On the Cross: A Romance of the Passion Play at Oberammergau

by Wilhelmine von Hillern

The burgomaster pressed his hand to his head; a keen pang was piercing his brain--and his heart also.

"I have nothing more to add," he concluded, faintly. "But if you know any one whom you believe could care for Ammergau better than I--I am ready at any moment to place my office in his hands."

Then, with one accord, every heart swelled with the old lofty feeling for the sacred cause of their ancestors and grateful appreciation of the man who had again roused it in them. No, he did not deserve that they should doubt him--he had again taught them to think like true natives of Ammergau, aye, they felt proudly that he was of the true stock--it was Ammergau blood that flowed in his veins and streamed from the wounds which had been inflicted on his heart that day! They saw that they had wronged him and they gathered with their old love and loyalty around the sorely-beset man, ready to atone with their lives, for these hot-blooded, easily influenced artist-natures were nevertheless true to the core.

The malcontents were forced to keep silence, no one listened to them. All flocked around the burgomaster. "We will stand by you. Burgomaster--only tell us what we are to do--and how we can help ourselves. We rely wholly upon you."

"Alas! my friends, I must reward your restored confidence with unpalatable counsel. Let us bear the misfortune like men! It is better to fell trees in the forest, go out as day laborers--nay, starve--rather than be faithless to the spirit of our ancestors! Am I not right?" A storm of enthusiasm answered him.

It was resolved to announce the close of the Passion Play for this decade. The document was signed by all the members of the community.

"So it is ended for this year! For many of us perhaps for this life!" said the burgomaster. "I thank all who have taken part in the Play up to this time. I will report the receipts and expenditures within a few days. In consideration of the painful cause, we will dispense with any formal close."

A very different mood from the former one now took possession of the assembly. All anxiety concerning material things vanished in the presence of a deeper sorrow. It was the great, mysterious grief of parting, which seized all who had to do anything connected with the "Passion." It seemed as if the roots of their hearts had become completely interwoven with it and must draw blood in being torn away, as if a part of their lives went with it. The old men felt the pang most keenly. "For the last time for this life!" are words before whose dark portal we stand hesitating, be it where it may--but if this "for the last time" concerns the highest and dearest thing we possess on earth, they contain a fathomless gulf of sadness! Old Barabbas, the man of ninety, was the first, to express it--the others joined in and the greybeards who had been young together and devoted their whole lives to the cause which to them was the highest in the world, sank into one another's arms, like a body of men condemned to death.

Then one chanted the closing line of the choragus: "Till in the world beyond we meet"--and all joined as with a single voice, the unutterable anguish of resigning that close communion with Deity, in which every one of them lived during this period, created its own ceremonial of farewell and found apt expression in those last words of the Passion Play.

Then they shook hands with one another, exchanging a life-long farewell. They knew that they should meet again the next day--in the same garments--but no longer what they now were, Roman governor and high-priests, apostles and saints. They were excluded from the companionship of the Lord, for their Christ had not risen as usual--he had fled and faithlessly deserted his flock, ere their task could be fulfilled. It was doubly hard!