligence. Every person who crossed his path was a representative of some portion or place of the people's character. Instead of looking down upon others from the eminence of his own intellectuality, he forgot himself, and unconsciously looked up to the intelligence he detected in every other. The others were raised in his estimation, because he thought only of that which ennobled them: himself had sunk, because he was only reminded of himself by those petty occurrences of every-day life which brought out the lesser traits in his own nature.

He was a man who understood the inmost thoughts and feelings of all around him. He boldly followed up his resolve to give them a taste of the pleasures of the mind: he was sufficiently matured himself to penetrate the rough bark which concealed the core of their minds and hearts.

In the evening he would read aloud the papers at the inn. He had many explanations to give, and many false impressions to remove: for the College Chap, who had previously acted as oracle, had taken pleasure in "stuffing up the natives." A little circle habitually gathered round him, while others played cards at the table: even these, however, would occasionally listen to what he was saying, by which many a trick was lost.

Little by little the teacher obtained their confidence, and they spoke their minds more freely. With all the excellence of his intention, he still found it difficult to translate himself entirely into their ways of thinking. It is an easy thing to say, "I love the people!" but to be prepared at all times to receive all sorts of crudities with respect, without taking offence at habits and customs often repulsive and obdurate, – to follow the discursive ones through a thousand pointless digressions, – to sympathize with the impetuous in a jargon of incoherent impulses and sentiments, – requires a power of self-abnegation, a degree of control over one's own individuality, with which but very few are favored. Thanks to his clear understanding of the task, our friend was one of the number.

One evening Mat began, "Mr. Teacher, I'm going to ask a stupid question; but why is that paper called the 'Suabian Mercury,' and not the 'Suabian Markery'? Sure it is a markery; because every thing that happens is marked down there. Is 'Mercury' High German for 'Markery'?"

"You've caught the old robin in his nest," said the College Chap. "You're right there, Mat: those fellows in Stuttgard don't know any thing about it. If I was you I'd go down and tell 'em: they'll give you a premium, depend upon it."

The teacher explained that Mercury had been the messenger of the gods, and the god of trade, in ancient Greece.

"Yes; but how does he come to be called 'Suabian'?" asked Mat, again.

"Well, they chose to give that name to the paper," answered the teacher. He had never thought about it himself.

"I want to know," began Hansgeorge: "did the Greecelanders believe in more gods than one?"

"Of course," replied the College Chap. "One of 'em manured and the other sowed, one rained and the other thundered: they had a particular god or goddess for every particular job. The Greeks even allowed their gods to marry."

"I guess they were saints or angels," said Wendel the mason, "or tutelaries; but they must have had some sort of a captain over them, or it would be a carnival stupid enough to split your sides with laughing."

"You weren't by when they built the tower of Babel, neither, mason," said the College Chap. "Of course they had a captain, and a trump card he was: he had a jealous wife, though, and she gave him lots of trouble. Now, I'll leave it to the teacher whether all this isn't as true as gospel."

Suppressing a sigh, the teacher gave the company a cursory sketch of the Grecian mythology. Some of the wonders included in it created much sensation. It occurred to him, also, how strange it was that he should be expounding the Hellenic sages in a smoky bar-room of the Black Forest. All this was the doing of the Suabian Mercury.

It was almost impossible to persuade the farmers that the Greeks were not "jackasses." He told them of the wise and good Socrates, and of his martyrdom.

"Why, that was almost as bad as the way they treated our Savior," said Kilian of the Frog Alley.

"Certainly," replied the teacher. "Whoever undertakes to teach a new and wholesome truth by its right name and without circumlocution must take a cross for his pains." He sighed as he said this; for it seemed to have some bearing upon his own case: the task he had undertaken was not an easy one.

As they went away, the men said to each other, "We've had a fine evening for once: you get a little wiser, and time passes round before you know it."

The teacher had formed the design of reading something to the farmers about the Grecian mythology: fortunately, however, he laid his hand upon a very different book, – a collection of German proverbs. On entering the bar-room, he took the book from his pocket, saying, "Let me read you something."

There were wry faces on all sides; for farmers regard books as their natural enemies. Mat spoke first: -

"Better tell us a story, Mr. Teacher."

"Yes, yes; tell us something: don't read," was the general response.

"Well, just listen a little while," said the teacher: "if you don't like it, say so, and I'll stop."

He began to read the proverbs, pausing after every one.

"Why, that's what George the blacksmith says," and "That's Spring Bat's word," "That's what old Maurita used to say," "That's your speech, Andrew, Mike, Caspar," was soon heard from different quarters of the room. The players laid aside their cards and listened; for at times a pithy sentence would provoke general merriment.

The teacher could not refrain from asking, with an air of some triumph, "Shall I read on?"

"Yes; read on till morning," said every one; and Kilian of the Frog Alley added, "It must have been the smartest kind of a man that made that book; for he knew every thing. I wonder if he wasn't one of the ancient sages."

"Yes: those are your sort of folks, Kilian," said some one in a corner.

"Be quiet, now," cried others. "Read on, Mr. Teacher."

He did so. Sometimes corrections and additions were suggested, which the teacher would gladly have noted in writing, but refrained for fear of restraining the open-heartedness of the audience. They were overjoyed to find the whole stock of their collective wisdom thus heaped up in a single granary. One or two discussions arose in reference to the explanation, or the truth of this or that proverb, with which the teacher never interfered; others would urge the disputants to silence; while still others urged the teacher to proceed. A bright fire was burning, which our friend had the satisfaction of having kindled.

When he returned the next evening, he found more guests than usual. They had lost their dread of books, and immediately inquired whether he had not some similar entertainment for them.

"Yes," said the teacher, taking out a book. But this time things were not destined to go so smoothly; there were tares among the wheat, sowed by the College Chap, who had a deep-seated aversion to any thing serious or sensible. With some partisans whom he had enlisted, he sat at a table and began to sing. The teacher was at a loss.

"Why, Constantine," said Mat, "a'n't you ashamed of yourself, and you a town-clerk?"

"I've paid for my wine, and have as good a right here as the next man," replied the College Chap; "and the tavern isn't a place to read books in."

There was a general murmur.

"Hold on," said Mat, "we'll soon fix this. Landlord, I'll go and get some wood, and we'll make a fire in the room upstairs. Whoever wants to listen may come up, and whoever don't may stay where he is."

"I'll go," said Thaddie, who had come this evening also. The stove was soon in a glow, for Thaddie was afraid of losing something by making up the fire afterward. Mat sat down beside the teacher and snuffed the candle. The story was Zschokke's "Village of Gold-Makers."

In spite of its fine subject and elevating tendency, the book was far from earning the applause which the teacher had expected: it was so interwoven with the experiences of peasant-life that every one felt himself qualified to judge it. It would occupy too much of our space to repeat all the opinions expressed. Whenever the phrase recurred, "Oswald opened his lips and spoke," Buchmaier smiled in derision of its formality. Many of the ideas were lost; while others received a general nod of approbation.

To the teacher's surprise, the first thing manifest when the story had reached its close was that most of the company sided with the village and against Oswald. Mat soon hit upon the reason of this incongruity in saying, "What I don't like is that Oswald seems to do all the good in the village alone."

"And I," said Thaddie, "would like to pull off his feather and his star: he's a fine fellow, and don't want them gimcracks."

"You're right," replied Buchmaier. "He plays the gentleman too much, anyhow; and as for his hereditary prince, what's he good for? But what were you going to say, Andrew? Bring out the wild-cats."

"I think Oswald has no business to put his nose into other people's pots and pans. What's he got to do with their cooking?"

"And I think," said Kilian, "the farmers are made out a good deal too stupid: it isn't quite so bad, after all."

"And you're a learned man yourself, too," said Hansgeorge. Everybody laughed.

"My notion is," said Wendel the mason, "the village is a deal too bad at first and a deal too good afterward. I don't see how things can change so in one and the same place."

"What puts me out most," said Buchmaier, "is that they can't get through without even making out what sort of clothes people shall wear and what they sha'n't. That's just like the cruelty-to-animals societies. These things must be left to every man's own taste and fancy. And once I could hardly help laughing when Oswald, in his uniform and with the feathers on his hat, embraced the thirty-two men one by one: there's a job for you!"

The teacher called to mind that the book had been written years ago, when people were far more ceremonious than at present. He adverted to the fine moral of the book and the many fine passages it contained. He showed how great is the use of position, money, dress, and other externals to those who desire to carry out good intentions among men, and concluded by saying that it was unjust to make such incidental trifles an excuse for condemning the whole.

"No doubt about that," said Buchmaier. "If I could see the man that wrote that book, I'd take off my hat rather than to the king himself, and say, 'You're a good fellow, and mean well by us.' That's my notion."

When they rose to go, Thaddie nudged Mat, and said, in a whisper, "Come! out with it now, or they'll all run away."

"What do you say, men," began Mat, "to getting the teacher to read to us an evening or two every week?"

"Why, that would be first-rate," cried all.

"I'm quite ready," said the teacher. "Let's have a meeting to-morrow night, say in the school-room. Meantime, all can think about the society, and make proposals."

"Yes, that's right," said every one: and they parted in great good-humor.

The meeting, which was held next day, was stormy. The teacher, with Buchmaier's assistance, had prepared a draft of a constitution. It was read paragraph by paragraph, with a long pause after each. At every pause there was a buzz of conversation; but when the talkers were requested to express their opinions publicly they suddenly ceased. None but Mat, Hansgeorge, Kilian, and Wendel could be induced to address the whole company. A general tempest was provoked by the paragraph, -

"During the continuance of the reading-nights no smoking shall be permitted."

There was no end to the angry mutterings, until Buchmaier, nodding to the teacher, as if to say, "Didn't I tell you so? I know my men," moved to "strike out the law about smoking altogether."

"Yes, yes!" they all exclaimed as with one mouth. Buchmaier continued: -

"So, whoever can't do without smoking, let him smoke. It'll be hard for the teacher to read in the steam; so, if he has to stop, nobody can blame him. But one thing we will stick to: if any man's pipe goes out, he sha'n't light it again till the teacher's done reading. He may sleep if he can't keep his eyes open; but he sha'n't snore."

A roar of laughter ensued, after which Buchmaier went on: -

"So we won't put a word about smoking into the law, and we'll only have the understanding that, when the reading is all done, every man shall light his pipe with the wisdom he's got by listening, and smoke what's been told him. Is that right, or not?"

"Yes: that's right."

"And whoever wants to talk must take the pipe out of his mouth," said the voice of an unknown speaker, who has been too modest to reveal himself to this day.

Another knotty point was the place of meeting. With a fine tact, the teacher objected to the school-room. All the members of the town-council being present, the large anteroom of the town-hall was fixed upon.

On Jack George's motion, it was resolved that every man should be at liberty to have his glass of beer before him, but no more. This proposal made Jack George so popular that he was elected to the executive committee with Mat and Kilian.

There were many other difficulties to be overcome; but a knot of enthusiasts had gathered around the teacher, who carried him over every thing in triumph. The foremost of these were Mat and Thaddie. The latter only regretted that he could not find some herculean labor to perform for the teacher: he would gladly have run through the fire to please him.

On the other hand, the society had two mortal foes, in the landlord of the Eagle and the College Chap. The former feared for his custom, and railed against the teacher, who since his betrothal boarded with his intended father-in-law. The College Chap suspected "psalm-singing" in all things, and said that his brother only meant to catch the people first and pluck them afterward.

It is a customary trick of the monarchical Governments of Europe to disarm demagogues by appointing them to office. In pursuance of the same policy, the teacher made Constantine "alternate reader." Now that it afforded scope for his ambition, the College Chap was one of the most devoted adherents of the society.

Thus the teacher gradually learned to understand men and to govern them. He made efforts to gain the support of the old teacher and of the Jewish schoolmaster. What the former wanted in zeal the latter richly atoned for. Some Jews, who, being engaged in agriculture or in mechanical trades, were always at home, also took an active part.

The selection of the books was not easy. Our friend soon found that didactic reading, or that which aimed immediately at moral instruction and improvement, must not be allowed to preponderate. Without degrading the matter to mere amusement, he read extracts from the Limpurg Chronicles, Gleim's poems, and the lives of Schubart, Moser, Franklin, and others. Particular success attended the reading of Paul and Virginia, and of Wallenstein's Camp, to which were added some chapters from Simplicissimus. The greatest attention, however, was excited by the reading of Kœrner's "Hedwig, the Bandit's Bride," by the teacher, the College Chap, and the Jewish teacher. The exalted diction and wonderful incidents produced a great impression. At the close of the piece, Mat inquired, "What became of the robbers in the cellar? Were they burned or hanged?"

The teacher could not repress a laugh at this sympathetic question, but he knew not what to answer. Perhaps one of our readers will have the goodness to inform him.

Sometimes the old popular books were read likewise: the Schildburgers aroused especial merriment.