Long, long ago, in the days when the light of Christian teaching yet struggled with the gloom of heathendom, there lived in the Edelsitz of Ruggburg, by Bregenz, a most beautiful maiden—Kriselda by name. So fair she was that, from far and near, knights and nobles came to ask her hand; but though she was not proud or haughty, she would have none of them, because there was not one of them all that came up to her expectations. It was not that she said they were not good enough for her, but high or noble, or rich or renowned, as they might be, they all failed to satisfy her longings; and with gentle words and courteous demeanour, she dismissed them all. And yet she looked out with hope, too, that the next should supply the bright ideal of her heart; but when that other came he always still fell short of what she had imagined.
One evening she went out to walk amid the dark pines, where the golden light of the setting sun gleamed between their bare stems. At the foot of one of them lay a poor wayworn beggar woman, fainting with hunger and fatigue.
Kriselda was full of compassion for her sad state, and sent her maidens to fetch restoratives, and ministered them to her with her own hands.
But the beggar woman, instead of cringing with gratitude and surprise at the interest the noble lady had shown in her, was no sooner able to speak than she reproached her bitterly.
“It is well for you,” she said, “who live daintily, and have your will every day, now and then to show a little charity for those who suffer! but what is it, think you, to suffer every day, and to have your own will never?”
“It must be very sad!” said Kriselda, compassionately; “that is not your case, I hope?”
“How can you know it is sad? How can you hope any thing about it?” retorted the beggar woman, sternly; “you who know not what it is to suffer. Believe me, it is not fine clothes and a grand palace, a beautiful face, or deeds of fame which make one great. Those to whom all these things appertain are, for the most part, little worth. To do well is so easy to them, that what merit have they to boast? The truly great is one who suffers, and yet does well; who goes through toil and travail, sorrow and grief, and bears it in silence, and in secret, and has no fame and no praise of men to sound sweetly in his ears.”
Kriselda listened to her words full of excitement, for it seemed as if a chord in her heart had been touched which none had ever reached before. And the picture the old beggar woman had drawn was nearer her mind’s bright ideal than any image she had approached heretofore.
“What, then, is this same travail and grief?” she asked, with simplicity.
“If you really desire to know with good desire,” answered the beggar woman, “take this end of a hank of yarn, and follow its leading, winding it up as you go along, till you come to the bobbin, where it is made fast; and when you arrive there you will know what travail and grief are. But you must go forth alone.”