Household stories from the Land of Hofer

Eligio mounted his horse, and rode away over the stony path outside the city, and pursued it all night, till at daybreak he reached the thick forest, when a bear came out upon him; Eligio sprang deftly from his horse, and plunging his hunting-knife into his throat, flung the carcase across the path. The bear fell upon the dead horse, and Eligio watched for the moment when he should have finished his repast; but, as he was long about it, he thought to himself, “Why not jump upon him at once? and then I shall be ready to start with him when he has done, without so much anxiety about catching the right instant.” So said, so done; but the bear was not at all the docile animal he had expected.

“Don’t disturb me when I’m feeding!” he growled, and shook our hero off into a bed of nettles.

Eligio owned to himself he would have done better to follow the directions of those wiser than he, and waited, with as much patience as the stinging of the nettles would allow him, till the brute was ready to start, and then made a bold leap on to his back, which made him turn round.

“Well sprung, this time!” growled the bear; “and as you have managed that part of the business so well I have no objection to do what you require. But you must attend to what I have to tell you. Keep your seat steadily, for I have to go swiftly; but speak not a word, and when I bring you to the palace where the phœnix-bird is kept, look not to the right hand or the left, but walk straight before you, through terrace, and galleries, and corridors, till you come to a dismal, deserted-looking aviary, where the phœnix-bird evermore sits on his perch. Put this hood over him, and bring him away with you; but listen not to the songs of the other birds all around, and, above all, touch not the golden owl which sits in the shade above!”

Eligio promised to attend to all the bear told him, and took a firm seat on his back. The bear bounded away with an awkward gait, but Eligio was an accomplished cavalier, and was nothing daunted. After many hours’ rough riding, they came to a vast palace, which he understood by the bear’s halting was the abode of the phœnix-bird; so he dismounted, and walked straight along the terraces, and galleries, and corridors, till he came to a sorry aviary where a thousand birds of gay plumage fluttered and chirped around. Faithful to his promise, Eligio stopped to look at none of them; but walked straight up to the perch of the phœnix-bird. When, however, he saw him, he began to reason in place of obeying. “What can be the use of taking a shabby old bird like that? he looks like a fowl plucked ready for cooking! surely, some of these gay-plumaged birds are better worth taking!” and then his eye caught the golden owl snugly ensconced in the shady bower above. “Ah! that’s a bird worth having, that is now! that’s worth coming a perilous journey for; something to be proud of when you’ve got it! That’s the bird for me!” and, springing upon a ledge of rock, he threw the hood the bear had given him over the head of the golden owl, and brought it down. He had scarcely touched the golden owl, however, when the whole assemblage of other birds, which had taken no notice of him before, suddenly began screeching forth their highest notes. Their cries brought a crowd of servants, who surrounded him and held him fast, while the lord of the palace came down, and severely asked an account of his conduct.

Eligio told his story with a frankness which, in some measure, conciliated the old lord; but the offence was too great to be passed over. “The phœnix-bird,” he said, “might have been taken by him who had courage to take it after the prescribed manner; but the other birds it was sacrilege to meddle with, and the golden owl he had been expressly forbidden, of all others, to touch; and though he granted him his life, he condemned him to perpetual durance.” The servants dragged him off to a deep dungeon, where he had nothing to do but to bewail his folly.

Night fell around, and nothing could be more hopeless than his position. His cell was hewn out of the earth; the iron door through which he had been thrust had been made fast with bolts and chains, and the only window which admitted the free air was strongly fitted with iron bars.

Eligio was generous enough, in his utter desolation, to grieve more over his unfulfilled mission and wasted opportunities, than over his personal hardships. “Oh, my beautiful Dove-Maiden!” he exclaimed, “shall I, then, never see you again? Must you be left for aye to the power of the horrid pagan enchanter, because I, by my insensate folly, have failed in restoring you to the brightness of the Christian faith?” and when he thought of her fate, he wept again.

“St Anthony! St. Anthony!” he cried, a little after, “you befriended me once; give me one chance again! This once but send me forth again with the mission of liberating her, and then let me come back and pass my life in penance; but let not her suffer through my fault!”

By a mechanical instinct he had placed himself near the window, as the type of freedom to him, and now he thought he heard a low grunt on the other side of it, close to his ear. The sound was not melodious, but yet he fancied there was something friendly in its tone. He raised himself up, and saw two white boar’s tusks between the bars. His solitude was so utter that even the visit of a wild boar was a solace of companionship; but much greater was his pleasure when he found that his uncouth visitor was grubbing up the earth round the iron bars and the stones which held them, and had already loosened one.

“How now, good boar!” cried Eligio; “are you really come to release me?”

“Yes,” said the boar, as he paused for a moment to take breath; “St. Anthony has heard you, and has sent me to give the fresh chance you ask for; and if you this time but keep your promise, and do as you are bid, he will not exact the performance of the lifelong penance you offer to perform; but after you have released the Dove-Maiden, you shall live with her the rest of your life in holy union and companionship.”

In a transport of delight Eligio set to work to co-operate with the boar in unearthing the massive stanchions; and when they had loosened three he was able to force himself through the narrow opening.

“Now return to the aviary,” said the boar; “look neither to right nor left, but bring away the phœnix-bird; and speak not a word, but mount on my back, and I will carry you back to the city. But make all haste, or the three days will have expired, and then all will be lost!”

This time Eligio followed his instructions implicitly, and got back to the town just in time to present the magician with the phœnix-bird before the expiring of his three days’ grace. The magician was surprised indeed to find he had been successful, but could not recall his word, so he was forced to pronounce him free; and Eligio immediately repaired to the Dove-Maiden to thank her for her succour, and to ask what was next to be done to set her free too, that they might go away together to Christian lands, and live for each other in holy union.

“As for me,” replied the maiden, blushing, “I shall be free by virtue of your freedom when you have performed one trial well, and without altering according to your own ideas the directions prescribed for you. And now the first thing is, to obtain the release of my dear nurse from the horrid form in which the magician has disguised her. To keep her in that shape, she is forced to eat a live mouse every week; and as nothing else is given her that she can eat, and as she is very ravenous by the time the week comes round, she is forced to eat the mouse. But if the mouse be killed by a sword consecrated to Christian chivalry, and it is dead before she eats it, the spell will be broken, and she will resume her natural form.”

Eligio said this was an easy matter. She had only to tell him on what day the feeding took place, and where.

“It has its difficulties, too,” replied the Dove-Maiden; “for if any blood of the mouse be spilt, the magician will know that I have instructed you, and he will play us some bad turn. To prevent this, you must cut the mouse in two by drawing your sword towards you; then all the blood will be caught on the sword, and you must make the rat lick it off afterwards.” Then she showed him where the mouse was brought, and told him to be on the watch at sunset that very night.

Sunset accordingly found Eligio in close watch, his sword ready in his hand. But he thought, “As for how to use a sword, my pretty Dove-Maiden knows nothing about that. Who ever heard of drawing a sword towards one? Why, if any one saw me they would laugh, and say, ‘Take care of your legs!’ I know how to cut a mouse in two so quickly that no blood shall be spilt; and that’s all that matters.” So, you see, he would do it his own way; and the consequence was that three drops of blood were spilt on the ground However, the white rat got a dead mouse to eat instead of a live one, and immediately appeared in her proper woman’s form.

When Eligio went to visit the Dove-Maiden after this, she spoke no word of reproach, but she told him she knew some trouble would befall them in consequence of those three drops of blood. She could not tell what it would be: they must do their best to provide against it when the time came. The next thing he had to do was, to go by midnight to the magician’s stables under the rock, and take out thence the swiftest horse in the whole world, and he was to know it by the token that it was the thinnest horse he ever saw; its eyeballs and its ribs were all that could be seen of it; and its tail was only one hair! This he was to saddle and bring under her window; and then all three would ride away on it together.

Eligio went down into the magician’s stable under the rock by midnight, and there he saw the lean horse, with his protruding ribs and eyeballs, and whose tail was only one hair. But he said to himself, “My pretty Dove-Maiden hasn’t much experience in horseflesh; that can’t be the swiftest horse in the world. Why, it would sink to the ground with our weight alone, let alone trying to move under us! That high-couraged chestnut there, with the powerful shoulders —that is the horse to hold out against fatigue, and put miles of distance behind you! I think I know a good horse to go when I see one!” So he saddled the high-couraged chestnut, and led it under the Dove-Maiden’s window.

When she saw the stout chestnut instead of the lean horse, she could not suppress a cry of disappointment.

“What have you done?” she said. “You have left the swiftest horse in the world behind; and now the magician can overtake us, nor can we escape him!”

Eligio hung his head, and stammered out a proposal to go and change the horse. But she told him it was too late; the stable-door was only open at midnight. He could not now get in till the next night; and if they left their escape till then, the magician would find out the disenchantment of the white rat, and from that suspect their scheme; and would then surround them with such a maze of difficulties, that it would take her years to learn how to solve them; whereas she had promised St. Anthony to have nothing more to do with the books of magic, but to burn them all, and go and live with a Christian husband, far from all these things. There was nothing to be done, therefore, but to start at once with their best speed, only keeping on the watch for the pursuer, who would inevitably come.

Away went the high-couraged chestnut, with the speed of the wind, and as if his threefold burden had been light as air. But how swiftly soever he went, the lean horse was swifter; and before the end of the second day’s journey they saw, at no distance, his fire-darting eyeballs and smoking ribs, and his tail of one hair stretched out far behind.

When the Dove-Maiden saw the magician coming after them on this weird mount, she called to her companions to jump down; and she turned the horse into a wayside chapel of St. Anthony, and herself into a peasant girl weaving chaplets on the grass outside.

“Have you seen a chestnut steed pass this way, with a young man and maiden, pretty child?” said the magician, bending low over his horse’s neck to pat the peasant girl’s cheek, but without recognizing her. The Dove-Maiden started aside from his touch; but she answered, —

“Yes, good sir; they are gone into the chapel; and if you will go in, there you will find them.”

“Oh! I’ve got into the land of the Christians, have I?” said the magician to himself. “I think I had better make the best of my way home, and not trust myself there.” So he mounted his fiery steed, and rode away.

Then the Dove-Maiden restored herself and her companions to their former shapes, and they soon reached home, where Eligio was received with joyful acclamations by all. But to his intense surprise and disappointment, his mother did not welcome his beautiful Dove-Maiden with any thing like satisfaction.

“That is because of the three drops of the mouse’s blood incautiously spilt,” she whispered, when he deplored it to her; “but I have a spell against that also. Let me into your mother’s room when she is asleep, to-night, and I will anoint her eyes with an ointment with shall make her look on me for ever after with a loving glance. It was done as she said, and next morning Eligio’s mother received her lovingly to her arms as a daughter.

After this, the Dove-Maiden burnt her magic books, and her nuptials with Eligio were celebrated with great rejoicings throughout the valley. They lived together for the rest of their days, in holy union, and the poor Christians of the whole countryside blessed their charity.

KRISELDA

Long, long ago, in the days when the light of Christian teaching yet struggled with the gloom of heathendom, there lived in the Edelsitz of Ruggburg, by Bregenz, a most beautiful maiden – Kriselda by name. So fair she was that, from far and near, knights and nobles came to ask her hand; but though she was not proud or haughty, she would have none of them, because there was not one of them all that came up to her expectations. It was not that she said they were not good enough for her, but high or noble, or rich or renowned, as they might be, they all failed to satisfy her longings; and with gentle words and courteous demeanour, she dismissed them all. And yet she looked out with hope, too, that the next should supply the bright ideal of her heart; but when that other came he always still fell short of what she had imagined.

One evening she went out to walk amid the dark pines, where the golden light of the setting sun gleamed between their bare stems. At the foot of one of them lay a poor wayworn beggar woman, fainting with hunger and fatigue.

Kriselda was full of compassion for her sad state, and sent her maidens to fetch restoratives, and ministered them to her with her own hands.

But the beggar woman, instead of cringing with gratitude and surprise at the interest the noble lady had shown in her, was no sooner able to speak than she reproached her bitterly.

“It is well for you,” she said, “who live daintily, and have your will every day, now and then to show a little charity for those who suffer! but what is it, think you, to suffer every day, and to have your own will never?”

“It must be very sad!” said Kriselda, compassionately; “that is not your case, I hope?”

“How can you know it is sad? How can you hope any thing about it?” retorted the beggar woman, sternly; “you who know not what it is to suffer. Believe me, it is not fine clothes and a grand palace, a beautiful face, or deeds of fame which make one great. Those to whom all these things appertain are, for the most part, little worth. To do well is so easy to them, that what merit have they to boast? The truly great is one who suffers, and yet does well; who goes through toil and travail, sorrow and grief, and bears it in silence, and in secret, and has no fame and no praise of men to sound sweetly in his ears.”

Kriselda listened to her words full of excitement, for it seemed as if a chord in her heart had been touched which none had ever reached before. And the picture the old beggar woman had drawn was nearer her mind’s bright ideal than any image she had approached heretofore.

“What, then, is this same travail and grief?” she asked, with simplicity.

“If you really desire to know with good desire,” answered the beggar woman, “take this end of a hank of yarn, and follow its leading, winding it up as you go along, till you come to the bobbin, where it is made fast; and when you arrive there you will know what travail and grief are. But you must go forth alone.”

Kriselda dismissed all her maidens, and taking the yarn, cheerfully followed the steep path through which it led. On it led her, and on and on. Her light garments were rent by the thorns and briars, and her hands and delicate cheeks too; her feet were cut by the stones of the way, and her knees began to tremble with fatigue. Darkness fell around, and loneliness crept over her, with fear, for she had never been in the forest by night alone before; but still the yarn led on, and on, and it was thick night before she reached the bobbin, where it was made fast.

When she reached the place a dim light gleamed around, and in the midst of the dim light a Kreuzstöcklein96: and on the cross, One fairer than the sons of men, but wan and wayworn, even as the fainting beggar woman; His brow rent by thorns, even as her own; His knees bent with weariness; His body wasted by want.

But in His face the majesty and sweetness she had sought so long; the perfect ideal of her heart, which none who had approached her had ever presented before.

“This, then, is He for whom my soul longed!” she cried, and clasped her hands. “I have found Him, and will not leave Him more! But who is He? what does He here? and is it He who knows travail and grief?”

“In truth, have I known travail and grief!” He sighed, and the silvery tones of His plaintive voice filled her with unutterable joy; “and, in truth, must all those who would abide with Me know travail and grief too!”

She strained her ears that she might hear those sweet notes again, but she listened in vain; only its echoes seemed to live on in her heart, as though they would never die there. But without, there was no sound, save of the terrible Föhn97 moaning through the tall black pines, and drifting round her masses of heaped-up snow, which had long lain by the wayside. Even the Kreuzstöcklein she saw no more, nor the dim light, nor knew how to find the way home. All alone, with terror only for her companion, she stood and wondered what that cross could mean, and who He could be who hung thereon. Soon she ceased to wonder, for numbness crept over her, and unconsciousness which was not sleep.

When she opened her eyes again the grey light of morning had fallen around, and there was a sound as of men in deadly combat. A terrible sound, yet less terrible than the deathly stillness of the night.

It was a hermit and a giant who strove, as men who give no quarter, and yet neither prevailed against the other. The giant was accoutred in burnished steel; and his polished weapons flashed with angry fire. The hermit bore no arms – or rather, those he bore were invisible, for when he wielded them you saw the giant shrink, though you saw not the blow; and, in like manner, many a stroke of the giant’s sword was harmlessly warded off, though no shield was seen.

“Wherefore fight you so furiously?” said Kriselda, at length. “Put up your arms, and be at peace.”

“We fight for you, fair maiden!” said both, speaking together.

“For me!” cried Kriselda.

“Yes, even for you,” said the giant; “anon you were lying here asleep, and I would have carried you to rule over my castle, when up started this puny man in brown, and dared me to lay finger on you; and till you have pronounced which of us you approve, neither can prevail. Say only one word, and I will hurl him down the cliff, like this pebble, with one spurning of my foot; and you shall come and reign with me in my castle, where I will fulfil your every desire.”

A brave enthusiasm kindled his eye as he spoke; his well-knit frame, terrible in its strength, was bowed to hear her word; and his arms, anon so furiously raised, were now folded before her, seemingly awaiting his life to be rekindled at her lips.

Kriselda looked at him, and met his rapt gaze, and asked herself was there not here the strength, the majesty, the nobility, her soul had desired. Almost she had spoken the word he craved. But first she addressed the hermit.

“And you – why measured you your strength with him for my sake?”

“Because,” said the hermit, meekly, “I am the servant of Him who knows travail and grief; because you have lifted up your eyes to Him, and to all such He sends help, that they may be strengthened to follow Him.”

Then the dim light seemed once more present to Kriselda’s mind, and she recalled the Kreuzstöcklein, and the majesty and beauty of Him who hung thereon; and the musical tones of His plaintive voice which said, “Truly I have known travail and grief; and all they who would abide with Me must know grief and travail too!”

The giant’s nobility paled before the thought; she looked at him again, and his strength and his power had lost their charm, for the image of One stronger than he was present to her mind. Then she turned and followed the hermit, and said, “Where is He whom I seek? Take me to Him.”

The hermit raised his hand and beckoned her to follow still higher up the steep path.

But the giant was forced to sheathe his sword and to depart alone; Kriselda had spoken, and he knew he could not prevail against the hermit contrary to her will. He turned away sorrowful, casting in his mind who it could be whose attractions were more powerful on Kriselda than his own; and as he walked he determined he would not sleep or eat till he had found out Him who hung upon the Kreuzstöcklein, and knew travail and grief.

Kriselda, meantime, followed the hermit to where the crystal brook flowed, and there he signed her with the token of Him who knew travail and grief. Then he took her to where other maidens dwelt who loved that same ideal; and there she lived many years, waiting for the time when the hermit promised her she should be united with Him for ever.

That day came at last; and she called her sisters round her, and told them the joy of her soul. Already she saw a dim light, as on that first night under the black pines, and she knew it was the dawn of the bright unending day, and the soft voice that had spoken to her there was calling to her to come to Him.

But when they carried her earthly form out to burial, they found one already lying in the grave. It was the giant, who had journeyed thus far, and had there laid him down and died in the place where Kriselda should be laid; and he held, clasped to his breast, the Kreuzstöcklein of the black pine-forest.

THE GOLDEN PEARS

There was once a poor peasant of Bürs who had nothing in the world but three sons, and a pear-tree that grew before his cottage.

But as his pears were very fine, and the Kaiser was very fond of them, he said to his sons one day, that he would send the Kaiser a basket of them for a present.

So he plaited a nice Krattle98 and lined it with fresh leaves, and laid the pears on them, and sent his eldest son with it to make a present to the Kaiser, giving him strict charge to take care and not let any one rob him of them by the way.

“Leave me alone, father!” replied the boy; “I know how to take care of my own. It isn’t much any one will get out of me by asking; I can find as good an answer as any one.”

So he closed up the mouth of the basket with fresh leaves and went out to take the pears to the Kaiser.

It was autumn, and the sun struck hot all through the midday hours, and at last coming to a wayside fountain, he sat down to drink and rest.

A little doubled-up old woman was washing some rags at the same fountain, and singing a ditty all out of tune. “A witch, I’ll be bound!” said the boy to himself. “She’ll be trying to get my pears, by hook or by crook, but I’ll be even with her!”

“A fair day, my lad!” said the little old wife; “but a heavy burden you have to carry. What may it be with which you are so heavily laden?”

“A load of sweepings off the road, to see if I can turn a penny by it,” replied the boy, in a moody tone, intended to arrest further questioning.