Seed-time and Harvest: A Novel

by Fritz Reuter

I have been telling of sorrow, and have yet more to relate; but why not also of joy? There was joy in the pastor's-widow-house, for long years. Frau Pastorin used to sit, on summer evenings, and look at her Pastor's grave. Ah! how glad she would be to die; and then, when Dürt brought the candles, she would turn round, and look at her old furniture, and the picture gallery, and the duster in its old place, and under the picture gallery, the two friendly old faces, which she had so often seen there in her Pastor's time, and then, how glad she was to live! Habermann was constantly active, no longer for strangers, but for his children and grandchildren, for Louise had two of the dearest little girls; and he had still another gratification. Fritz Triddelsitz walked in one day,--of course in a blue dress-coat,--with the little assessor, and introduced himself as a proprietor, in Lower Pomerania, and the little assessor as his bride; and when he had talked of various matters through the evening, and they had gone away, Bräsig said, "Karl, this time you were right again; but who would have thought it? Your greyhound has become quite a reasonable being; but don't plume yourself too much upon it; it is not your doing, it is the little assessor's."

Bräsig himself scoured the whole region after news. Now he was in Rexow, then in Pumpelhagen, then in Rahnstadt, but his chief place of resort was Hogen Selchow. He journeyed thither, nearly every quarter, and when he came back he would say, "Karl, it goes well; he has quite given up the management, and now he sits in his work-shop, and invents. Stuff and nonsense, of course; but Bremer says he would not ask for a better master, and the gracious Frau looks as happy and blessed as an angel in Paradise. But, Karl, he is not so stupid, after all. He has made one invention, that I am going to try, myself. You see, you take an old hat, cut out a hole in front, and put a lantern in, and when you are riding out, in the winter evenings, and have your lantern there, you can see, as if it were broad daylight."

Bräsig actually brought Axel's invention into practice, and frightened all the country people in the region; but once when he had visited Hogen Selchow, he had an attack of his old friend the Podagra, and the old friend kicked him in the stomach, with both feet, and on the way home, he took a severe cold. And so he lay on his death-bed.

The Frau Pastorin and Frau Nüssler and his old Karl Habermann were sitting by him, and the Frau Pastorin said, "Dear Bräsig, shall I not call in the young Herr Pastor?"

"Let it go, Frau Pastorin, you have called me a heathen all my life; it may not have been right for me to live as I have done; but the pastor-business! No, it is better so. And, Karl, my sister's daughter, Lotting, is to have two thousand thalers; and the rest shall go to the school in Rahnstadt; for, Karl, the Frau Pastorin has enough to live on, and you have enough to live on, but the poor school-children are so badly off! And Frau Nüssler has enough to live on, and my godchild, Mining, and you, Karl, and you are all going to live, and I am going to die." And then his mind began to wander and he was once more in his early childhood, keeping sheep for his father, and an old ram made him a great deal of trouble, and he called to Frau Nüssler to come and help him, and Frau Nüssler sat down on the bed, and put her arms around him, and then he began about the three sweethearts, and Frau Nüssler, and kept calling out that he had never loved any one but her, and Frau Nüssler kissed the words from his lips, saying, "I know it, Bräsig, my dear, old Zachary, I know it."

And the fancies came thicker and faster, about the time when he was assessor at the court, and the indiciums, and the young Herr von Rambow, and the Lauban pond, and how he threw the pistol into the pond and lost four groschen on the wager. And then a strange lightness came over him, and he told his dear old Frau Nüssler the most wonderful stories about the little twins, and his godchild, Mining, and Karl Habermann and Louise,--all intermingled with each other,--holding Frau Nüssler's hand fast in his all the while; but suddenly he raised himself, and said, "Frau Nüssler, lay your hand on my head; I have always loved you. Karl Habermann, rub my feet, they are cold." Habermann did so, and a bright smile flashed across Bräsig's face, and he said slowly, "I was always ahead of you in style." That was the last.

Our little Frau Pastorin soon followed him. There are a few people who live very happily on earth, and yet are glad to die. To these few belonged the little round Frau. She was very comfortable here below, but when she thought of the home above, a dear old face shown upon her, and old tones rang in her ears, for she thought of heaven as a little, neat, clean village church, where the angels sang and her pastor preached. Now she is with him, and can put on his mantle, and tie his bands, and sing with him, in the little church, no longer "funeral hymns," no! "resurrection songs."

With these thoughts running through my head, I turned the corner near the arbor, where so many people had sat in their trouble and distress, and saw, playing on the lawn, three little maidens from four to eleven years of age. And, as I came nearer, I saw a lady with a friendly, contented expression in her face, and she dropped her work in her lap, and smiled at the little girls, and shook her finger at them: "Don't provoke me too far!" Near her, sat a fresh, healthy-looking man, reading the newspaper, and he laid it down and shook his head, as if he said, "There is nothing in it." And farther on sat an old man, at whose knee a little girl of twelve years was leaning, and chatting with him, and he interrupted her lively childish prattle, to say to the young Frau: "Let them play, Louise, they will become steady and reasonable soon enough." And as I came round the corner, the old man exclaimed: "Good heavens! is not that----?" And Franz and Louise came towards me, and Franz said, "See! see! That is right, Fritz, to visit us once more!"

"Many greetings, gracious Frau," said I, "from my Louise," for my wife is a Louise too. And we talked of one thing and another, but our quiet did not last long, for a troop came tearing through the garden, like the wild hunt, and four boys, with brown eyes, and brown cheeks, and gray jackets and trousers, scampered up the path, and a little rogue of six years rushed up to Franz and clasped his knees, saying over his shoulder to the others, "I am the first!"

"Yes," said another, a boy of about twelve, "I believe you, you ran through the meadow; but how you look! Mather will scold finely!" And now the little fellow looked down at his stockings and trousers, and, truly! if his mother were contented with their condition, he would have reason to be thankful.