Ekkehard: A Tale of the Tenth Century. Vol. 2 (of 2)

by Joseph Victor von Scheffel

CHAPTER XXIII.

[On the Ebenalp.]

For six days Ekkehard was ill. The herdsmen nursed him, and a decoction of the blue gentian took away the fever. The Alpine air too, helped his recovery. A great shock had been necessary to restore his bodily as well as mental equilibrium. Now he was all right again, and heard neither voices, nor saw phantoms. A delicious feeling of repose and recovering health ran through his veins. It was that state of indolent, pleasant weakness, so beneficial to persons recovering from melancholy. His thoughts were serious, but had no longer any bitterness about them.

"I have learnt something from the mountains," said he to himself. "Storming and raging will avail nothing, though the most enchanting of maidens were sitting before us; but we must become hard and stony outside like the Säntis, and put a cooling armour of ice round the heart; and sable night herself must scarcely know, how it burns and glows within."

By degrees, all the sufferings of the past months, were shrouded and seen through a soft haze. He could think of the Duchess and all that had happened on the Hohentwiel, without giving himself a heartache. And such is the influence of all grand and beautiful nature, that it not only delights and softens the heart of the looker-on, but that it widens the mind in general, and conjures back the days, which have long since, become part and parcel of the inexorable Past.

Ekkehard, had never before cast a retrospective glance on the days of his youth, but he now loved to fly there in his thoughts, as if it had been a paradise, out of which the storm of life had driven him. He had spent several years in the cloister-school at Lorsch on the Rhine. In those days he had no idea what heart-and-soul-consuming fire could be hidden in a woman's dark eyes. Then, the old parchments were his world.

One figure out of that time had, however, been faithfully kept in his heart's memory; and that was Brother Conrad of Alzey. On him, who was his senior by but a few years, Ekkehard had lavished the affection of a first friendship. Their roads in life afterwards became different; and the days of Lorsch had been forced into the background, by later events. But now, they rose warm and glowing in his thoughts, like some dark hill on a plain, when the morning-sun has cast his first rays on it.

It is with the human mind as with the crust of this old earth of ours. On the alluvion of childhood, new strata heap themselves up, in stormy haste; rocks, ridges and high mountains, which strive to reach up to heaven itself, and the ground on which they stand, is forgotten and covered with ruins.--But like as the stern peaks of the Alps, longingly look down into the valleys, and often, overwhelmed by homesickness, plunge down into the depths from which they rose,--in the same way, memory loves to go back to youth, and digs for the treasures which were left thoughtlessly behind, beside the worthless stones.

So Ekkehard's thoughts now recurred often to his faithful companion. Once more he stood beside him, in the arched pillar-supported hall, and prayed with him beside the mausoleums of the old kings, and the stone coffin of the blind Duke Thassilo. With him, he walked through the shady lanes of the cloister-garden, listening to his words;--and all that Conrad had spoken then, was good and noble, for he looked at the world with a poet's eye, and it was as if flowers must spring up on his way, and birds carol gaily, when his lips opened to utter words, sweeter than honey.

"Look over yonder!" Conrad had once said to his young friend, when they were looking down, over the land, from the parapet of the garden. "There, where the mounds of white sand rise from the green fields, there was once the bed of the river Neckar. Thus, the traces of past generations, run through the fields of their descendants, and 'tis well if these pay them some attention. Here, on the shores of the Rhine, we stand on hallowed ground, and it were time that we set to collecting that, which has grown on it, before the tedious trivium and quadrivium, has killed our appreciation of it."

In the merry holiday-time, Conrad and he had wandered through the Odenwald, where, in a valley, hidden by green drooping birch-trees, they had come to a well. Out of this they drank, and Conrad had said: "bow down thy head, for this is the grove of the dead, and Hagen's beech-tree and Siegfried's well. Here the best of heroes received his death-wound from the spear of the grim Hagen, which entered his back, so that the flowers around were bedewed with the red blood. Yonder, on the Sedelhof, Chriemhildis mourned for her slain husband, until the messengers of the Hunnic king, came to demand the hand of the young widow." And he told him all about the princely castle at Worms, and the treasure of the Nibelungen, and the revenge of Chriemhildis, and Ekkehard listened with sparkling eager eyes.

"Give me thy hand!" he cried, when all was over, to his young friend. "When we have become men, well versed in poetry, then we will erect a monument to the legends of the Rhine. My heart is even now brimful with the material for a mighty song of the prowess of heroes, perils, death and vengeance, and I likewise know the art of the horny Siegfried, how he made himself invulnerable; for though there are no more any dragons to be slain in whose blood one could bathe, everyone, who with a pure heart breathes the mountain air, and bathes his brow in the morning dew, is gifted with the same knowledge. He can hear what the birds are singing in the trees, and what the winds tell of old legends, and he becomes strong and powerful; and if his heart is in the right place, he will write it down for the benefit of others."

Ekkehard had listened with an amazed, half fearful surprise at the other's dashing boldness, and had said at last: "My head is getting quite dizzy, when I listen to thee, and how thou intendest to become another Homerus."

And Conrad had smilingly replied: "Nobody will dare to chant another Iliad after Homer, but the song of the Nibelungen has not yet been sung, and my arm is young and my courage undaunted, and who knows what the course of time may bring."

Another time they were walking together on the shores of the Rhine, and the sun, coming over the Wasgau mountains, was mirrored in the waves, when Conrad said: "For thee I also know a song, which is simple and not too wild, so that it will suit thy disposition; which prefers the notes of a bugle, to the roar of thunder. Look up! Just as to-day, the towers of Worms shone and glistened in the sun, when the hero Waltari of Aquitania, flying from the Hunnic bondage came to Franconia. Here, the ferry-man rowed him over, with his sweetheart and his golden treasure. Through yonder dark, bluish looking wood he then rode, and there was a fighting and tilting, a rattling and clashing of swords and spears, when the knights of Worms, who had gone out in his pursuit, attacked him. But his love and a good conscience made Waltari strong, so that he held out against them all, even against King Gunther and the grim Hagen."

Conrad then told him the whole legend with its details. "Around all large trees," he concluded, "wild, young sprouts shoot up in abundance; and so round the trunk of the Nibelungen a whole thicket has sprung up, out of which he who has got the talent can build up something. Couldst thou not sing the Waltari?"

But Ekkehard preferred at that time to throw pebbles, making them skim the water, and he only took in, half the meaning of that which his friend had said. He was a devoted cloister-pupil, and his thoughts were as yet contented with the tasks which fell to his daily share. Time separated the two friends, and Conrad had to fly from the cloister-school, because he had once said that the logic of Aristotle was mere straw. So he had gone out into the wide world, nobody knew whither; and Ekkehard came to St. Gall pursuing his studies assiduously. There, he had grown into a learned and sensible young man, deemed fit to become a professor; and he sometimes thought of Conrad of Alzey with something akin to pity.

But a good seed-corn may for a long time lie hidden in a human heart, and yet at last germinate and bud, like the wheat from Egypt's mummy-graves.

That Ekkehard now delighted in dwelling on these recollections, was a proof that he had undergone a considerable change. And this was well. The caprices of the Duchess, and the unconscious grace of Praxedis, had refined his shy and awkward manners. The time of stirring excitement he had gone through during the invasion of the Huns, had given a bolder flight to his aspirations and had taught him to despise the paltry intrigues of petty ambition. Then, his heart received a mortal wound, which had to be struggled with and overcome; and so, the cloister-scholar, in spite of cowl and tonsure, had arrived at a happy state of transition, in which the monk was about to become a poet, and walked about like a serpent which has assumed a new covering, and only watches for an opportunity to strip off its shabby old coat against some hedge or tree.

Daily and hourly, when contemplating the ever-beautiful peaks of his mountains, and breathing the pure, fragrant Alpine air, it appeared a constant riddle to him, how he could ever have thought to find happiness in reading and poring over yellow parchment-leaves, and how he then almost lost his reason on account of a proud woman. "Let all perish which has not strength to live," said he to himself, "and build up a new world for thyself; but build it inwardly; large, proud and wide,--and let the dead Past bury its dead!"

He was already walking about again quite cheerfully in his hermitage, when one evening after he had rung the vesper-bell, the master of the Ebenalp came to him, carrying something carefully in a handkerchief. "God's blessing be with you, mountain-brother," said he. "Well, you have had a good shaking-fit, and I came to bring you something as an after-cure. But I see that your cheeks are red and your eyes bright, so it has become unnecessary."

He opened his handkerchief, and displayed a lively ant-hill,--old and young ants with a quantity of dry fir-leaves. He shook the industrious little creatures down the hill-side.

"If you had not been well, you would have had to sleep on that to-night," said he with a laugh. "That takes away the last trace of fever!"

"The illness is past," said Ekkehard, "Many thanks for the medicine!"

"You had better provide yourself against the cold, however," said the herdsman, "for a black cloud is hanging over the Brülltobel, and the toads are coming out of their holes; a sure sign that the weather is about to change."

On the next morning all the peaks shone out in a dazzling white cover. A great deal of snow had fallen. Yet it was still much too early for the beginning of winter. The sun rose brightly, and tormented the snow with his rays, so as to make it almost repent having fallen.

When Ekkehard that evening was sitting before his pine-wood torch, he heard a thundering noise, as if the mountains were toppling over. He started, and put his hand up to his forehead, fearing that the fever was coming back.

This time, however, it was no fancy of a sick brain. A hollow echo boomed forth from the other side, rolling through the glens of the Sigelsalp, and Maarwiese. Then, there followed a sound like the breaking of mighty trees,--a clattering fall, and all was silent again. Only a low, plaintive hum, could be heard all the night, coming up from the valley.

Ekkehard did not sleep; yet, since his experiences on the Seealpsee, he did not quite trust the evidence of his senses. In the early morning he went up to the Ebenalp. Benedicta stood before their cottage door and greeted him with a snow-ball. The herdsman laughed when questioned about the nightly disturbance.

"That music you will hear often enough," said he. "An avalanche has fallen down into the valley."

"And the humming?"

"That I suppose to have been your own snoring."

"But I did not sleep," said Ekkehard.

So they went down with him and listened. It was like a distant moaning coming up from the snow.

"If Pater Lucius of Quaradaves were still living," said Benedicta, "I should believe it to be him; as he had such a soft bear-like voice."

"Hush, thou wild bumble-bee!" cried her father. Then, they went to fetch shovels and Alpine sticks, the old man likewise taking his hatchet, and accompanied by Ekkehard, they followed the traces of the avalanche. It had fallen down from the Aesher, over earth and rock; breaking the low fir-trees like straw. Three mighty tors, looking down into the valley like sentinels, stopped the fall. There, the snow had angrily heaped itself up, only a small part had fallen over. The chief bulk, broken to pieces by the violence of the encounter, lay about in fantastic masses. The herdsman stooped down, to place his ear on the snow; then he advanced a few paces, and thrusting his mountain-stick in, he cried: "here we must dig!"

And they shovelled up the snow for a considerable while, and dug a regular shaft, so that the snow-walls on both sides, rose high over their heads. They had often to breathe on and rub their hands during their cold work. Suddenly the herdsman uttered a shout of delight, echoed by Ekkehard, for now a black spot had become visible. The old man ran to fetch the hatchet; a few shovelsful more, and a shaggy object arose heavily, and, snorting and grunting, stretched out its forepaws, as if trying to shake off sleep; and finally it slowly mounted one of the tors, and sat down.

It was a huge she-bear, who, on a nightly fishing-expedition to the Seealpsee, had been buried alive with her spouse. The latter, however, gave no sign of life. He had been stifled by her side, and lay there in the quiet sleep of death. Around his snout there was yet a half angry, half defiant expression; as if he had left this life with a curse on the early snow.

The herdsman wanted to attack the she-bear with his hatchet, but Ekkehard restrained him, saying: "Let her live! One, will be enough for us!"

Then, they drew the bear out, and together could hardly carry him. The she-bear sat on her rock, gazing down mournfully, and uttering a plaintive growl, she cast a tearful look on Ekkehard, as if she had understood his interference in her behalf. Then, she came down slowly, but not as if with hostile intentions. The men meanwhile had made a sling, with some twisted fir-branches, in which to drag their booty along. They both stepped back, hatchet and spear in hand, but the bear-widow bent down over her dead spouse, bit off his right ear and ate it up, as a memorial of the happy Past. After this, she approached Ekkehard walking on her hind-legs, who, being frightened at the prospect of a possible embrace, made the sign of the cross, and pronounced St. Gallus's conjuration against bears: "Go out and take thyself away from this our valley, thou monster of the wood. Mountains and Alpine glens be thy realm; but leave us in peace, as well as the herds of this Alm."

The she-bear had stopped, with a bitter melancholy look in her eyes, as if she felt hurt at this disdain of her friendly feelings. She dropped down on her fore-legs, and turning her back on the man who had thus banished her, walked away on all fours. Twice she looked back, before entirely disappearing from their sight.

"Such a beast, has the intelligence of a dozen men, and can read a person's will, in his eyes," said the herdsman. "Else, I should think you a saint, whom the inhabitants of the wilderness obey."

Weighing the paws of the dead bear in his hand, he continued: "Hurrah! that will be a repast. These we will eat together next Sunday, with a dainty salad, made of Alpine herbs. The meat will be ample provision for us through the winter, and for the skin we will cast lots."

Whilst they were dragging the victim of the avalanche up to the Wildkirchlein, Benedicta sang:

"And he who digs for snow-drops,
And whom fortune will befriend,
Will by chance dig a bear out,
And perhaps two, in the end."

The snow had been a mere soft sleet, which soon melted again. Summer came back once more to the mountains with heart-stirring warmth, and a peaceful Sabbath-quiet lay over the highlands. Ekkehard had regaled himself with the bear's paws at dinner in company with the herdsman and his daughter. It was a savoury dish, coarse, but strengthening, and well suited for inhabitants of the mountains. Then he mounted the top of the Ebenalp, and threw himself into the fragrant grass, from whence he looked up at the blue sky, enjoying his recovered health.

Benedicta's goats were grazing around him, and he could hear how the juicy Alpine-grass was greedily munched between their sharp teeth. Restless clouds drifted along the hillsides; and on a piece of white lime-stone, with her face towards the Säntis, sat Benedicta. She was playing on a queer sort of a flute. It was a simple and melodious air; like a voice from the days of youth. With two wooden milk-spoons in her left hand she beat time. She was a proficient in this art, and her father would often say with regret: "Tis really a pity! She deserved to be called Benedictus, as she would have made a capital herdsman."

When the rythmical air came to an end, she gave a loud shout in the direction of the neighbouring alp, upon which the soft tones of an Alpine horn were heard. Her sweetheart, the herdsman on the Klus stood under the dwarf fir-tree, blowing the ranz des vaches,--that strange, primitive music, which unlike any other melody, seems at first a mere humming sound, which an imprisoned bumble-bee, searching for an outlet, might produce, and that by-and-by, rises and swells into that wondrous song of longing, love, and home-sickness, creeping into the very heart's core; filling it either with rapturous joy, or making it almost break with sorrow.

"I trow that you are quite well again, mountain-brother," cried Benedicta to Ekkehard, "as you are lying so contentedly on your back. Did you like the music?"

"Yes," said Ekkehard, "go on!"

He could scarcely gaze his fill, on all the beauty around him. To the left, in silent grandeur, stood the Säntis, with his kindred. Ekkehard, already knew them by their different names, and greeted them as his dear neighbours. Before him, a confused mass of smaller hills and mountains, green luxuriant meadow-lands, and dark pine-woods lay extended. A part of the Rhinevalley, bordered by the heights of the Arl-mountains and the distant Rhætian Alps, looked up at him. A vapoury stripe of mist indicated the mirror of the Bodensee, which it covered; and all that he saw was wide and grand and beautiful.

He, who has felt the mysterious influence which reigns on airy mountain-peaks, widening and ennobling the human heart, raising it heavenwards, in loftier thoughts, he, is filled with a sort of smiling pity, when he thinks of those, who, in the depth below, are dragging tiles and sand together, for the building of new towers of Babel; and he will unite in that joyous mountain-cry, which according to the old herdsman, is equal to a paternoster before the Lord.

The sun was standing over the Kronberg, inclining towards the west, and deluging the heavens with a flood of golden light. He likewise sent his rays into the mists over the Bodensee, so that the white veil slowly dissolved, and in soft, delicate blue tints, the Untersee became visible. Ekkehard strained his eyes, and beheld a filmy dark spot, which was the island of Reichenau, and a mountain which scarcely rose above the horizon, but he knew it well,--it was the Hohentwiel.

The ranz des vaches accompanied the tinkling of the cow-bells, and over the prospect was a continually increasing warmth of colour. The meadows were steeped in a golden-brown green, and even the grey lime-stone walls of the Kamor, were dyed with a faint roseate hue. Then, Ekkehard's soul also glowed and brightened. His thoughts flew away, over into the Hegau, and he fancied himself once more sitting with Dame Hadwig on the Hohenstoffeln, when they celebrated Cappan's wedding, and saw Audifax and Hadumoth, who appeared to him the very embodiment of earthly happiness, coming home from the Huns. There arose also from the dust and rubbish of the past, what the eloquent Conrad of Alzey, had once told him of Waltari and Hiltgunde. The joyous spirit of poetry entered his mind. He rose and jumped up into the air, in a way, which must have pleased the Säntis. In the imagery of poetry, the poor heart could rejoice over that, which life could never give it;--the glory of knighthood, and the felicity of wedded love.

"I will sing the song of Waltari of Aquitania!" cried he to the setting sun, and it was as if he saw his friend Conrad of Alzey, standing between the Sigelsalp and Maarwiese, in robes of light, and nodding a smiling approval to this plan.

So, Ekkehard cheerfully set to work. "What is done here, must either be well done, or not at all, else the mountains will laugh at us," the herdsman had once said, to which remark, he had then nodded a hearty assent. The goat-boy was sent into the valley to fetch some eggs and honey; so, Ekkehard begged his master to give him a holiday, and entrusted him with a letter to his nephew. He wrote it in a cipher, well known at the monastery, so that no other persons could read it. The contents of the letter were as follows:

"All hail and blessings to the cloister-pupil Burkhard!"

"Thou, who hast been an eye-witness of thy uncle's sorrow, wilt know how to be silent. Do not try to find out where he is now, but remember that God is everywhere. Thou hast read in Procopius how Gelimer, the king of the Vandals, when he was a prisoner in the Numidian hills, and when his misery was great, entreated his enemies to give him a harp, so that he might give voice to his grief. Thy mother's brother now begs thee, to give to the bearer of this, one of your small harps, as well as some sheets of parchment, colours and pens, for my heart in its loneliness, also feels inclined to sing a song. Burn this letter. God's blessing be with thee! Farewell!"

"Thou must be wary and cautious, as if thou wert going to take the young ones out of an eagle's nest," Ekkehard said to the goat-boy. "Ask for the cloister-pupil, who was with Romeias the watchman, when the Huns came. To him thou art to give the letter. Nobody else need know about it."

The goat-boy, putting his forefinger to his lips, replied with a knowing look: "With us no tales are repeated. The mountain-air teaches one to keep a secret."

Two days afterwards he returned from his expedition, and unpacked the contents of his wicker-basket before Ekkehard's cavern. A small harp, with ten strings, three-cornered so as to imitate a Greek delta; colours and writing material, and a quantity of clean, soft parchment-leaves with ruled lines, lay all carefully hidden under a mass of green oak-leaves.

The goat-boy however looked sullen and gloomy.

"Thou hast done thy business well," said Ekkehard.

"Another time, I won't go down there," grumbled the boy, clenching his fist.

"Why not?"

"Because there is no room for such as I. In the hall, I enquired for the pupil, and gave him the letter. After that, I felt rather curious to see what nice young saints those might be, who went to school there, with their monks' habits. So I went to the garden where the young gentlemen were playing with dice, and drinking, as it was a recreation day. I looked on, at their throwing stones at a mark, and playing a game with sticks, and I could not help laughing, because it was all so weak and miserable. And when they asked me, what I was laughing at, I took up a stone, and threw it twenty paces further than the best of them, and cried out: what a set of green-beaks you are! Upon this, they tried to get at me with their sticks; but I seized the one next to me, and sent him flying through the air, so that he dropped into the grass like a lamed mountain-rook; and then they all cried out that I was a coarse mountain-lout, and that their strength lay in science and intellect. Then I wanted to know what intellect was, and they said: drink some wine, and afterwards we will write it on thy back! And the cloister-wine being good, I drank a few jugs full, and they wrote something on my back. I do not remember how it was all done, for the next morning I had a very bad headache, and did not know any more about their intellect, than I had done before."

Throwing back his coarse linen shirt, he showed his back to Ekkehard, on which with black cart-grease, in large capital letters the following inscription was written.

"Abbatiscellani, homines pagani,
Vani et insani, turgidi villani."

It was a monastic joke. Ekkehard could not restrain a laugh. "Don't mind it," said he, "and remember that it is thy own fault as thou hast sat too long over thy wine."

The goat-boy, however, was not to be appeased so easily.

"My black goats are far dearer to me, than all those younkers together," said he, buttoning his shirt again. "But if ever I catch such a milksop on the Ebenalp, I will write something on his back with unburnt ashes, that he will not forget as long as he lives; and if he is not satisfied with that, he may fly down the precipice, like an avalanche in spring."

Still grumbling, the boy went away.

Ekkehard then took up the harp, and sitting down at the foot of the crucifix before his cavern, he played a joyous air. It was a long time since he had last touched the chords, and it was an unspeakable delight for him, in that vast solitude, to give vent in low tuneful melodies, to the thoughts and feelings, that were oppressing his heart. And the fair lady Musica was Poetry's powerful ally; and the epic song of Waltari, which at first had approached him only in misty outlines, condensed itself into clearly defined figures; which again grouped themselves into warm, life-glowing pictures. Ekkehard closed his eyes to see them still better, and then he beheld the Huns approaching; a race of nimble, merry horsemen, with less repulsive faces than those against whom he had himself fought but a few months ago; and they carried off the royal offspring from Franconia and Aquitania, as hostages; Waltari and the fair Hiltgunde, the joy of Burgundy. And as he struck the chords with greater force, he also beheld King Attila himself, who was of tolerable mien, and well inclined to gaiety and the joys of the cup. And the royal children grew up at the Hunnic court, and when they were grown up, a feeling of home-sickness came over them, and they remembered how they had been betrothed to each other, from the days of their childhood.

Then, there arose a sounding and tuning of instruments, for the Huns were holding a great banquet; King Attila quaffed the mighty drinking-cup, and the others followed his example until they all slept the heavy sleep of drunkenness. Now he saw how the youthful hero of Aquitania, saddled his warhorse in a moon-lit night, and Hildegunde came and brought the Hunnic treasure. Then he lifted her up into the saddle, and away they rode out of Hunnic thraldom.

In the background, in fainter outlines, there still floated pictures of danger, and flight, and dreadful battles with the grasping King Gunther.

In large bold outlines, the whole story which he intended to glorify in a simple, heroic poem, stood out before his inward eye.

That very same night, Ekkehard remained sitting up with his chip-candle, and began his work; and a sensation of intense pleasure, came over him, when the figures sprang into life, under his hand. It was a great and honest joy; for in the exercise of the poetic art, mortal man elevates himself to the deed of the Creator, who caused a world to spring forth out of nothing. The next day found him eagerly busying himself with the first adventures. He could scarcely account for the laws by which he regulated and interwove the threads of his poem, and in truth it is not always necessary to know the why and the wherefore of everything. "The wind bloweth where it listeth, and thou hearest the sound thereof, but canst not tell whence it cometh, and whither it goeth; so is every one that is born of the Spirit," says St. John.

And if now and then a feeling of doubt and distrust of his own faculties came over him,--for he was timidly organised, and sometimes thought that it was scarcely possible to attain anything without the help of books, and learned models,--then, he would walk up and down the narrow path before his cavern, and riveting his looks on the gigantic walls of his mountains, he derived comfort and serenity from them; and finally said to himself, "In all that I write and conceive, I will merely ask the Säntis and the Kamor, whether they are satisfied." And with these thoughts, he was on a good track; for the poetry of him, who receives his inspiration from old mother nature, will be genuine and truthful, although the linen-weavers, stonecutters, or the whole of that most respectable brotherhood of straw-splitters, in the depth below, may ten thousand times declare it to be, a mere fantastical chimera.

Some days were thus spent, in industrious work. In the Latin verse of Virgil, the figures of his legend were clothed, as the paths of the German mother-tongue struck him as being still too rough and uneven, for the fair measured pace of his epic. Thus his solitude became daily more peopled. At first, he thought he would continue his work night and day, without any interruption; but the physical part of our nature will claim its rights. Therefore he said: "He who works, must attune his daily labour to the course of the sun;" and when the shadows of evening fell on the neighbouring heights, he made a pause; seized his harp and with it ascended the Ebenalp. The spot, where the first idea of writing the epic had entered his mind, had become very dear to him.

Benedicta welcomed him joyfully, when he came for the first time with his harp.

"I understand you, mountain-brother," said she. "Because you are not allowed to have a sweetheart, you have taken to a harp to which you tell everything that's going on in your heart. But it shall not be in vain that you have become a musician."

Raising her hand to her mouth, she uttered a clear, melodious whistle, towards the low-thatched cottage on the Klusalp, which soon brought over the herdsman her sweetheart, with his Alpine horn. He was a strong and fine looking lad. In his right ear he wore a heavy silver ring, representing a serpent, suspended from which, on a tiny silver chain, hung the slender milkspoon, the herdsman's badge of honour. His waist was encircled by the broad belt; in front of which some monstrous animal, faintly resembling a cow, was to be seen. With shy curiosity depicted in his healthy face, he stood before Ekkehard; but Benedicta said:

"Please to strike up a dance now; for often enough we have regretted that we could not do it ourselves; but, when he blows his horn he cannot whirl me round at the same time, and when I play on the flute, I cannot spare an arm."

Ekkehard willingly struck up the desired tune, being much pleased at the innocent merriment of these children of the mountains; and so they danced on the soft Alpine grass, until the moon rose in golden beauty over the Maarwiese. Greeting her with many a shout of delight, they still continued their dance; singing at the same time, alternately some simple little couplets ...

"And the glaciers grew upwards
Until nigh to the top,
What a pity for the maiden
If they'd frozen her up!"

sang Benedicta's lover, gaily whirling her round;

"And the storm blew so fiercely,
And it blew night and day,
What a pity for the cow-herd
If it had blown him away!"

she replied in the same measure.

When at last, tired with dancing, they rested themselves beside the young poet, Benedicta said: "Some day you will also get your reward, you dear, kind music-maker! There is an old legend belonging to these mountains, that once in every hundred years, a wondrous blue flower blooms on the rocky slopes, and to him, who has got the flower, the mountains open, and he can go in and take as much of the treasures of the deep, as his heart desires; and fill his hat to the brim with glittering jewels. If ever I find the flower, I will bring it to you, and you'll become a very, very rich man;" for, added she, clasping the neck of her lover with both arms,--"I should not know what to do with it, as I have found my treasure already."

But Ekkehard replied, "neither should I know what to do with it!"

He was right. He, who has been initiated in art, has found the genuine blue flower. Where others see nothing but a mass of rocks and stones, the vast realm of the beautiful opens to him; and there he finds treasures which are not eaten up by rust, and he is richer than all the money-changers and dealers, and purse-proud men of the world, although in his pocket, the penny may sometimes hold a sad wedding-feast with the farthing.

"But what then are we to do with the blue flower?" asked Benedicta.

"Give it to the goats or to the big bull-calf," said her lover laughingly. "They also deserve a treat now and then."

And again they whirled each other around in their national dances, until Benedicta's father came up to them. The latter had nailed the bear's skull which had since been bleached by the sun, over the door of his cottage, after the day's labours were done. He had stuck a piece of stalactite between the jaws, so that the goats and cows timidly ran away, scared by the new ornament.

"You make noise and uproar enough to make the Säntis tremble and quake," cried the old master of the Alps. "What on earth are you doing up there?" Thus, good-naturedly scolding, he made them go into the cottage.

The Waltari-song meanwhile, proceeded steadily; for when the heart is brimful of ideas and sounds, the hand must hurry, to keep pace with the flight of thought.

One midday, Ekkehard had just begun taking his usual walk on the narrow path before his cavern, when a strange visitor met his view. It was the she-bear, which he had dug out of the snow. Slowly she climbed up the steep ascent, carrying something in her snout. He ran back to his cave to fetch his spear, but the bear did not come as an enemy. Pausing respectfully at the entrance of his domicile, she dropped a fat marmot, which she had caught basking in the sunny grass, on a projecting stone. Was it meant as a present to thank him for having saved her life, or was it instigated by other feelings, who knows?--To be sure, Ekkehard had helped to consume the mortal remains of her spouse;--could some of the widow's affection thus be transferred to him?--we know too little about the law of affinities to decide this question.

The bear now sat down timidly before the cavern, stedfastly gazing in. Then, Ekkehard was touched, and pushed a wooden plate with some honey towards her, though still keeping his spear in his hand. But she only shook her head mournfully. The look out of her small, lidless eyes was melancholy and beseeching. Ekkehard then took down his harp from the wall, and began to play the strain, which Benedicta had asked for. This evidently had a soothing effect on the deserted bear-widow's mind; for raising herself on her hind-legs, she walked up and down, with rhythmical grace; but when Ekkehard played faster and wilder, she bashfully cast down her eyes, as her thirty-years-old bear's conscience did not sanction her dancing. Then, she stretched herself out again before the cavern, as if she wanted to deserve the praise, which the author of the hymn in praise of St. Gallus, bestowed on the bears, when he called them, "animals possessing an admirable degree of modesty."

"We two suit each other well," said Ekkehard. "Thou hast lost what thou hast loved best, in the snow, and I, in the tempest,--I will play something more for thee."

He now chose a melancholy air which seemed to please her well, as she gave an approving growl now and then. But Ekkehard, ever inwardly busy with his epic, at last said: "I have thought for a long while, what name I should give to the Hunnic queen, under whose care the young Hildgund was placed; and now I have found one. Her name shall be Ospirin, the godlike bearess. Dost thou understand me?"

The bear looked at him, as if it were all the same to her; so Ekkehard drew forth his manuscript, and added the name. The wish to make known the creation of his mind to some living being, had for a long while been strong within him. Here, in the vast solitude of the mountains, he thought that the bear might take the place which under other circumstances would have required some learned scholar. So he stepped into his blockhouse, and leaning on his spear, he read out the beginning of his poem; he read with a loud, enthusiastic voice, and the bear listened with laudable perseverance.

So he read further and further; how the knights of Worms, who persecuted Waltari, entered the Wasgau-forest, and fought with him,--and still she listened patiently; but when at last the single combat went on without end,--when Ekkefried of Saxony fell down into the grass a slain man, beside the bodies of his predecessors, and Hadwart and Patavid, the nephews of Hagen, likewise shared the lot of their companions,--then, the bear raised herself slowly, as if even she had grown tired of so much bloodshed; and with stately steps strode down the valley.

In a solitary rocky crag on the Sigelsalp opposite, was her domicile. Thitherwards she directed her steps, to prepare for the coming long sleep of winter.

The epic, however, which of all living beings, was first heard by the she-bear of the Sigelsalp, the writer of this book, has rendered into German verse, during the long winter-evenings; and though many a worthy translator had undertaken this task before him, he yet did not like to withhold it from the reader, in order that he may see, that in the tenth century, as well as in later ages, the spirit of poetry had set up her abode in the minds of chosen men.