Legends from River & Mountain

by Carmen Sylva; Alma Strettell

“Because men, and all human folk, are evil. Thou shalt speak to the man I shall choose for thee, and to no other,” rejoined the hag, with a grim chuckle.

“Have men wrought thee harm, then, that thou dost shun them so?” continued the girl. “Methinks the folk at market fear thee more than thou dost them. And yet there be some folk whose company thou dost seek, I have heard thee say, when thou goest forth on these long journeys. Whither dost thou go so far, mother, and wherefore?”

“Fine doings!” sputtered the old woman viciously. “Listening to evil spoken of thine own mother, and spying upon her! Little white-faced fool! what knowest thou of that which is fitting to be done? But have a care, or thou wilt find out something of my power, and of how I can punish when I have a mind.”

Truda sank into terrified silence, and brooded in her own heart over the mysteries of the dark fate which she seemed unable to escape.

But she would escape it yet! She would not give up her love, and everything that made life happy, without a struggle! Only her weapons must be guile and secrecy, and she was but little skilled in the use of them, poor child. For days and weeks she worked and drudged at home, to quiet her mother’s suspicions; only now and then, as she hurried along to get some few things they could not do without, she managed to give Wippold a sign that kept him quiet. At last, one Sunday, the old witch, afraid to keep her from her pious duties any more, and feeling sure that she had frightened her into obedience, bade the girl get ready to go to Mass; she herself would see her to the church door, though she might go no farther. Truda could not quite keep out of her face the joy which this order gave her, and her mother did not fail to notice the radiant gleam which lit up her eyes. She hurried away to get ready; and before the bell had ceased ringing, her mother had watched her run lightly up the steps and disappear into the church. Could she at that moment have seen through stone walls, she would have beheld her daughter reply to a sign made her by the young fellow who stood waiting behind one of the pillars and follow him out at the small north door, which was nearly opposite to the one by which she had gone in. And now, keeping close in the thickets, so as to be seen of no one, the pair of lovers hastened towards the lonely rock, where they were sure of a quiet hour together, and where Truda could unburden her heart of all its fears and sorrows, and hear from her lover that he would never rest till he had carried her away from her unhappy home.

Meanwhile the old witch had returned to her cottage, thinking over her daughter’s behaviour that morning. “I wonder why she was so overjoyed to go to church,” she mused; “it was not always her wont.” She could not get the matter out of her mind, and after a time she was so tormented by suspicion that she fetched out her mirror, and sprinkling some drops of magic water upon it, desired it to show her the spot where her daughter was.

Immediately there arose before her the picture of the lofty rock—its surface sparkled in the sunshine; down below, the blue Elbe wound along amid the meadows, and on a narrow green space near the top of the crag, and overshadowed by it, she saw the forms of the two lovers. Her Truda, the virtuous maiden, on whom she had staked all her hopes, was folded in the arms of the forester, while he pressed burning kisses upon her lips, and prayer-book and rosary lay forgotten at their feet.

Every drop of blood in the old hag’s veins tingled with fury, a hellish light gleamed in her sunken eyes, and seizing her witch’s staff in her hand, she went raging forth, and in the twinkling of an eye had rushed like a storm up the rocky ascent, and fallen upon the luckless lovers.

“Accursed child! and hast thou lied to me, and is this the Mass thou wentest forth to hear? And thou, thrice accursed fellow, it was an evil day for thee when thou camest a-wooing of Gundelheind’s daughter!”

And before the ill-fated man could so much as attempt to defend himself, the witch, suddenly grown to an immense height, and towering grimly above him, seized him in her huge horny hands and cast him down the cliff into the river below.