"Yes, let it lie, you have cross enough in your blindness."
"Do you hear?" Porphyrius said in a low awe-stricken tone. "It is God that speaks by her."
"Then break off a twig from it and give it me that I may keep it, it will bring me a blessing."
The little girl ran back and broke off a twig which she brought to him.
"If you will only wait a few minutes longer I will make you a wreath of leaves from the little tree so that the sun may not burn your head."
The two men were quite content to do everything the child wished, was not her will God's will? And with nimble fingers that moved as if by magic, the little one twined a broad wreath to give a cool shade to the wounded man's burning head; then they went on again.
"Let me lead you, I shall do it better," said the child, and she took the blind man's hand from that of the other monk. This too they agreed to, and Donatus felt as if the child's touch infused new strength into him.
"There is a blessing in your hand, it leads me softly," he said gratefully.
The little girl was silent, only her eyes told of unutterable happiness as she looked speechlessly up at him. And on went the three, now over slippery morasses, now over green hills and fields, and after taking the little girl's hand the blind man's foot stumbled no more, and the thorns no longer tore him; she carefully cleared every stone out of his path; where it was uneven she warned him by word or sign and guided his steps slowly and cautiously. No mother could guide her child, no sister tend her infant brother, no angel lead a soul to Heaven, as she watched over the blind man in his helplessness. The girl's pure breath fanned him like forest-airs when her bosom rose and fell quickly from some steep ascent or the fatigue of guiding him. He neither saw nor heard her; for her little bare feet went on by his side as softly as those of a fairy, he only felt her. He felt as if an angel of pity was walking by his side to cool his deadly pain with the waving of tender wings. They spoke no word and yet they understood each other as spirits do without any earthly speech. What they could say to each other was but little and very simple, but what they told in that dumb discourse was higher than human wit and worldly wisdom and echoed in their soul like angelic hymns.
It was by this time noon; the sun brooded hotly on the gorgeous landscape. The wanderers took their first rest outside the village of Glurns in the shade of the churchyard wall and eat their meagre meal, while far and near the solemn noontide peal was rung. The glaciers looked down kind and radiant from above the high cliffs of micaceous schist, which, turning here towards the south-east, form the opening of the gorge of the Münster-thal. Far and wide, spread a picture of blooming life and sturdy strength; villages and towns lay scattered all round while, veiled in the misty noon-tide blue, the haughty walls of the fortresses of Reichenberg and Rotund stared down from their rocky eminence like border watchers over the Münsterthal overlooking the smiling plain.