Part 15

"I thought over this thing a couple of days and some of the nights too, and then the third day I drifted over to Morten's. Ane Kirstine stood alone outside the gate with her back turned, for she was busy whitewashing a wall, so I came upon her before she knew it. 'Mercy on us! is that you?' she cried, 'where have you been all these many days?'--'I have been at home, and in the field, and on the heath, as it happened, and now I come to take a look at you.'--'I am not worth looking at,' said she, and thrust her clay-covered hands down into the pail to rinse off the clay. 'I don't care,' says I, 'whether you are yellow or gray, for you are the best friend I've got in this world; but I suppose I shall never be worthy of taking you in my arms in all honor and virtue.'--'It would be bad if that couldn't be,' said she, 'but it may happen we have got to wait awhile.'--'I can't wait over-long,' said I, 'for my mother will have no roof over her head, and either I shall have to take the farm or else a sister; that is how it stands, and it cannot be otherwise.'--Then she began to sniffle, and dried her eyes and sighed, but said nothing. I felt sorry for her, but what was there for one to do?

"Well, some one came who could tell us what to do, and it was none other than that same Poorman. Along he tramps with one of his women, and had his glass case on his back and wanted to get into the farm." Then he turned toward us and said:--'Well, well! what are you two doing there? Come along in with me, little girl, and I'll see if I can't manage it for you; but you stay out here, my little man! then we'll see what may come of it.'--They went, and I sat down on a stone that was lying there and folded my hands. I was not over-happy. I don't know how long I sat there, for I had fallen asleep; but then I was waked by some one kissing me, and it was no other than Ane Kirstine. 'Are you sitting there sleeping?' said she; 'come along in now, it is as it ought to be. The knacker has spoken a good word for us to mother, and when nothing could change her he said, "There is a black cock sitting on the perch: maybe a red one will crow over you if you don't do as I say." At this she got a little bit scared, and said, "Then let it be! but this I tell you, Ane Kirstine, I'll keep the black-headed cow for milking, and I'll have all the hay that is my share."--"That is no more than reasonable," said I, "and now we have no more to quarrel about, I suppose." Now you can let them publish the banns when you please.' 'And now, Ane Kirstine,' said I, 'this tramp here, he must have a reward, and I'll give it with a good will; and if we can get hold of him when we have our feast, he shall have a pot of soup and a hen to himself and those women and children.'--'That is right enough,' said she; 'and I will give them a rag or so, or a few more of my half-worn clothes.'

"Well, then my mother-in-law made a splendid feast, and there was plenty of everything. The Poorman was there, too, with all his following; but they had theirs by themselves, as you might know, seeing that they were of the knacker kind. Him I gave a coat, and Ane Kirstine gave the women each a cap and a kerchief and a piece of homespun for a petticoat for each of the young ones, and they were mighty well pleased.

"I and Ane Kirstine had lived happily together for about four years, as we do still, and all that time we had seen nothing of that Poorman, although we had spoken of him now and again. Sometimes we thought he had perished, and sometimes that they had put him into Viborghouse. Well, then it was that we were to have our second boy christened, him we called Sören, and I went to the parson to get this thing fixed up. As I came on the marsh to the selfsame place where I saw that Poor-customer the first time, there was somebody lying at one edge of the bog, on his back in the heather and with his legs in the ditch. I knew him well enough. 'Why are you lying here alone?' said I: 'is anything the matter with you?' 'I think I am dying,' said he, but he gasped so I could hardly understand him. 'Where are those women,' said I, 'that you used to have with you? Have they left you to lie here by the road?' He nodded his head and whispered, 'A drop of water.' 'That I will give you,' said I, and then I took some of the rainwater that stood in the ditch, in the hollow of my hat, and held it to his mouth. But that was of no use, for he could drink no longer, but drew up his legs and opened his mouth wide, and then the spirit left him. I felt so sorry for him that when I came to the parson's I begged that his poor ghost might be sheltered in the churchyard. That he gave me leave to do, and then I fetched him on my own wagon and nailed a couple of boards together and laid him down in the northwestern corner, and there he lies."

"Well now, that was it," said Kristen Katballe, "but why do you sit there so still, Marie Kjölvroe? Can you neither sing nor tell us something?" "That is not impossible," said she, and heaved a sigh, and sang so sadly that one might almost think it had happened to her.

THE HOSIER

"The greatest sorrow of all down here, Is to lose the one we hold most dear."

Sometimes, when I have wandered far out on the wide heath, where I have had nothing but the brown heather around me and the blue sky above me; when I walked far away from mankind and the monuments of its busy doings here below,--which after all are only molehills to be leveled by time or by some restless Tamerlane;--when I drifted, light-hearted, free, and proud, like the Bedouin, whom no house, no narrowly bounded field chains to the spot, but who owns, possesses, all he sees,--who does not dwell, but who goes wherever he pleases; when my far-hovering eye caught a glimpse of a house in the horizon, and was thus disagreeably arrested in its airy flight, sometimes there came (God forgive me this passing thought, it was no more than that) the wish--would that this dwelling of man were not! there too is trouble and sorrow; there too they quarrel and fight about mine and thine!--Oh! the happy desert is mine, is thine, is everybody's, is nobody's.--It is said that a forester has proposed to disturb the settlements, to plant forests on the fields of the peasants and in place of their torn-down villages; the far more inhuman thought has taken possession of me at times--what if the heather-grown heath were still here the same as it was centuries ago, undisturbed, untouched by the hand of man! But as I have said, I did not mean it seriously. For when tired and weary, suffering from hunger and thirst, I thought longingly of the Arab's tent and coffee-pot, I thanked God that a heather-thatched roof--be it even miles away--promised me shelter and refreshment.

On a still, warm September day, several years ago, I found myself walking on this same heath, which, Arabically speaking, I call mine. No wind stirred the blushing heather; the air was heavy and misty with heat. The far-off hills that limited the horizon seemed to hover like clouds around the immense plain, and took many wonderful shapes: houses, towers, castles, men and animals; but all of dark uncertain outline, changing like dream pictures; now a cottage grew into a church, and that in turn into a pyramid; here a spire arose, there another sank; a man became a horse, and this in turn an elephant; here floated a boat, there a ship with all sails set.

My eye found its pleasure for quite a while in watching these fantastic figures--a panorama which only the sailor and the desert-dweller have occasion to enjoy--when finally I began to look for a real house among the many false ones; I wanted right ardently to exchange all my beautiful fairy palaces for a single human cottage.

Success was mine; I soon discovered a real farm without spires and towers, whose outlines became distincter and sharper the nearer I came to it, and which, flanked by peat-stacks, looked much larger than it really was. Its inmates were unknown to me. Their clothes were poor, their furniture simple, but I knew that the heath-dweller often hides noble rental in an unpainted box or in a miserable wardrobe, and a fat pocketbook inside a patched coat; when therefore my eyes fell on an alcove packed full of stockings, I concluded, and quite rightly, that I was in the house of a rich hosier. (In parenthesis it may be said that I do not know any poor ones.)

A middle-aged, gray-haired, but still strong man rose from his slice and offered me his hand with these words: "Welcome!--with permission to ask, where does the good friend come from?"

Do not jeer at so ill-mannered and straightforward a question! the heath peasant is quite as hospitable as the Scotch laird, and but a little more curious; after all, he cannot be blamed for wanting to know who his guest is.

When I had told him who I was and whence I came, he called his wife, who immediately put all the delicacies of the house before me and begged me insistently, with good-hearted kindness, to eat and drink, although my hunger and thirst made all insistence unnecessary.

I was in the midst of the repast and a political talk with my host, when a young and exceedingly beautiful peasant girl came in, whom I should undoubtedly have declared a lady who had fled from cruel parents and an unwished-for marriage, had not her red hands and unadulterated peasant dialect convinced me that no disguise had taken place. She nodded in a friendly way, cast a passing glance under the table, went out and came in soon again with a dish of milk and water, which she put down on the floor with the words, "Your dog may need something too."

I thanked her for her attention; but this was fully given to the big dog, whose greediness soon made the dish empty, and who now in his way thanked the giver by rubbing himself up against her; and when she raised her arms, a little intimidated, Chasseur misunderstood the movement, put himself on the alert, and forced the screaming girl backwards toward the alcove. I called the dog back and explained his good intentions.

I would not have invited the reader's attention to so trivial a matter, but to remark that everything is becoming to the beautiful; for indeed this peasant girl showed, in everything she said and did, a certain natural grace which could not be called coquetry unless you will so call an innate unconscious instinct.

When she had left the room I asked the parents if this was their daughter. They answered in the affirmative, adding that she was an only child.

"You won't keep her very long," I said.

"Dear me, what do you mean by that?" asked the father; but a pleased smile showed that he understood my meaning.

"I think," I answered, "that she will hardly lack suitors."

"Hm!" grumbled he, "of suitors we can get a plenty; but if they are worth anything, that is the question. To go a-wooing with a watch and a silver-mounted pipe does not set the matter straight; it takes more to ride than to say 'Get up!' Sure as I live," he went on, putting both clenched hands on the table and bending to look out of the low window, "if there is not one of them--a shepherd's boy just out of the heather--oh yes, one of these customers' who run about with a couple of dozen hose in a wallet--stupid dog! wooes our daughter with two oxen and two cows and a half--yes, I am on to him!--Beggar!"

All this was not addressed to me, but to the new-comer, on whom he fastened his darkened eyes as the other came along the heather path toward the house. The lad was still far enough away to allow me time to ask my host about him, and I learned that he was the son of the nearest neighbor--who, by the way,

MATHILDE BLIND

(1847-1896)

Mathilde Blind was born at Mannheim, Germany, March 21st, 1847. She was educated principally in London, and subsequently in Zurich. Since her early school days, with the exception of this interval of study abroad, and numerous journeys to the south of Europe and the East, she has lived in London. Upon her return from Zurich she was thrown much into contact with Mazzini, in London, and her first essay in literature was a volume of poems (which she published in 1867 under the pseudonym Claude Lake) dedicated to him. She was also in close personal relationship with Madox Brown, W.M. Rossetti, and Swinburne. Her first literary work to appear under her own name was a critical essay on the poetical works of Shelley in the Westminster Review in 1870, based upon W.M. Rossetti's edition of the poet. In 1872 she wrote an account of the life and writings of Shelley, to serve as an introduction to a selection of his poems in the Tauchnitz edition. She afterwards edited a selection of the letters of Lord Byron with an introduction, and a selection of his poems with a memoir. A translation of Strauss's 'The Old Faith and the New' appeared in 1873, which contained in a subsequent edition a biography of the author. In 1883, Miss Blind wrote the initial volume, 'George Eliot,' for the 'Eminent Women Series,' which she followed in 1886 in the same series with 'Madame Roland.' Her first novel, 'Tarantella,' appeared in 1885. Besides these prose works, she has made frequent contributions of literary criticism to the Athenaeum and other reviews, and of papers and essays to the magazines; among them translations of Goethe's 'Maxims and Reflections' in Fraser's Magazine, and 'Personal Recollections of Mazzin' in the Fortnightly Review.

Her principal claim to literary fame is however based upon her verse. This is from all periods of her productivity. In addition to the book of poems already noticed, she has written 'The Prophecy of St. Oran, and other Poems,' 1882; 'The Heather on Fire,' a protest against the wrongs of the Highland crofters, 1886; 'The Ascent of Man,' her most ambitious work, 1889; 'Dramas in Miniature' 1892; 'Songs and Sonnets,' 1893; and 'Birds of Passage: Songs of the Orient and Occident,' 1895.

'The Ascent of Man' is a poetical treatment of the modern idea of evolution, and traces the progress of man from his primitive condition in a state of savagery to his present development. Miss Blind has been an ardent advocate of the betterment of the position of woman in society and the State. To this end she has worked and written for an improved education, and against a one-sided morality for the sexes. In her verse she shows characteristically a keen appreciation of nature. Her minor poems particularly, many of which are strong in feeling and admirable in form, entitle her to a distinguished place among the lyric poets of England.

She died in London near the end of November, 1896.

FROM 'LOVE IN EXILE'

I charge you, O winds of the West, O winds with the wings of the dove, That ye blow o'er the brows of my Love, breathing low that I sicken for love.

I charge you, O dews of the Dawn, O tears of the star of the morn, That ye fall at the feet of my Love with the sound of one weeping forlorn.

I charge you, O birds of the Air, O birds flying home to your nest, That ye sing in his ears of the joy that for ever has fled from my breast.

I charge you, O flowers of the Earth, O frailest of things, and most fair, That ye droop in his path as the life in me shrivels, consumed by despair.

O Moon, when he lifts up his face, when he seeth the waning of thee, A memory of her who lies wan on the limits of life let it be.

Many tears cannot quench, nor my sighs extinguish, the flames of love's fire, Which lifteth my heart like a wave, and smites it, and breaks its desire.

I rise like one in a dream when I see the red sun flaring low, That drags me back shuddering from sleep each morning to life with its woe.

I go like one in a dream; unbidden my feet know the way To that garden where love stood in blossom with the red and white hawthorn of May.

The song of the throstle is hushed, and the fountain is dry to its core; The moon cometh up as of old; she seeks, but she finds him no more.

The pale-faced, pitiful moon shines down on the grass where I weep, My face to the earth, and my breast in an anguish ne'er soothed into sleep.

The moon returns, and the spring; birds warble, trees burst into leaf; But Love, once gone, goes for ever, and all that endures is the grief.

* * * * *

SEEKING

In many a shape and fleeting apparition, Sublime in age or with clear morning eyes, Ever I seek thee, tantalizing Vision, Which beckoning flies.

Ever I seek Thee, O evasive Presence, Which on the far horizon's utmost verge, Like some wild star in luminous evanescence, Shoots o'er the surge.

Ever I seek Thy features ever flying, Which, ne'er beheld, I never can forget: Lightning which flames through love, and mimics dying In souls that set.

Ever I seek Thee through all clouds of error; As when the moon behind earth's shadow slips, She wears a momentary mask of terror In brief eclipse.

Ever I seek Thee, passionately yearning; Like altar fire on some forgotten fane, My life flames up irrevocably burning, And burnt in vain.

THE SONGS OF SUMMER

The songs of summer are over and past! The swallow's forsaken the dripping eaves; Ruined and black 'mid the sodden leaves The nests are rudely swung in the blast: And ever the wind like a soul in pain Knocks and knocks at the window-pane.

The songs of summer are over and past! Woe's me for a music sweeter than theirs-- The quick, light bound of a step on the stairs, The greeting of lovers too sweet to last: And ever the wind like a soul in pain Knocks and knocks at the window-pane.

A PARABLE

Between the sandhills and the sea A narrow strip of silver sand, Whereon a little maid doth stand, Who picks up shells continually, Between the sandhills and the sea.

Far as her wondering eyes can reach, A vastness heaving gray in gray To the frayed edges of the day Furls his red standard on the breach Between the sky-line and the beach.

The waters of the flowing tide Cast up the sea-pink shells and weed; She toys with shells, and doth not heed The ocean, which on every side Is closing round her vast and wide.

It creeps her way as if in play, Pink shells at her pink feet to cast; But now the wild waves hold her fast, And bear her off and melt away, A vastness heaving gray in gray.

LOVE'S SOMNAMBULIST

Like some wild sleeper who alone, at night Walks with unseeing eyes along a height, With death below and only stars above, I, in broad daylight, walk as if in sleep Along the edges of life's perilous steep, The lost somnambulist of love.

I, in broad day, go walking in a dream, Led on in safety by the starry gleam Of thy blue eyes that hold my heart in thrall; Let no one wake me rudely, lest one day, Startled to find how far I've gone astray, I dash my life out in my fall.

THE MYSTIC'S VISION

Ah! I shall kill myself with dreams! These dreams that softly lap me round Through trance-like hours, in which meseems That I am swallowed up and drowned; Drowned in your love, which flows o'er me As o'er the seaweed flows the sea.

In watches of the middle night, 'Twixt vesper and 'twixt matin bell, With rigid arms and straining sight, I wait within my narrow cell; With muttered prayers, suspended will, I wait your advent--statue-still.

Across the convent garden walls The wind blows from the silver seas; Black shadow of the cypress falls Between the moon-meshed olive-trees; Sleep-walking from their golden bowers, Flit disembodied orange flowers.

And in God's consecrated house, All motionless from head to feet, My heart awaits her heavenly Spouse, As white I lie on my white sheet; With body lulled and soul awake, I watch in anguish for your sake.

And suddenly, across the gloom, The naked moonlight sharply swings; A Presence stirs within the room, A breath of flowers and hovering wings: Your presence without form and void, Beyond all earthly joys enjoyed.

My heart is hushed, my tongue is mute, My life is centred in your will; You play upon me like a lute Which answers to its master's skill, Till passionately vibrating, Each nerve becomes a throbbing string.

Oh, incommunicably sweet! No longer aching and apart, As rain upon the tender wheat, You pour upon my thirsty heart; As scent is bound up in the rose, Your love within my bosom glows.

* * * * *

FROM 'TARANTELLA'

Sounds of human mirth and laughter from somewhere among them were borne from time to time to the desolate spot I had reached. It was a Festa day, and a number of young people were apparently enjoying their games and dances, to judge by the shouts and laughter which woke echoes of ghostly mirth in the vaults and galleries that looked as though they had lain dumb under the pressure of centuries.

There was I know not what of weird contrast between this gaping ruin, with its fragments confusedly scattered about like the bleaching bones of some antediluvian monster, and the clear youthful ring of those joyous voices.

I had sat down on some fragment of wall directly overhanging the sea. In my present mood it afforded me a singular kind of pleasure to take up stones or pieces of marble and throw them down the precipice. From time to time I could hear them striking against the sharp projections of the rocks as they leaped down the giddy height. Should I let my violin follow in their wake?

I was in a mood of savage despair; a mood in which my heart turned at bay on what I had best loved. Hither it had led me, this art I had worshiped! After years of patient toil, after sacrificing to it hearth and home, and the security of a settled profession, I was not a tittle further advanced than at the commencement of my career. For requital of my devoted service, starvation stared me in the face. My miserable subsistence was barely earned by giving lessons to females, young and old, who, while inflicting prolonged tortures on their victim, still exacted the tribute of smiles and compliments.

Weakened and ill, I shuddered to think of returning and bowing my neck once more to that detested yoke.

"No! I'll never go back to that!" I cried, jumping up. "I'll sooner earn a precarious livelihood by turning fisherman in this island! Any labor will be preferable to that daily renewing torture." I seized my violin in a desperate clutch, and feverishly leant over the wall, where I could hear the dirge-like boom of the breakers in the hollow caves.

Only he who is familiar with the violin knows the love one may bear it--a love keen as that felt for some frail human creature of exquisitely delicate mold. Caressingly I passed my fingers over its ever-responsive strings, thinking, feeling rather, that I could endure no hand to handle it save mine!

No! rather than that it should belong to another, its strings should for ever render up the ghost of music in one prolonged wail, as it plunged shivering from this fearful height.

For the last time, I thought, my fingers erred over its familiar chords. A thrill of horrid exultation possessed me, such as the fell Tiberius may have experienced when he bade his men hurl the shrinking form of a soft-limbed favorite from this precipice.