Hans growled a little, but he took the hint, for her sake and the boy's, and gradually found the practice so pleasant on its own account, that the washing of his hands and face became a daily process.
On his patron saint's day (St. John, February 8), Mother Magdalis went a step further, and presented him with a clean suit of clothes, very humble but neat and sound, of her own making out of old hoards. Not for holidays only, she said, but that he might change his clothes every day, after work, as her Berthold used.
"Dainty, burgher ways," Hans called them, but he submitted, and Gottlieb was greatly comforted, and thought his old friend a long way advanced in his transformation into an angel.
So, between the sweetness of the boy's temper and of his dear mother's love which folded him close, the bitter was turned into sweet within him.
But Ursula, who heard the mocking of the boys with indignation, was not so wise in her consolations.
"Wicked, envious little devils!" said she. "Never thou heed them, my lamb! They would be glad enough, any of them, to be the master's angel, or Dwarf Hans' darling, for that matter, if they could. It is nothing but mean envy and spite, my little prince, my little wonder; never thou heed them!"
And then the enemy crept unperceived into the child's heart.
Was he indeed a little prince and a wonder, on his platform of gifts and goodness? And were all those naughty boys far below him, in another sphere, hating him as the little devils in the mystery-plays seemed to hate and torment the saints?
Had the "raven" been sent to him, after all, as to the prophet of old, not only because he was hungry and pitied by God, but because he was good and a favorite of God?
It seemed clear he was something quite out of the common. He seemed the favorite of every one, except those few envious, wicked boys.