This same phenomenon happened to me, when addressing the people. The clouds were being driven by the wind across the blue heaven back of the cross, which, since the rough spoliation of the other figures stands much out of the perpendicular, so that it appears in fact the more the sky is cast over, the more to nod or bend over. No one noticed this. But when I saw that the crowd was deeply affected by the sudden death of a wicked youth, who broke his neck at the time I prophesied, it shot through my brain, to weld the iron whilst it was hot. Thus I made the second miracle quickly succeed the first. You shake your head, but I had no other means to bring the people for their own good under my power. If ever a pia fraus was permissible it was then."
"You are a Romanist," said Erastus coldly.
"I am," answered the young Priest, who seemed to increase in stature. "I shall however leave the Palatinate, so soon as matters are so far in order here, that your officials and clergy can carry on the work." Saying this he stretched out his hand to Erastus as if for a last farewell. The physician hesitatingly gave him his lame right hand. "May it be well with you," he said. But he thought to himself: "from to-day our paths are separate." As Erastus later on reaching a turn in the road looked back, he saw the young Priest coming out of a house with a child in his arms, leading another by the hand. The little ones had apparently lost their parents.
CHAPTER V.
Erastus found a more systematic order in Petersthal, on his return in the evening, but still much was wanting, as the four physicians with their dozen assistants had only accomplished the half of what the Priest had done single handed in the much larger district of Schönau. The laborers themselves had been obliged to undertake the burial of the dead and the cleaning of the streets, all the healthy men having fled. It was impossible to think of cleaning the houses, the women asserted that they were all too weak to help in any way. They could not even be induced to give up the beds and clothing they had used to be burnt, or to purify and air their houses. Out of humor, angry, and wearied of their fruitless toil, the physicians sat together round one of the carts, which they had fitted up as their night-quarters. The horses were fastened to the trees, whilst each man made ready with the means at hand. Erastus still went about the neighboring houses, to at least aid the sick as far as possible, and only when darkness prevented any further visitation did the conscientious physician seek his own narrow cart. Wearied he stretched himself out and gazed upwards at the starry sky, whose pure beauty formed a singular contrast to the misery going on around him. Jupiter beamed in calm splendor, and to the South shone the ruddy Mars. "Can your conjunctions have anything to do with death, plague and pestilence?" thought the physician, who was generally known as an opponent of astrology. Then he also slumbered off, but in his restless sleep he heard the laborers stealing the provision and guzzling the wine set aside for the sick. Towards morning there was an alarm. Some scoundrels had furtively approached the provision cart and attempted to quietly draw it away. But two of the laborers, who contrary to Erastus' orders had laid down between some sacks, awoke and roared for help, at which the thieves disappeared in the darkness. At day-break the expedition arose with stiff limbs, heavy heads, and in a most dejected condition of mind. The fruitless negotiations with the people demoralised through sickness began anew. As Erastus perceived that in this way he would never attain his object, he determined to copy the example which had been set him the day previous. He turned his back to the scolding women, and directed his steps towards the church, whose steeple ranged high above the houses and trees. Surrounded by a low broken down wall, the small white village church gleamed through the fruit trees amidst wooden crosses and sunken graves. The physician thought of turning this into an hospital, but the narrow space would only hold at the most thirty patients. He had to take hay and straw by force from the stalls, and with these the laborers prepared a clean litter along the walls of the church. Erastus and some of his assistants returned to the carts to fetch blankets and linen. On his return, he saw a column of smoke arising near the chapel and an alarm of fire was raised in the quiet village. A peasant enraged at the forcible abstraction of his hay, had set his whole provision on fire, and stole unmolested away. It was useless to think of extinguishing the flames. With a grim laugh the laborers sat on the walls of the church-yard and looked on at the little church burning down. "If these people will not help themselves in any way," said the physicians, "let us leave them. When the pestilence has raged itself out it will cease of itself." Erastus urged them to make one more house to house visitation. They shrugged their shoulders and left it to him. The well intentioned physician met only with senseless objections or coarse abuse on giving orders in the nearest house, that the infected objects should be burnt. He at length lost all patience, and declared he would hand over no provisions to those who refused to obey his directions. He then together with his laborers began clearing out the empty farm-yards, so that after this work had been completed, the healthy could occupy them instead of their infected dens in the village. Here and there large fires fed by the straw beds of the patients now flamed up, and the disgusting smell of burnt linen filled the entire valley. But Erastus' own people had had already enough of the affair. Nothing was done as quick as he ordered it, or as he had ordered it. The laborers took advantage of the evacuation of the sick-dens to pilfer, as predicted by the peasants, and the villagers stood in angry groups together consulting as to whether they could not resist by force the attacks of these strangers. Finally Erastus was compelled to make the humiliating confession to himself, that without priestly intervention he could never attain his object among this debased population. Paul's miracle on the Kreuzweg appeared to him now in a much milder light. So he sat down on a stone and wrote a letter to the Magister. "Jurists and medical men abdicate, and pray for help from the theologians," he began his request to Paul, asking him whether he could not leave Schönau to itself for a short while, so as to place matters here on a better footing. One of the laborers was despatched to the monastery with this prayer to the miracle-monger, a request disagreeable enough to Erastus, who himself returned once more to his thankless duties. The mood of the peasants had now become belligerent. They stood around the carts in groups and declared that the Kurfürst had sent these provisions for their benefit, and that the Counsellor had no right to withhold them. Some of the men and youths, who had kept out of the way on the previous day, now mingled among the groups. They were presumably the same who had made the nightly attack on the cart containing the provisions. Erastus had to summon his men from their work to guard the wagons. The physicians themselves began to be weary of their work. "Let us give the provisions to this rebellious peasantry and leave them to their fate," they said. Whilst thus a violent discussion arose among the members of the Commission, an impudent youth sprang upon the provision cart and tore down the linen covering. Immediately the women surrounded the cart and seized casks and sacks with eager hands. Suddenly the trot of horses was heard at the entrance of the village. "The police magistrate with four mounted men," cried a laborer, "he knows what is necessary to do." The women crept off, in an instant the crowd dispersed and the young men disappeared behind the houses. Herr Hartmann Hartmanni, "the learned Magistrate," as he was wont to be called by the guests at the Hirsch, appeared on the spot and sprang from his horse. He was a handsome man, this magistrate, but his tall figure was broken down through dissipation. Only a few sparse black hairs covered the head of this man yet in the prime of life, and all the seven mortal sins had left their traces on his worn face. His eyes were crooked, and his legs no longer carried out the wishes of their owner. Although the ends of his moustache curled up grimly, the corners of the mouth were weak and flabby. For so severe a man his bearing was rather affected, as he much liked to show off the learning, which he owed to the old school of humanity at Heidelberg. Herr Hartmann Hartmanni did not like work. Instead of fulfilling his office at the town-hall, he preferred making verses, and the reports of his examinations often read like poems. The Kurfürst wished to dismiss him, but the Amtmann of Heidelberg had rendered to Frederic III., at the death of Otto Heinrich, a signal service. He had enabled the poor Duke of Simmern to enter Heidelberg in sufficient time to possess himself of his legitimate inheritance, which the Duke Albert of Bavaria was already preparing to seize. Thus the Kurfürst felt himself bound down by personal obligations, and many a Prince has been compelled to adopt new reforms to render an official whom he does not wish to offend harmless. Herr Hartmann's bad management had rendered the idea of handing over police management to the Presbyters more acceptable to Frederic III., as the Church alone seemed to have an earnest desire to punish sin. Naturally the Magistrate himself was numbered among the friends of the Geneva Ban who would thus relieve him of a part of his burdensome duties. Such was the man who now appeared on Paolo's battle-field of Schönau. Half rake, half pedant he presented at no time a pleasant appearance, but that day he was as wonderfully decked out as if he had copied Holbein's picture of the plague-doctor. In one hand he had a bottle of vinegar which he clapped to his nose so soon as the smell of burnt bedding reached his nostrils; in the other he held drawn his longest sword, as if to keep away every danger from his person. If he had to touch anything, he dropped the vinegar bottle into his pocket, and brought out a pair of tweazers, with which he held out the objects, although he appeared well protected by thick leather gloves. Doublet and hose were stuffed out with camomile and peppermint, and in case this did not suffice, around his breast and back hung hollow balls pierced with holes, from which spunges steeped in medicines, spread a stupefying odor. Deadly fear and silent rage at the disgusting duty imposed on him were expressed on his dark countenance. His first magisterial duty was to arrest the peasant who had caused the fire, and who for the time was bound to a tree. The soldiers brought about by blows and curses the execution of the precautionary measures, which the physician had been vainly endeavouring for the last twenty-four hours to induce the obstinate peasant-women to adopt. At midday the Magistrate held an inquiry as to how the plague had crept in. At first the women kept a sullen silence, till finally a young wench on whose features idiocy was plainly marked stepped forward and related like some cackling hen her confused tale. Every evening before the outburst of the pestilence, a dog with fiery eyes had run across the village snapping at the houses. Wherever he had stopped, the plague declared itself within seven days. The dog was in fact no one else but the herb-woman of the Kreuzgrund, in whose hut he always disappeared. The infection had left off at the Kreuzgrund, not a single person had died there. "So she is again to the front," said the Magistrate. "In the office there is already a series of papers about her misdeeds. Now is she ripe for the stake. Does not her appearance quite coincide with the story of the mad dog at Ephesus, which Apollonius of Tyana ordered to be stoned to death?" he said turning to the Counsellor. Erastus however returned to his cart, he would have nothing to do with the matter. The Magistrate mounted accompanied by two men, to arrest Mother Sibylla. Near them ran the girl who had accused the witch to act as guide. "That she is a witch," she said panting, "one can know from her always having butter, and yet no one has ever seen her churning. She has charmed my Peter and he now keeps company with Sue, and my mother's pains are also owing to her. But there is her house, I won't go any further, else she will do me some harm." The old woman's hut lay in the woody green Seitenthal, whose stream turned the wheels of Werner's mill. It was a small house black with smoke and age having blind windows. The door was shut, one of the soldiers looked through the cracks: "All is empty, she escaped up the chimney the moment she heard us coming."
"Dismount, we must make an inventory," ordered the Magistrate. The men dismounted and a strong shove soon broke in the door of the empty hut. On entering the soldiers made the sign of the cross to guard themselves from the magic arts of the escaped witch. This was a catholic custom and it was well for them that none of the gentlemen forming the Church Council saw them otherwise they would have been dismissed from the service. The room was empty. Only a large black cat sitting by the hearth, glared with ferocious green eyes at the uninvited guests. "Could that be the witch in person." The sergeant approached, "Jesus, Maria, Joseph," he yelled out as the cat made a spring forward and disappeared through the open door. Herr Hartmann Hartmanni maintained his composure, but nevertheless let his men precede him, so that they might fall victims to any magic curse, which the old woman might have left behind. He also took care not to touch anything. Whatever was to be confiscated, he let the soldiers take away. There was however not much. Above the empty hearth, hung a fox's skin, as well as other furs and hides, placed there by the witch to be dried out. A box with old iron seemed to Herr Hartmann to resemble the nails of a scaffold, and the rope hanging near might have been used for hanging. Brooms leaning against the chimney appeared to him worthy of suspicion. All kinds of flowers and herbs were laid out on boards or in wicker-baskets to be dried: elder, dandelions, camomile, lime-blossoms, and others, though it was not really necessary for the devil to have taught mother Sibylla their properties. The disappointed police-officers looked at each other, was that really a witch's kitchen? The sergeant came a sudden exclamation of joy and pointed to a small trap-door carefully concealed by old clothes. Herr Hartmann pushed it open with his sword, and as it gave way ordered the officer to open it. "Here we have her household ware," said the Amtmann with a furious look. The men entered into the room. The bleached skull of a horse gazed at them with hollowed eyes from the opposite wall. On old pots and broken dishes lay dried wolves' eyes, birds' hearts, owls' feathers and claws. Snakes with black backs and white bellies were seen in tightly corked glass bottles, as well as horribly distended toads. Lizards with far cleverer eyes than those of the men looking at them returned their gaze from the glassy confines in which they were placed. On the window-sill were little bottles with salves, fern-seeds, vervain and all kinds of magic powders. That which however most served to convict the witch, was a basket which the wicked old woman had evidently placed hurriedly down after her last trip, before escaping, for in it lay carefully wrapped up in rags and small boxes, all kinds of snake skeletons, toads' bones, a child's skull, wolf's hair, a bottle with pigeon's blood, and numerous bits of paper on which curious symbols were inscribed, together with a skillet with tinder and flint used to cook the witch's broth in the woods. Herr Hartmann Hartmanni did not appear quite satisfied. "A miserably low slut," he said contemptuously, "the whole find is not worth fifty thalers. Take up the basket, as it is, and the old pots with their contents. This Satan's bride has concealed her more valuable implements, otherwise I should have managed to scrape together a pretty considerable sum out of these confiscated pots and kettles. But Master Hammerling will soon open her mouth, and make her tell, where she has hidden her treasure, the moment we have caught her."
"She won't let herself be caught," said the sergeant, "she is now away with the plague, and God only knows what shape she will assume, and whether she won't appear to us to-night as a nightmare."
"The plague take it," said the Amtmann tremblingly.
"I think, Sir," continued the soldier, "it would be as well to leave her property untouched, one never knows how she may revenge herself. It once came to pass, that the Magistrate at Mosbach, after he had confiscated the witch's rubbish, went quietly to bed thinking that his beloved wife was already there; she however turned out to be the witch, pulled his leg out of the socket and otherwise injured him, then she vanished up the chimney, and what he had taken from her, had the next morning disappeared, in spite of having been carefully deposited under lock and key. I vote that we leave it all, as it is."
The Magistrate turned pale. "We can perhaps affix a seal," he murmured. At this instant a long dark figure appeared at the doorway. "Good Heavens," ejaculated the sergeant.