I have left the proud rooms of the front of the house with their decorations, ornaments, carvings and weapons on display to the spiders and the maids. It is my youth that has brought me in old age back to my tiny schoolroom. It is my garden and the garden in which Mechthild Grossin played as a little girl and strolled in as a young woman that have brought me back here.
But I did not live alone then in the small room. In the year 1390 the knight Hans Groland with his brother Ulrich had placed his Laufenholz stables in the town of Nuremberg on the open market and both brothers had sworn that neither they nor any of their descendants would sell the property to anyone other than a citizen or a citizeness of Nuremberg. When in 1392 the great bell of Saint Sebaldus was blessed, both brothers had already died and Hans's son, Michael Groland, became my father's ward and was brought to our home as no-one else wanted to take him in. My father's guardianship extended to little more than the wild young squire himself for the Groland family had managed their affairs badly from of old and for the last scion of their race little remained of ancient property rights. His parents, however, had held the stables in perpetuity from the time of Emperor Ludwig the Second of Bavaria.
The wild young squire Michael was my friend and Mechthild Grossin grew up to be his bride. Their voices too are silent now and their footsteps no more heard. Tolle! Lege! Tolle! Lege!
From the time of Conrad Hainzen onwards, who was called Conrad the Leper and then Conrad the Great, no more imposing family has arisen in Nuremberg and on the strong tree with a hundred branches no fairer blossom than Mechthild Grossin whose father on Banner Mountain was my father's neighbour. For me it is a miracle, even if it is not one, that today, withered and grey, I can overlook the window of the fair maid's summer garden, while she departed this life many years ago as she left her room in all her youthful beauty.
Yes, she left and no-one was able to stop her—not her father, not her mother, not the might, power and reputation of the great town nor those of her great and honourable family.
She listened to the voice of love and followed the promptings of her forefather. Tolle! Lege!
It was a one-year-old child that was brought to my father in his home and grew to be like a young eaglet that fell out of its parents' nest and was taken home by a beekeeper under his arm. My father learnt the hard way what it is to feed a bird of prey. But I, who was only slightly older than Squire Michael, took pleasure in having a good playmate until we were both eligible bachelors and had gone from being playmates to being friends for life until death came to part us.
Yes, we were boys in the time of the wild and merry king Wenceslas and the way things stood in the Empire at that time and the feuds the town had on its hands with Heinrich von Buchteck, Georg von Wichsenstein, Sybold Schelm of Bergen and dozens of other thorns in its side, even the careworn face of my father, the keeper of the public purse who had to keep an eye on the town's treasure, seals and documents, could often not repress with its grim lines the youthful merriment in the house on Banner Mountain. And that fateful day in Rense that brought to a wondrous end the splendour of King Wenceslas on German soil was really not able to put paid to the splendour of o u r youth.
In the year of Our Lord 1400 Mechthild Grossin was born into this vale of tears in the house next door to us. In the reign of King Ruprecht Squire Groland von Laufenholz and myself became young men.
Look at that sun! It lies like gold over the grey wall of the town and the turret of the watchtower opposite my window. In my north-facing room it cannot of course penetrate, but I see it as I saw it in the days of my youth. Why is the monk at Saint Sebaldus preaching about the end of the world? The world won't come to an end because Constantinople has fallen into the hands of the heathen, because the Holy Roman Empire's fortresses are threatened, because poor mankind wanders into sin as it has to wander in pain and inexpressible misery! A friendly swaying moves the trees of my youth. They bow to each other over the gates that separate neighbours' gardens. The unsteady shadows of branch and leaf dance on the ground. The happy birds hop and flutter in the treetops. The summer flowers of my youth bloom in my garden and in the gardens of my neighbours. The world defends itself today as it did in olden days through beauty and loveliness against the words of the angry monk. Tolle! Lege! Take and read and understand rightly and take care not to attribute a false meaning to the word that is opened up to you and stands for your life and the life of your contemporaries!