Black Forest Village Stories. Auerbach Berthold
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word he had uttered stung him to the soul: he would gladly have given his life to recall it. Such are we. Instead of bearing with and sustaining each other in life, most men grieve when it is too late, when death has made the irreparable separation. Why not love while yet we live? Every hour not spent in kindness is so much robbed from the life of those around us, which can never be restored.
On Sunday the manor-house farmer no longer went to church in the town, but to the village church, for his wife lay buried beneath the shadow of its steeple: he always took the roundabout way of the churchyard. The weekly visit to his wife's grave seemed like an effort to atone for his shortcomings toward her in life.
The house was all quiet now. Not a loud word was spoken, and Vefela ruled there like a spirit of peace. Peace was there, but not joy: some one seemed to be always missed or anxiously expected. Still, the effect of Vefela's management on the manor-house farmer was such that he gradually regained his spirits: he did nothing without consulting "the child." Indeed, he left almost every thing to her disposal: when any thing was asked of him, he usually answered, "Ask Vefela."
Thus they lived for years. Vefela was over five-and-twenty. Many suitors asked for her hand; but she always said that she did not wish to marry; and her father always assented. "Vefela," he would say, "you are too refined for a farmer, and when I have gained my lawsuit we will move into town, and I will give you a peck of dollars for your portion, and you can choose a gentleman." Vefela would laugh; but secretly she agreed with her father, at least in so far that she made up her mind that if she ever did marry it should not be a farmer. She had suffered so much from the ill-governed passions and implacable hatred of the peasantry that she had contracted a great hatred against them. She thought that in town, where people are more refined and have better manners, they must also be better and truer. She had steeled herself to bear her troubles only by looking upon the people about her as coarse, and herself as something higher; and, after pondering on the matter for so many years, she had come not only to think herself better, but even to fancy that she occupied a higher position. This was her great misfortune.
2
It is a great mistake to suppose that in the country people, may live alone and undisturbed. Such a thing is only possible in a large city, where men take no interest in each others' affairs, where one man may meet the other daily for years, and never think of inquiring who he is or what he does; where you pass a human being without a greeting or even a look, just as if he were a stone. In the country, where everybody knows everybody, each one is compelled to account to all the others' for what he does: no one can rest content with the approbation of his own judgment. In the Black Forest the passing word of recognition varies with the direction of your steps. If you are going down hill, the passer-by inquires, "'You going down there?" If you are ascending, "'You going up there?" If he finds you loading a wagon, he says, "Don't load too heavy," or, "Don't work too hard." If you are sitting before your door or on a stile, it is, "'You resting a little?" If two are talking, the third man who passes by says, "Good counsel, neighbors?" and so on.
There is a charm in this communion of work and rest, word and thought; but the custom has its drawbacks. Any one having good or bad reasons of his own for disposing of his time in a manner different from what is customary has to contend against the gossip and the jibes and mockery of all. An old bachelor or an old maid are in particular the butts of this sort of street-raillery, whether it be from poverty or any other motive that they cling to their single condition.
The more Vefela approached the sombre years of old-maidenhood, the more was the "manor-house lady" persecuted by this sort of fun. One Sunday, as she walked through the village, a crowd of young men were standing before the town-hall, and "Tralla," the butt of the village, – a poor simpleton who was half dumb, – stood near them. When they saw Vefela, one of them cried, "Tralla, there comes your sweetheart." Tralla grinned from ear to ear. They urged him on to take his sweetheart by the arm. Poor Vefela heard them, and almost sank to the ground with shame and vexation. Already had Tralla hobbled up and taken her arm, with his brutal features distorted with fun. Vefela raised her eyes to the young fellows with a look so full of entreaty and reproach that one of them was actually induced to take her part. What he said was not heard, being drowned in the uproarious laughter of the others. Here Vefela found a rescuer whom nobody had expected. Her father's dog Nero, who had followed her, suddenly sprang on Tralla's back, seized him by the collar, and dragged him down. Vefela took him away from his victim in all haste, and hurried on her way. From that time Nero was a power in the village. The whole affair mortified Vefela greatly, and confirmed her in her dislike to farmers and farmers' ways.
Vefela spent some weeks with her brother Melchior, in Ergenzingen. Here too she was often sad; for Melchior had hard-hearted, stingy wife, who hardly gave him enough to eat.
The squire of Ergenzingen, a widower with three children, frequently came to Melchior's house; and one day he asked Vefela to marry him. Vefela was disposed to consent; for, though not attached to the squire, she was weary of her lonesome life, and hoped to derive pleasure from being a kind mother to the children. But the manor-house farmer came and told his daughter that the squire was a hard man, who had been unkind to his first wife, and, besides, that Vefela could only be happy with a man of great refinement. The squire was rejected. But his proposal had been heard of in Ergenzingen; and the boys, with whom he was unpopular on account of his strictness, came one night and strewed bran all along the path between his house and Melchior's. The squire forthwith began to hate the manor-house farmer and Vefela: she returned with her father to the solitude of his roof.
Vefela would have done better to have followed her own counsel and married the squire; but her doom was sealed, and she could not escape it.
The life of the manor-house farmer seemed likely to end sooner than his lawsuit. The strong man was sinking under petty ailments: the trouble and chagrin so long suppressed had gnawed his core. For hours and hours he would sit speechless in his arm-chair, only murmuring occasionally an indistinguishable word to his dog Nero, whose head was on his master's knee, while his faithful eyes looked up into his face. Vefela could not be with him always, and he now felt doubly the dreariness of his lot. He would have given any thing for the privilege of receiving a guest in his warm, cosy room, only to have given or received a pinch of snuff. He went to the window and looked out; he coughed when anybody passed; but no one spoke to him, no one came. He closed the sash and returned grumbling to his seat.
It was two days before New-Year. Vefela had gone to the well with the maid for water. She purposely did this coarse kind of work because the villagers had said that she was ashamed of it. Just as her bucket was full, the girl said, "Look at that man there with the double eyes: I guess he is the new surgeon."
A man in citizens' dress, with spectacles on his nose, was coming down the village. Just as he was passing the two girls, Vefela took the pail on her head; but, by an unlucky step, she slipped upon the ice and fell, pouring the water over her. When she recovered herself the strange gentleman was standing by her: he took her hand and helped her up, and then asked her, kindly, whether she had not hurt herself, for she had had a bad fall. There was something so winning in the tone of his voice that Vefela experienced a strange sensation: she thanked him quite warmly, and assured him that she was not hurt. She walked on, the gentleman beside her.
"Why, you are limping," said he again. "Does your foot pain you?"
"No," answered Vefela; "I have a short foot;" and, though she was chilled through, the blood shot into her face. She covered her face with her apron, pretending to wipe it, though it was wet through and through. The stranger now remarked that her limp was scarcely to be perceived. Vefela smiled, half incredulous, half flattered. It was a strange thing to Vefela to find the gentleman walking by her side through the village, all the way to her father's house; and even there he entered with her, with a word of apology, to which he gave no time to reply. Nero, however, sprang upon the stranger, and would have dragged him down had not the manor-house farmer and Vefela interfered. The stranger now gave sundry directions to guard against Vefela's taking cold. She must go to bed, drink tea, and so on.
Edward Brenner (for such was his name) sat down and chatted cosily with the manor-house farmer. Not an hour passed before he was master of his whole history. The latter took a strong liking to Dr. Brenner, but spoke so much of the spectacles, and asked so often whether he had need of