My eyes quitted the pallid face a moment and wandered to the sunny window. There I saw the mute figure, clad in black, still gazing fixedly in. He did not even seem to see me, but stood motionless, watching the lifeless form, of which only the head and the tips of the feet were visible to him. I now distinctly saw large tears gush from his dilated, motionless eyes, and course down his pale cheeks.
"Mother," I asked softly, "who is the man outside of the window?"
I had forgotten that her deafness would prevent her understanding me. Just at that moment a clear little bell began to ring from the steeple of the chapel. The old dame looked up.
"It is four o'clock," she said; "the services will begin. You can't stay here any longer, sir; the pastor and the others will come directly. But if you stand by the trellis outside you can see everything. Oh, dear! Now the sad end is coming! But God's will be done! Only, may it be my turn soon. Come, sir, there are the bearers."
Six men in long black coats entered, and I was obliged to leave the room. In the corridor I met the pastor in his robes, and a tall, broad-shouldered man, with a sorrowful face--the burgomaster, the old dame whispered. Outside the house a large crowd of people had assembled, who eyed me with surprise and curiosity. Most of them were women in mourning-garments, but in their midst was a group of young girls dressed in white, with large black bows, and black veils on their heads. Each carried a garland of flowers on her arm, and the eyes of all were full of tears. I perceived that, as a total stranger, I ought to keep myself as much out of sight as possible, and hurried around the house to a post by the garden-fence, whence I could overlook the chapel and the cemetery.
The solitary man in the black coat had disappeared.
The bell continued to toll, the birds twittered in the linden boughs, but spite of the surging throng the spot was otherwise so still that we could distinctly hear the coffin-lid screwed on. A few minutes after, the funeral procession began to move, headed by the pastor; then came the bearers with the coffin, over which hung the gay rug covered with garlands, close behind it the aged paupers, six in number, then the young girls, two by two, carrying their wreaths, and behind them the burgomaster and many stately men, evidently the dignitaries of the little place. Last of all came the women and less important citizens, in such a throng that the open space between the house and the chapel was filled with the crowd. But scarcely had the pastor entered the consecrated ground, when, from behind a dense clump of elderberry-bushes on the edge of the cemetery, floated the notes of a chant, a beautiful, simple melody, wholly unfamiliar to me, which did not sound as if it came from a hymn-book. Clear, boyish voices, well-trained, fresh, and pure, as children alone sing ere they have learned to understand the solemnity of death and can not belie their joyousness even in a dirge.
There were only three verses, then the clergyman began his address, of which I could distinguish but a few words in my distant corner. But it must have been very touching, for all present showed the deepest emotion, and the suppressed sobbing was communicated to the farthest ranks. I regretted that I had not ventured nearer, I so much desired to know who this noble woman was, and why she had enjoyed such universal reverence and love.
But I could only indistinctly see the pastor raise his hand to bless first the open grave and then the mourning parish, the young girls approach and throw their wreaths upon the coffin, and the whole assembly press forward to scatter a handful of earth upon the flowers. During this ceremony, which occupied some time, the boys' voices were again raised, and this time I plainly heard the words:
"Like her in sweet repose,
All the sainted--"