[NOTE: There is a short list of bookmarks, or pointers, at the end of the
file for those who may wish to sample the author's ideas before making an
entire meal of them.  D.W.]





A WORD, ONLY A WORD, Complete

By Georg Ebers

Translated from the German by Mary J. Safford



Volume 1.

CHAPTER I.

"A word, only a word!"  cried a fresh, boyish voice, then two hands were
loudly clapped and a gay laugh echoed through the forest.  Hitherto
silence had reigned under the boughs of the pines and tops of the
beeches, but now a wood-pigeon joined in the lad's laugh, and a jay,
startled by the clapping of hands, spread its brown wings, delicately
flecked with blue, and soared from one pine to another.

Spring had entered the Black Forest a few weeks before.  May was just
over, yet the weather was as sultry as in midsummer and clouds were
gathering in denser and denser masses.  The sun was still some distance
above the horizon, but the valley was so narrow that the day star had
disappeared, before making its majestic entry into the portals of night.

When it set in a clear sky, it only gilded the border of pine trees on
the crest of the lofty western heights; to-day it was invisible, and the
occasional, quickly interrupted twittering of the birds seemed more in
harmony with the threatening clouds and sultry atmosphere than the lad's
gay laughter.

Every living creature seemed to be holding its breath in anxious
suspense, but Ulrich once more laughed joyously, then bracing his bare
knee against a bundle of faggots, cried:

"Give me that stick, Ruth, that I may tie it up.  How dry the stuff is,
and how it snaps!  A word!  To sit over books all day long for one stupid
word--that's just nonsense!"

"But all words are not alike," replied the girl.

"Piff is paff, and paff is puff!"  laughed Ulrich.  "When I snap the
twigs, you always hear them say 'knack, knack,' and 'knack' is a word
too.  The juggler Caspar's magpie, can say twenty."

"But father said so," replied Ruth, arranging the dry sticks.  "He toils
hard, but not for gold and gain, to find the right words.  You are always
wanting to know what he is looking for in his big books, so I plucked up
courage to ask him, and now I know.  I suppose he saw I was astonished,
for he smiled just as he does when you have asked some foolish question
at lessons, and added that a word was no trifling thing and should not be
despised, for God had made the world out of one single word."

Ulrich shook his head, and after pondering a few minutes, replied.

"Do you believe that?"

"Father said so," was the little girl's only answer.  Her words expressed
the firm, immovable security of childish confidence, and the same feeling
sparkled in her eyes.  She was probably about nine years old, and in
every respect a perfect contrast to her companion, her senior by several
summers, for the latter was strongly built, and from beneath his
beautiful fair locks a pair of big blue eyes flashed defiance at the
world, while Ruth was a delicate little creature, with slender limbs,
pale cheeks, and coal-black hair.

The little girl wore a fashionably-made, though shabby dress, shoes and
stockings--the boy was barefoot, and his grey doublet looked scarcely
less worn than the short leather breeches, which hardly reached his
knees; yet he must have had some regard for his outer man, for a red knot
of real silk was fastened on his shoulder.  He could scarcely be the
child of a peasant or woodland laborer--the brow was too high, the nose
and red lips were too delicately moulded, the bearing was too proud and
free.

Ruth's last words had given him food for thought, but he left them
unanswered until the last bundle of sticks was tied up.  Then he said
hesitatingly:

"My mother--you know....  I dare not speak of her before father, he goes
into such a rage; my mother is said to be very wicked--but she never was
so to me, and I long for her day after day, very, very much, as I long
for nothing else.  When I was so high, my mother told me a great many
things, such queer things!  About a man, who wanted treasures, and before
whom mountains opened at a word he knew.  Of course it's for such a word
your father is seeking."

"I don't know," replied the little girl.  "But the word out of which God
made the whole earth and sky and all the stars must have been a very
great one."

Ulrich nodded, then raising his eyes boldly, exclaimed:

"Ah, if he should find it, and would not keep it to himself, but let you
tell me!  I should know what I wanted."

Ruth looked at him enquiringly, but he cried laughingly: "I shan't tell.
But what would you ask?"

"I?  I should ask to have my mother able to speak again like other
people.  But you would wish...."

"You can't know what I would wish."

"Yes, yes.  You would bring your mother back home again."

"No, I wasn't thinking of that," replied Ulrich, flushing scarlet and
fixing his eyes on the ground.

"What, then?  Tell me; I won't repeat it."

"I should like to be one of the count's squires, and always ride with him
when he goes hunting."

"Oh!"  cried Ruth.  "That would be the very thing, if I were a boy like
you.  A squire!  But if the word can do everything, it will make you lord
of the castle and a powerful count.  You can have real velvet clothes,
with gay slashes, and a silk bed."

"And I'll ride the black stallion, and the forest, with all its stags
and deer, will belong to me; as to the people down in the village, I'll
show them!"

Raising his clenched fist and his eyes in menace as he uttered the words,
he saw that heavy rain-drops were beginning to fall, and a thunder-shower
was rising.

Hastily and skilfully loading himself with several bundles of faggots, he
laid some on the little girl's shoulders, and went down with her towards
the valley, paying no heed to the pouring rain, thunder or lightning; but
Ruth trembled in every limb.

At the edge of the narrow pass leading to the city they stood still.  The
moisture was trickling down its steep sides and had gathered into a
reddish torrent on the rocky bottom.

"Come!"  cried Ulrich,  stepping on to the  edge of the ravine, where
stones and sand, loosened by the wet, were now rattling down.

"I'm afraid," answered the little girl trembling.  "There's another flash
of lightning!  Oh! dear, oh, dear!  how it blazes!--oh! oh! that clap of
thunder!"

She stooped as if the lightning had struck her, covered her face with her
little hands, and fell on her knees, the bundle of faggots slipping to
the ground.  Filled with terror, she murmured as if she could command the
mighty word: "Oh, Word, Word, get me home!"

Ulrich stamped impatiently, glanced at her with mingled anger and
contempt, and muttering reproaches, threw her bundle and his own into the
ravine, then roughly seized her hand and dragged her to the edge of the
cliff.

Half-walking, half-slipping, with many an unkind word, though he was
always careful to support her, the boy scrambled down the steep slope
with his companion, and when they were at last standing in the water at
the bottom of the gully, picked up the dripping fagots and walked
silently on, carrying her burden as well as his own.

After a short walk through the running water and mass of earth and
stones, slowly sliding towards the valley, several shingled roofs
appeared, and the little girl uttered a sigh of relief; for in the row of
shabby houses, each standing by itself, that extended from the forest to
the level end of the ravine, was her own home and the forge belonging to
her companion's father.

It was still raining, but the thunder-storm had passed as quickly as it
rose, and twilight was already gathering over the mist-veiled houses and
spires of the little city, from which the street ran to the ravine.  The
stillness of the evening was only interrupted by a few scattered notes of
bells, the finale of the mighty peal by which the warder had just been
trying to disperse the storm.

The safety of the town in the narrow forest-valley was well secured, a
wall and ditch enclosed it; only the houses on the edge of the ravine
were unprotected.  True, the mouth of the pass was covered by the field
pieces on the city wall, and the strong tower beside the gate, but it was
not incumbent on the citizens to provide for the safety of the row of
houses up there.  It was called the Richtberg and nobody lived there
except the rabble, executioners, and poor folk who were not granted the
rights of citizenship.  Adam, the smith, had forfeited his, and Ruth's
father, Doctor Costa, was a Jew, who ought to be thankful that he was
tolerated in the old forester's house.

The street was perfectly still.  A few children were jumping over the
mud-puddles, and an old washerwoman was putting a wooden vessel under the
gutter, to collect the rain-water.

Ruth breathed more freely when once again in the street and among human
beings, and soon, clinging to the hand of her father, who had come to
meet her, she entered the house with him and Ulrich.




CHAPTER II.

While the boy flung the damp bundles of brushwood on the floor beside the
hearth in the doctor's kitchen, a servant from the monastery was leading
three horses under the rude shed in front of the smith Adam's work-shop
The stately grey-haired monk, who had ridden the strong cream-colored
steed, was already standing beside the embers of the fire, pressing his
hands upon the warm chimney.

The forge stood open, but spite of knocking and shouting, neither the
master of the place, nor any other living soul appeared.  Adam had gone
out, but could not be far away, for the door leading from the shop into
the sitting-room, was also unlocked.

The time was growing long to Father Benedict, so for occupation he tried
to lift the heavy hammer.  It was a difficult task, though he was no
weakling, yet it was not hard for Adam's arm to swing and guide the
burden.  If only the man had understood how to govern his life as well as
he managed his ponderous tool!

He did not belong to Richtberg.  What would his father have said, had he
lived to see his son dwell here?

The monk had known the old smith well, and he also knew many things about
the son and his destiny, yet no more than rumor entrusts to one person
concerning another's life.  Even this was enough to explain why Adam had
become so reserved, misanthropic and silent a man, though even in his
youth lie certainly had not been what is termed a gay fellow.

The forge where he grew up, was still standing in the market-place
of the little city below; it had belonged to his grandfather and great-
grandfather.  There had never been any lack of custom, to the annoyance
of the wise magistrates, whose discussions were disturbed by the
hammering that rang across the ill-paved square to the windows of the
council-chamber; but, on the other hand, the idle hours of the watchmen
under the arches of the ground-floor of the town-hall were sweetened by
the bustle before the smithy.

How Adam had come from the market-place to the Richtberg, is a story
speedily told.

He was the only child of his dead parents, and early learned his father's
trade.  When his mother died, the old man gave his son and partner his
blessing, and some florins to pay his expenses, and sent him away.  He
went directly to Nuremberg, which the old man praised as the high-school
of the smith's art, and there remained twelve years.  When, at the end
of that time, news came to Adam that his father was dead, and he had
inherited the forge on the market-place, he wondered to find that he was
thirty years old, and had gone no farther than Nuremberg.  True,
everything that the rest of the world could do in the art of forging
might be learned there.

He was a large, heavy man, and from childhood had moved slowly and
reluctantly from the place where he chanced to be.

If work was pressing, he could not be induced to leave the anvil, even
when evening had closed in; if it was pleasant to sit over the beer, he
remained till after the last man had gone.  While working, he was as
mute as the dead to everything that was passing around him; in the tavern
he rarely spoke, and then said only a few words, yet the young artists,
sculptors, workers in gold and students liked to see the stout drinker
and good listener at the table, and the members of his guild only
marvelled how the sensible fellow, who joined in no foolish pranks, and
worked in such good earnest, held aloof from them to keep company with
these hairbrained folk, and remained a Papist.

He might have taken possession of the shop on the market-place directly
after his father's death, but could not arrange his departure so quickly,
and it was fully eight months before he left Nuremberg.

On the high-road before Schwabach a wagon, occupied by some strolling
performers, overtook the traveller.  They belonged to the better class,
for they appeared before counts and princes, and were seven in number.
The father and four sons played the violin, viola and reboc, and the two
daughters sang to the lute and harp.  The old man invited Adam to take
the eighth place in the vehicle, so he counted his pennies, and room was
made for him opposite Flora, called by her family Florette.  The
musicians were going to the fair at Nordlingen, and the smith enjoyed
himself so well with them, that he remained several days after reaching
the goal of the journey.  When he at last went away Florette wept, but he
walked straight on until noon, without looking back.  Then he lay down
under a blossoming apple-tree, to rest and eat some lunch, but the lunch
did not taste well; and when he shut his eyes he could not sleep, for he
thought constantly of Florette.  Of course!  He had parted from her far
too soon, and an eager longing seized upon him for the young girl, with
her red lips and luxuriant hair.  This hair was a perfect golden-yellow;
he knew it well, for she had often combed and braided it in the tavern-
room beside the straw where they all slept.

He yearned to hear her laugh too, and would have liked to see her weep
again.

Then he remembered the desolate smithy in the narrow market-place and the
dreary home, recollected that he was thirty years old, and still had no
wife.

A little wife of his own!  A wife like  Florette!  Seventeen years old,
a complexion like milk and blood, a creature full of gayety and joyous
life!  True, he was no light-hearted lad, but, lying under the apple-tree
in the month of May, he saw himself in imagination living happily and
merrily in the smithy by the market-place, with the fair-haired girl who
had already shed tears for him.  At last he started up, and because he
had determined to go still farther on this day, did so, though for no
other reason than to carry out the plan formed the day before.  The next
morning, before sunrise, he was again marching along the highway, this
time not forward towards the Black Forest, but back to Nordlingen.

That very evening Florette became his betrothed bride, and the following
Tuesday his wife.

The wedding was celebrated in the midst of the turmoil of the fair.
Strolling players, jugglers and buffoons were the witnesses, and there
was no lack of music and tinsel.

A quieter ceremony would have been more agreeable to the plain citizen
and sensible blacksmith, but this purgatory had to be passed to reach
Paradise.

On Wednesday he went off in a fair wagon with his young wife, and in
Stuttgart bought with a portion of his savings many articles of household
furniture, less to stop the gossips' tongues, of which he took no heed,
than to do her honor in his own eyes.  These things, piled high in a
wagon of his own, he had sent into his native town as Florette's dowry,
for her whole outfit consisted of one pink and one grass-green gown, a
lute and a little white dog.

A delightful life now began in the smithy for Adam.  The gossips avoided
his wife, but they stared at her in church, and among them she seemed to
him, not unjustly, like a rose amid vegetables.  The marriage he had made
was an abomination to respectable citizens, but Adam did not heed them,
and Flora appeared to feel equally happy with him.  When, before the
close of the first twelvemonth after their wedding, Ulrich was born, the
smith reached the summit of happiness and remained there for a whole
year.

When, during that time, he stood in the bow-window amid the fresh balsam,
auricular and yellow wallflowers holding his boy on his shoulder, while
his wife leaned on his arm, and the pungent odor of scorched hoofs
reached his nostrils, and he saw his journeyman and apprentice shoeing a
horse below, he often thought how pleasant it had been pursuing the finer
branches of his craft in Nuremberg, and that he should like to forge a
flower again; but the blacksmith's trade was not to be despised either,
and surely life with one's wife and child was best.

In the evening he drank his beer at the Lamb, and once, when the surgeon
Siedler called life a miserable vale of tears, he laughed in his face and
answered: "To him who knows how to take it right, it is a delightful
garden."

Florette was kind to her husband, and devoted herself to her child, so
long as he was an infant, with the most self-sacrificing love.  Adam
often spoke of a little daughter, who must look exactly like its mother;
but it did not come.

When little Ulrich at last began to run about in the street,
the mother's nomadic blood stirred, and she was constantly dinning it
into her husband's ears that he ought to leave this miserable place and
go to Augsburg or Cologne, where it would be pleasant; but he remained
firm, and though her power over him was great, she could not move his
resolute will.

Often she would not cease her entreaties and representations, and when
she even complained that she was dying of solitude and weariness, his
veins swelled with wrath, and then she was frightened, fled to her room
and wept.  If she happened to have a bold day, she threatened to go away
and seek her own relatives.  This displeased him, and he made her feel it
bitterly, for he was steadfast in everything, even anger, and when he
bore ill-will it was not for hours, but months, nor at such times could
he be conciliated by coaxing or tears.

By degrees Florette learned to meet his discontent with a shrug of her
shoulders, and to arrange her life in her own way.  Ulrich was her
comfort, pride and plaything, but sporting with him did not satisfy her.

While Adam was standing behind the anvil, she sat among the flowers in
the bow-window, and the watchmen now looked higher up than the forge,
the worthy magistrates no longer cast unfriendly glances at the smith's
house, for Florette grew more and more beautiful in the quiet life she
now enjoyed, and many a neighboring noble brought his horse to Adam to be
shod, merely to look into the eyes of the artisan's beautiful wife.

Count von Frohlingen came most frequently of all, and Florette soon
learned to distinguish the hoof-beats of his horse from those of the
other steeds, and when he entered the shop, willingly found some pretext
for going there too.  In the afternoons she often went with her child
outside the gate, and then always chose the road leading to the count's
castle.  There was no lack of careful friends, who warned Adam, but he
answered them angrily, so they learned to be silent.

Florette had now grown gay again, and sometimes sang like a joyous bird.

Seven years elapsed, and during the summer of the eighth a scattered
troop of soldiers came to the city and obtained admission.  They were
quartered under the arches of the town-hall, but many also lay in the
smithy, for their helmets, breast-plates and other pieces of armor
required plenty of mending.  The ensign, a handsome, proud young fellow,
with a dainty moustache, was Adam's most constant customer, and played
very kindly with Ulrich, when Florette appeared with him.  At last the
young soldier departed, and the very same day Adam was summoned to the
monastery, to mend something in the grating before the treasury.

When he returned, Florette had vanished; "run after the ensign," people
said, and they were right.  Adam did not attempt to wrest her from the
seducer; but a great love cannot be torn from the heart like a staff that
is thrust into the ground; it is intertwined with a thousand fibres, and
to destroy it utterly is to destroy the heart in which it has taken root,
and with it life itself.  When he secretly cursed her and called her a
viper, he doubtless remembered how innocent, dear and joyous she had
been, and then the roots of the destroyed affection put forth new shoots,
and he saw before his mental vision ensnaring images, of which he felt
ashamed as soon as they had vanished.

Lightning and hail had entered the "delightful garden" of Adam's life
also, and he had been thrust forth from the little circle of the happy
into the great army of the wretched.

Purifying powers dwell in undeserved suffering, but no one is made better
by unmerited disgrace, least of all a man like Adam.  He had done what
seemed to him his duty, without looking to the right or the left, but now
the stainless man felt himself dishonored, and with morbid sensitiveness
referred everything he saw and heard to his own disgrace, while the
inhabitants of the little town made him feel that he had been ill-
advised, when he ventured to make a fiddler's daughter a citizen.

When he went out, it seemed to him--and usually unjustly--as if people
were nudging each other; hands, pointing out-stretched fingers at him,
appeared to grow from every eye.  At home he found nothing but
desolation, vacuity, sorrow, and a child, who constantly tore open the
burning, gnawing wounds in his heart.  Ulrich must forget "the viper,"
and he sternly forbade him to speak of his mother; but not a day passed
on which he would not fain have done so himself.

The smith did not stay long in the house on the market-place.  He wished
to go to Freiburg or Ulm, any place where he had not been with her.  A
purchaser for the dwelling, with its lucrative business, was speedily
found, the furniture was packed, and the new owner was to move in on
Wednesday, when on Monday Bolz, the jockey, came to Adam's workshop from
Richtberg.  The man had been a good customer for years, and bought
hundreds of shoes, which he put on the horses at his own forge, for he
knew something about the trade.  He came to say farewell; he had his own
nest to feather, and could do a more profitable business in the lowlands
than up here in the forest.  Finally he offered Adam his property at a
very low price.

The smith had smiled at the jockey's proposal, still he went to the
Richtberg the very next day to see the place.  There stood the
executioner's house, from which the whole street was probably named.
One wretched hovel succeeded another.  Yonder before a door, Wilhelm the
idiot, on whom the city boys played their pranks, smiled into vacancy
just as foolishly as he had done twenty years ago, here lodged Kathrin,
with the big goitre, who swept the gutters; in the three grey huts, from
which hung numerous articles of ragged clothing, lived two families of
charcoal-burners, and Caspar, the juggler, a strange man, whom as a boy
he had seen in the pillory, with his deformed daughters, who in winter
washed laces and in summer went with him to the fairs.

In the hovels, before which numerous children were playing, lived honest,
but poor foresters.  It was the home of want and misery.  Only the
jockey's house and one other would have been allowed to exist in the
city.  The latter was occupied by the Jew, Costa, who ten years before
had come from a distant country to the city with his aged father and a
dumb wife, and remained there, for a little daughter was born and the old
man was afterwards seized with a fatal illness.  But the inhabitants
would tolerate no Jews among them, so the stranger moved into the
forester's house on the Richtberg which had stood empty because a better
one had been built deeper in the woods.  The city treasury could use the
rent and tax exacted from Jews and demanded of the stranger.  The Jew
consented to the magistrate's requirement, but as it soon became known
that he pored over huge volumes all day long and pursued no business, yet
paid for everything in good money, he was believed to be an alchemist and
sorcerer.

All who lived here were miserable or despised, and when Adam had left the
Richtberg he told himself that he no longer belonged among the proud and
unblemished and since he felt dishonored and took disgrace in the same
dogged earnest, that he did everything else, he believed the people in
the Richtberg were just the right neighbors for him.  All knew what it is
to be wretched, and many had still heavier disgrace to bear.  And then!
If want drove his miserable wife back to him, this was the right place
for her and those of her stamp.

So he bought the jockey's house and well-supplied forge.  There would be
customers enough for all he could do there in obscurity.

He had no cause to repent his bargain.

The old nurse remained with him and took care of Ulrich, who throve
admirably.  His own heart too grew lighter while engaged in designing or
executing many an artistic piece of work.  He sometimes went to the city
to buy iron or coals, but usually avoided any intercourse with the
citizens, who shrugged their shoulders or pointed to their foreheads,
when they spoke of him.

About a year after his removal he had occasion to speak to the file-
cutter, and sought him at the Lamb, where a number of Count Frolinger's
retainers were sitting.  Adam took no notice of them, but they began to
jeer and mock at him.  For a time he succeeded in controlling himself,
but when red-haired Valentine went too far, a sudden fit of rage
overpowered him and he felled him to the floor.  The others now attacked
him and dragged him to their master's castle, where he lay imprisoned for
six months.  At last he was brought before the count, who restored him to
liberty "for the sake of Florette's beautiful eyes."

Years had passed since then, during which Adam had lived a quiet,
industrious life in the Richtberg with his son.  He associated with no
one, except Doctor Costa, in whom he found the first and only real friend
fate had ever bestowed upon him.




CHAPTER III.

Father Benedict had last seen the smith soon after his return from
imprisonment, in the confessional of the monastery.  As the monk in his
youth had served in a troop of the imperial cavalry, he now, spite of his
ecclesiastical dignity, managed the stables of the wealthy monastery, and
had formerly come to the smithy in the market-place with many a horse,
but since the monks had become involved in a quarrel with the city,
Benedict ordered the animals to be shod elsewhere.

A difficult case reminded him of the skilful, half-forgotten artisan;
and when the latter came out of the shed with a sack of coal, Benedict
greeted him with sincere warmth.  Adam, too, showed that he was glad to
see the unexpected visitor, and placed his skill at the disposal of the
monastery.

"It has grown late, Adam," said the monk, loosening the belt he was
accustomed to wear when riding, which had become damp.  "The storm
overtook us on the way.  The rolling and flashing overhead made the
sorrel horse almost tear Gotz's hands off the wrists.  Three steps
sideways and one forward--so it has grown late, and you can't shoe the
rascal in the dark."

"Do you mean the sorrel horse?"  asked Adam, in a deep, musical voice,
thrusting a blazing pine torch into the iron ring on the forge.

"Yes, Master Adam.  He won't bear shoeing, yet he's very valuable.  We
have nothing to equal him.  None of us can control him, but you formerly
zounds!....you haven't grown younger in the last few years either, Adam!
Put on your cap; you've lost your hair.  Your forehead reaches down to
your neck, but your vigor has remained.  Do you remember how you cleft
the anvil at Rodebach?"

"Let that pass," replied Adam--not angrily, but firmly.  "I'll shoe the
horse early to-morrow; it's too late to-day."

"I thought so!" cried the other, clasping his hands excitedly.  "You know
how we stand towards the citizens on account of the tolls on the bridges.
I'd rather lie on thorns than enter the miserable hole.  The stable down
below is large enough!  Haven't you a heap of straw for a poor brother in
Christ?  I need nothing more; I've brought food with me."

The smith lowered his eyes in embarrassment.  He was not hospitable.
No stranger had rested under his roof, and everything that disturbed his
seclusion was repugnant to him.  Yet he could not refuse; so he answered
coldly: "I live alone here with my boy, but if you wish, room can be
made."

The monk accepted as eagerly, as if he had been cordially invited; and
after the horses and groom were supplied with shelter, followed his host
into the sitting-room next the shop, and placed his saddle-bags on the
table.

"This is all right," he said, laughing, as he produced a roast fowl and
some white bread.  "But how about the wine?  I need something warm inside
after my wet ride.  Haven't you a drop in the cellar?"

"No, Father!"  replied the smith.  But directly after a second thought
occurred to him, and he added: "Yes, I can serve you."

So saying, he opened the cupboard, and when, a short time after, the monk
emptied the first goblet, he uttered a long drawn "Ah!" following the
course of the fiery potion with his hand, till it rested content near his
stomach.  His lips quivered a little in the enjoyment of the flavor; then
he looked benignantly with his unusually round eyes at Adam, saying
cunningly:

"If such grapes grow on your pine-trees, I wish the good Lord had given
Father Noah a pine-tree instead of a vine.  By the saints!  The
archbishop has no better wine in his cellar!  Give me one little sip
more, and tell me from whom you received the noble gift?"

"Costa gave me the wine."

"The sorcerer---the Jew?" asked the monk, pushing the goblet away.  "But,
of course," he continued, in a half-earnest, half-jesting tone, "when one
considers--the wine at the first holy communion, and at the marriage of
Cana, and the juice of the grapes King David enjoyed, once lay in Jewish
cellars!"

Benedict had doubtless expected a smile or approving word from his host,
but the smith's bearded face remained motionless, as if he were dead.

The monk looked less cheerful, as he began again "You ought not to grudge
yourself a goblet either.  Wine moderately enjoyed makes the heart glad;
and you don't look like a contented man.  Everything in life has not gone
according to your wishes, but each has his own cross to bear; and as for
you, your name is Adam, and your trials also come from Eve!"

At these words the smith moved his hand from his beard, and began to push
the round leather cap to and fro on his bald head.  A harsh answer was
already on his lips, when he saw Ulrich, who had paused on the threshold
in bewilderment.  The boy had never beheld any guest at his father's
table except the doctor, but hastily collecting his thoughts he kissed
the monk's hand.  The priest took the handsome lad by the chin, bent his
head back, looked Adam also in the face, and exclaimed:

"His mouth, nose and eyes he has inherited from your wife, but the shape
of the brow and head is exactly like yours."

A faint flush suffused Adam's cheeks, and turning quickly to the boy as
if he had heard enough, he cried:

"You are late.  Where have you been so long?"

"In the forest with Ruth.  We were gathering faggots for Dr. Costa."

"Until now?"

"Rahel had baked some dumplings, so the doctor told me to stay."

"Then go to bed now.  But first take some food to the groom in the
stable, and put fresh linen on my bed.  Be in the workshop early
to-morrow morning, there is a horse to be shod."

The boy looked up thoughtfully and replied: "Yes, but the doctor has
changed the hours; to-morrow the lesson will begin just after sunrise,
father."

"Very well, we'll do without you.  Good-night then."

The monk followed this conversation with interest and increasing
disapproval, his face assuming a totally different expression, for the
muscles between his nose and mouth drew farther back, forming with the
underlip an angle turning inward.  Thus he gazed with mute reproach at
the smith for some time, then pushed the goblet far away, exclaiming with
sincere indignation:

"What doings are these, friend Adam?  I'll let the Jew's wine pass, and
the dumplings too for aught I care, though it doesn't make a Christian
child more pleasing in the sight of God, to eat from the same dish with
those on whom the Saviour's innocent blood rests.  But that you,
a believing Christian, should permit an accursed Jew to lead a
foolish lad.  .  .  ."

"Let that pass," said the smith, interrupting the excited monk; but the
latter would not be restrained, and only continued still more loudly and
firmly: "I won't be stopped.  Was such a thing ever heard of?  A baptized
Christian, who sends his own son to be taught by the infidel soul-
destroyer!"

"Hear me, Father!"

"No indeed.  It's for you to hear--you!  What was I saying?  For you,
you who seek for your poor child a soul-destroying infidel as teacher.
Do you know what that is?  A sin against the Holy Ghost--the worst of all
crimes.  Such an abomination!  You will have a heavy penance imposed upon
you in the confessional."

"It's no sin--no abomination!"  replied the smith defiantly.