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diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6833f05 --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,3 @@ +* text=auto +*.txt text +*.md text diff --git a/23809-8.txt b/23809-8.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..94d86ee --- /dev/null +++ b/23809-8.txt @@ -0,0 +1,1395 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of An Idyl Of The East Side, by Thomas A. Janvier + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: An Idyl Of The East Side + 1891 + +Author: Thomas A. Janvier + +Illustrator: W. T. Smedley + +Release Date: December 10, 2007 [EBook #23809] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK AN IDYL OF THE EAST SIDE *** + + + + +Produced by David Widger + + + + + + +AN IDYL OF THE EAST SIDE + +By Thomas A. Janvier + +Copyright, 1891, by Harper & Brothers + + +In the matter of raising canary-birds--at once strong of body and of +note, tamed to associate with humanity on rarely friendly terms, and +taught to sing with a sweetness nothing short of heavenly--Andreas +Stoffel was second to none. And this was not by any means surprising, +for he had been born (and for its saintly patron had been christened) +close by the small old town of Andreasberg: which stands barely +within the verge of the Black Forest, on the southern declivity of the +Harz--and which, while famous for its mines, is renowned above all +other cities for the excellence of the bird songsters which there and +thereabouts are raised. + +Canary-birds had been the close companions of this good Andreas through +all the fifty years of his lifetime. They had sung their sweet song of +rejoicing at his birth--when the storks had brought him one day, while +his father was far underground at work in the mines, and was vastly well +pleased, when he came home all grimy at night, to find what a brave +boy God had sent him by these winged messengers. They had sung over his +cradle as his mother, knitting, rocked it in the midst of the long +patch of sunlight that came through the low, wide window of the +_bauernhaus_--the comfortable home with high-peaked roof, partly +thatched and partly shingled, and with great drooping eaves, that was +nooked snugly on the warm southern slope of the Andreasberg beside a +little stream. + +[Illustration: High-peaked roof, partly thatched 258] + +They had sung him awake many and many a bright summer morning; and one +of his tenderest memories of the time when he was a very little boy--and +was put to bed, as little boys should be, at sundown--was of their +faint, irregular, sleepy-headed chirpings and twitterings as they +settled themselves to slumber on their perches for the night. + +And when the time came that Andreas, grown to man's estate, being +one-and-twenty years old, but not to man's strength, for he was small of +stature and frail, was left lonely in the world--the good father killed +by a rock-fall in the mines, and the dear mother thereafter pining away +from earth, and so to the heaven that gave her husband back to her--it +was his house-mates the birds who did their best to cheer him with their +songs. And presently, as it seemed to him, these songs began to tell of +new happiness in a new home far away across the mountains and beyond the +sea--in that distant America where already his father's brother dwelt, +and whereof he had heard wonderful stories of splendors and of riches +incalculable all his life long. Indeed, the adventurous uncle had +prospered amazingly in the twenty years of his American exile: rising, +in due course, from the position of a young man of most promiscuous all +work in a delicatessen shop in New York to the position of owner of the +business, shop and all. + +To go to a land where such things as this were possible seemed to +Andreas most wise; and to be near his uncle, and the aunt and cousins +whom he had never seen, his sole remaining kin, held out to him a +pleasant promise of cheer and comfort in his loneliness. + +But, in very truth, the sweet burden of the song of his birds was not +born of thoughts of mere commonplace family affection and commonplace +worldly wealth. Far more precious than these was the motive of the +music that Andreas listened to and understood, and yet scarcely would +acknowledge, even to himself; for in America it was that Christine now +had her home--and that which set his heartstrings a-thrilling, as he +listened to the song of his birds, was the deep, pure melody of love. + +They had been children together, he and Christine, their homes side by +side on the flanks of the Andreasberg; and when, three years before, +she had gone with her father and her mother on the long journey +westward, the heart of Andreas Stoffel had gone with her, and only his +body was left behind among the mountains of the Harz. And Christine had +dulled to him a little the keen edge of the sorrow of their parting by +admitting that she left her own heart in the place of the heart that she +bore away. + +More than once had the rich uncle, owner of the delicatessen shop in New +York, written to urge that his nephew--whose frailty of body made him +unfit to enter upon the hard life of a worker in the mines--should +come to America; and with his large knowledge of affairs the uncle had +explained that the best bill of exchange in which money could be carried +from Andreasberg to New York was canary-birds, that could be bought for +comparatively little in the German town, and that would be worth in the +American city a very great sum. And now on this shrewd advice Andreas +acted. The dear old _bauernhaus_ was sold, and its furnishing with +it; and all the money thus gained, together with the greater sum that, +little by little, his father had added to the store in the old leather +bag (saving only what the journey would cost) was spent in buying the +finest canary-birds which money could buy; so that for a long while +after that time Andreasberg was desolate, for all of its sweetest +singers were gone. + +Thus it fell out that even in the time of his long journey his birds +still sang to him; and his fellow-travellers by land and sea regarded +curiously this slim, pale youth, who shyly kept apart from human +converse and communed with his companions the birds. And so lovingly +well did Andreas care for his little feathered friends that not one died +throughout the whole long passage; and as the ship came up the beautiful +bay of New York on a sunny May morning, while Andreas stood on the deck +with his cages about him, very blithely and sweetly did the birds sing +their hopeful song of greeting to the New World. + +But it was a false song of hope, after all. Hearts were fickle thirty +years ago, even as hearts are fickle to-day; and the first news that +Andreas heard when he was come to his uncle's home (a very fine home, +over a very fine shop, indeed) was that Christine had been a twelvemonth +married--in very complete forgetfulness of all her fine words about the +heart left behind her, and of all her fine promises that she would be +true! + +That there be such things as broken hearts is an open question. Yet when +this news came suddenly to Andreas a keen agony of pain went through +his heart as though it were really breaking; and with his hands pressed +tightly against his breast, and with a face as pale as death itself, he +fell to the floor. He would have died then very willingly; and it was +very unwillingly--the fierce pain leaving him as suddenly as it had +come--that he returned to life. Whatever may be said for or against the +probability of broken hearts, there can be no question as to the verity +of broken lives. That day, assuredly, the life of Andreas Stoffel was +broken, and it never wholly mended again. For a while even the song of +his birds lost all its sweetness, and seemed to him but a discordant +sound. + +Yet even a broken life, until it be snuffed out entirely, must battle in +the world for standing-room. Luckily for Andreas, there was no need for +him to question how his own particular battle should be made. The +shape in which his little store of worldly wealth was cast obviously +determined the lines on which he should seek maintenance. It was plain +that by the rearing and the selling of canary-birds he must gain support +until the time should come (and he hoped that it would come soon) when +he might find release from this earth, where love so soon grows false +and cold. + +The rich uncle, who was a kind-hearted man, gave his help in the +matter of finding a shop wherein the canary-bird business might be +advantageously carried on, and gave also the benefit of his commercial +wisdom and knowledge of American ways. And so, with no great difficulty, +Andreas was soon established in a snug little place of his own on the +East Side; where the friendly German speech sounded almost constantly +in his ears, and where the friendly German customs obtained almost as +completely as in his own dear German home. But, after all, the change +was a dismal one. As his unaccustomed nose was assailed by the rank +oil-vapors blown across from Hunter's Point he longed regretfully for +the fresh, aromatic air that the south winds swept up and over his old +home from the pines of the Schwarz-wald; and the contrast was a sorry +one between a home on the slopes of the Harz Mountains and a home in +Avenue B. + +Yet had these been his only sorrows, and had he borne them--as he had +hoped to bear them--with Christine, his lot would have been anything +but hard. It was the deep heart-wound that he had suffered that made his +life for many a year a very dreary one; too dreary for him to find +much pleasure even in the singing of his birds. Now and again he met +Christine. At their first meeting--in his uncle's fine parlor over the +fine delicatessen shop, one Sunday afternoon--she was, as she well might +be, confused in her speech and very shamefaced in her ways. Her husband +was with her, quite a prosperous person, so Andreas was told, who +had built up a great business in the pork and sausage line. He was a +loud-voiced, merry man; and he aired his wit freely, though evidently +with no intent to be unkind, upon the lover out of whose lucklessness +his own luck had come. Even as pretty a girl as Christine could not +have more than one husband at a time, said this big Conrad, with great +good-humor; and so, since they could not both marry her, Andreas would +do well to stop crying over spilled milk. They all would be very good +friends, he added, and Andreas would be godfather to the first child. He +put out his big hand as he made this proffer of friendship; and although +Andreas could not refuse to clasp it, there was not, in truth, any great +store of friendliness for Christine's loud-voiced husband in his heart. +So soon as this was possible, he was glad to get away from the merry +Sunday afternoon gathering in his uncle's fine parlor to the more +sympathetic society of his birds. Yet there did not seem to him much +music in the singing of his birds that day. + +Christine was vastly proud of her big, rosy-faced, noisy husband, whose +sausage-making greatly prospered, and to whom the American dollars +rolled in bravely. But even in these days of her good-luck she sometimes +found herself thinking--when Conrad's rough love-making was still +further roughened, and his noisiness greatly increased, by too free +draughts of heady German beer--of the gentler ways and constant +tenderness of her earlier lover, whose love, with her own promise to be +true to it, she had so lightly cast aside. Thoughts of this sort, it is +true, did not often trouble her, but now and then they gave her a little +heart-pang; and the pang would be intensified, sometimes, as the thought +also would come to her that perhaps it was because she had broken +her plighted troth that her many prayers to become a mother remained +unanswered. + +As time went on, Christine's sorrows came to be of a more instant sort. +Her too jolly husband's fondness for heady beer grew upon him, and with +its increase came a decrease in the success that until then had been +attendent upon his sausage-making. His business fell away from him by +degrees into soberer and steadier hands, which had the effect of making +him take to stronger drinks than beer in order that he might the more +effectually forget his troubles. He lost his merriness, and somewhat of +his loudness, and became sullen; and the wolf always was shrewdly near +the door. Thus, in a very bad way indeed, things went on for half +a dozen years; then the big Conrad, what with drink and worry, fell +ill--so ill, that for a long while he lay close to the open jaws of +Death. + +No one ever knew--though several people quite accurately guessed--why +the wolf did not fairly get into the house during that dismal time. It +is certain that when Conrad arose from his bed at last, a thin remnant +of his former bigness, there were few high-priced birds left in Andreas +Stoffel's little shop, where there had been a score or more when +his sickness began. And, possibly, it was something more than a mere +coincidence that nearly all of the few which remained were sold about +the time that Conrad started again, in a very humble way, his business +of sausage-making. + +But if Andreas did thus sacrifice his birds for Christine's good, he did +not grudge the sacrifice; for upon the big Conrad poverty and sickness +had exercised a chastening and most wholesome influence. He got up out +of his bed a changed man; and the change, morally at least, was greatly +for the better. Physically the result was less salutary; indeed, he +never quite recovered from his sharp attack; and three or four years +later, just as his business was getting into good shape again, he +sickened suddenly, and then promptly paid to nature the debt that all +men owe, and that his partial return to health had but a little time +delayed. + +But Christine was not left desolate in the world, for in the last year +of her husband's life the strong yearning that so possessed her had been +satisfied, and she was the mother of a baby girl. Andreas, claiming the +fulfilment of the promise made so long before, had stood godfather to +the little Rosa--for so, because of her fresh rosiness, was she named; +and there was a strange, sorrowful longing in his heart when, the rite +being ended, he came again to his lonely home and sat him down to be +comforted by the singing of his birds: for while the children of Alice +call Bartram father, there must be ever a weary weight of sadness in the +world. + +Life had not given so much of happiness to Christine--though, possibly, +her happiness was equal to her deserts--that her hold upon life was a +very firm one; and although she tried, for the little Roschen's sake, to +put fresh strength into her grasp, the pressure of poverty and care and +sorrow all combined to make her loosen it. Gently, a little at a time, +her hold gave way. She knew what was coming, and so did Andreas. Once +or twice they spoke about it; and spoke also of the old days on the +Andreasberg, when began the love that in one of their hearts at least +never had grown cold. And for this old love's sake Andreas promised that +when she was gone the little Rosehen should find a home with him and +with his birds. It was not a great while after this promise was made +that the end came. + +Some of the women laughed a little, and cried a little too, when, after +the funeral, old Andreas--for so already had they begun to call him, +because of his silent habit and quaint, old-fashioned ways--asked to be +shown how a baby should be carried; and, being in this matter properly +instructed, bore away with careful tenderness in his arms the little +Rosehen to her new home. And when he was come home with her, the birds, +as though in welcome--which seemed the more real because certain of the +tamer ones among them came forth from their open cages and perched upon +his arm-- + +[Illustration: Chorus of sweetest song 268] + +The good-wives living thereabouts were somewhat shocked at the thought +of risking a baby's life in the care of a man who was qualified only to +minister intelligently to the needs of baby canary-birds; yet were they +not a little touched when they came--in unnecessary numbers, as Andreas +thought--to give him the benefit of their superior wisdom in the +premises by finding how well, in a queer, awkward way, he was +discharging the duties of his office; and such gentleness in a man they +all vowed that they had never seen. Yet it was not surprising that his +quaint effort was crowned with so signal a success; as the birds could +have explained, had their song-notes been rendered into human speech, +Andreas had served an apprenticeship in caring for them which well +fitted him to care with a mother's tenderness for this little girl, who, +such was his love for her, seemed to him in all verity to be his own +proper child. Benefiting by the advice which so lavishly was bestowed +upon him, he presently became--as even the most critical of the women +were forced to admit--a much better mother to the little Roschen than +many a real mother might have been. It was, indeed, a sight worth +travelling far to see, this of Andreas washing and dressing the baby +in the sunny room at the back of the shop where hung the cages in which +were the choicest of his birds. Roschen's first conscious memory was +of laughing and splashing in her little tub in the sunshine, while all +around her was a carolling of song. + +In the course of the years which had drifted by since Andreas came with +his birds to New York that May morning he had not made for himself many +friends. To be a friend of birds a man must have a quiet habit of body, +and great gentleness of nature, and a true tenderness of heart; which +qualities tend also to solitariness, being for the most part harmed +rather than fostered by association with mankind. As suited him well, +his business was not one that called him much abroad, nor that brought +him greatly into contact with his fellows. In his good care the famous +stock of songsters which he had brought with him from the fatherland +had increased prodigiously; and even the sale of nearly all his best old +birds, about the time that Conrad was ill, had worked, in the long run, +to his benefit; for he had taken these birds to one and another of the +great dealers, who thus came to know that in the little shop on Avenue +B were to be found canaries the like of which for tameness and for +rare beauty of note could not be bought elsewhere in all New York. +Thereafter, as his young birds grew up, learning from Andreas himself +the lesson of gentleness, and from his teaching-birds the lesson of +sweetness of note, he had no lack of high-paying customers; so that from +his business he derived an income far in excess of his modest +needs. What went with the overplus was known only to certain of his +country-folk, whose ill venture after greater fortune in America had +proved to be but a fiercer struggle with still greater poverty than they +had struggled with at home; and no doubt the angels also kept track of +his modest benefactions, for such is reputed to be their way. + +Many a wounded life was healed by these hidden ministrations on the part +of Andreas; and, as rightly followed, great love there was for him +in many a humble heart. But love of this sort is not friendship, +for friendship requires some one plane at least of equality, and also +association and converse, which conditions were lacking in the case of +Andreas and those to whom he gave his aid; for the shyness of his nature +led him to keep himself apart--save when the demand upon his charity was +for that comfort and sympathy which can only be given in person--from +those whose burdens he lightened; so that, for the most part, while the +needed help was given the hand that gave it remained concealed. + +Yet with a few of his country-folk in New York Andreas had established, +in course of time, relations of warm friendliness. Of his kin only two +cousins were left; for the rich, good uncle, from overmuch eating of his +own delicatessen, had come to a bilious ending; and his uncle's widow, +wise in her generation, had returned to her native town in Saxony, where +she was enabled, by reason of the fortune that the delicatessen-shop had +brought to her, to outshine the local baroness, and presently to attain +the summit of her highest hopes and happiness by wedding an impoverished +local baron, and so becoming a baroness herself. Her two sons were well +pleased with this marriage. They were carrying on a great business +in hog products, and had purchased for themselves fine estates in the +country and fine houses in town. To be able to speak of their mother as +"the baroness" suited them very well. Andreas saw but little of these +gilded relatives--who yet were good-hearted men, and very kindly +disposed towards him--for their magnificent surroundings were appalling +to his simple mind. His few friends were more nearly in his own walk +in life, and his friendship with them had been built up, as substantial +friendship should be, by slow degrees. + +At the Café Nürnberger, near by his own little shop--a bakery celebrated +for the excellence of its bread, and for the great variety of its +toothsome. German cakes--it was his custom to make daily purchases. With +the plump, rosy Aunt Hedwig, who presided over the bakery, he passed the +good word of the day shyly; he responded shyly to the friendly nod of +the baker, Gottlieb Brekel, when that worthy chanced to be in the shop; +and he shyly greeted a certain jolly Herr Sohnstein, a German lawyer of +distinction, who was about the bakery a great deal and who popularly was +believed to be a suitor for the plump Hedwig's plump hand. And these shy +greetings might have gone on day after day for all eternity--or at least +for so much of it as these several persons were entitled to live out on +earth--without increasing one particle in cordiality, had there not +been one other dweller in the bakery to act as a solvent upon the +bird-dealer's reserve. This was the baker's daughter Minna, a child a +year or two older than Roschen and cast in a sturdier mould. + +There was that about Andreas which drew all children to him, even as his +birds were drawn to him; and a part of the spell certainly was the love +for children that always was in his heart. The small Minna was disposed +not a little to caprice--for she was a motherless child, and Aunt Hedwig +humored her waywardness a trifle more than was good for her--and she +manifested, usually, a certain haughtiness towards those who sought to +make friends with her. Yet of her own accord one day, when Andreas had +ceased to be a stranger to her, she went up to him and offered him a +kiss. Aunt Hedwig volubly explained to Andreas the honor that had been +done him, and from that moment was disposed herself to be most friendly +with him--as was also the baker, and as was also Herr Sohnstein, when +the story of this extraordinary performance duly was related to them. +And thus there began a real friendship between Andreas and these +kindly souls that ever grew riper as the years went on. Sometimes of an +evening, when his birds were all asleep and he was left lonely, Andreas +would step around to the bakery; and would sit for an hour or so in +the little room back of the shop, listening pleasantly to the talk of +Gottlieb and Herr Sohnstein, as they smoked their long pipes, and +even laughing in a quiet way at the merry sallies thrown into the +conversation by Aunt Hedwig as she sat knitting beside the fire. +Andreas himself rarely spoke--it was not his way; but there was such a +sympathetic quality in his silence that his lack of words passed almost +unobserved. Much more attention was attracted by the fact that he did +not smoke--a fact that was looked upon as most extraordinary. But +this also went unheeded after a while, as it well might in a small room +wherein Gottlieb and Herr Sohnstein were smoking with such vigor that +the air was a deep, heavy blue. It was because his birds did not like +smoke that he had given up his pipe, he explained, simply; and only to +Minna did it occur to say, after she had turned the matter over in +her small mind for a while, that the Herr Stoffel must be a +very kind-hearted man to go without smoking because the smell of +tobacco-smoke wasn't nice for his birds. + +When Andreas took the little Roschen to his home, that sad day after the +funeral, the good Hedwig was among the first of the womenkind to go to +him with tenders of instruction and advice; for while Hedwig was only, +as it were, a matron by brevet, she was deeply impressed by the extent +of her own knowledge in the matter of how motherless children should be +raised; and it is but just to add that this self-confidence was fully +warranted by the good results that had attended upon her care of her +brother's child. Something of the story of Andreas and Christine, and +something of what he had done for her and for her husband, was known +in the bakery; and enough more was guessed to make these friends of his +feel towards him, because of it all, a still stronger and more earnest +friendship. Herr Sohnstein, who, being a lawyer with an extensive +practice in the criminal courts, was not by any means in the habit of +praising his fellow-men indiscriminately, even went so far as to say +that Andréas was "better than any of the saints already." And when Aunt +Hedwig, somewhat shocked at this comparison to the disfavor at a single +thrust of the whole body of saints put together, reproved Herr Sohnstein +for his irreverence, he stoutly declared that while his knowledge of +saints was comparatively limited--since they did not come within the +jurisdiction of the courts--he certainly never had read of one who +had shown a finer quality of charity, both in forgiveness and in +self-sacrifice, than that which Andreas had displayed. + +"Don't you make believe, Hedwig," Herr Sohnstein continued, "that if +you go off after promising yourself to me and marry another fellow, that +I'll take care of him when he's sick, and set him up in business when +he gets well, and wind up by giving him a first-class funeral; and don't +you get it into your head that I'm going to adopt any of your children +that are not mine too--for I'm not a saint already, even if Andreas is." + +To which general declaration Aunt Hedwig replied, with much spirit, that +in the first place Herr Sohnstein had better wait until she promised +to marry him--or to marry anybody, for that matter--before he took to +preaching to her; that in the second place it was unnecessary for him +to declare that he was not a saint, since only a deaf blind man would be +likely to take him for one; and that in the third place he would do well +to save his breath to cool his broth: at which lively sally they all +laughed together very comfortably. + +With these good friends Andreas consulted in all important matters +relating to Roschen's well-being. Aunt Hedwig's practical advice in +regard to clothing and food and general care-taking was of high value +in the early years; and it was Gottlieb's suggestion, when the time +came for beginning the sowing of seeds of wisdom in her small mind, that +Roschen should go with his own Minna to the school where the Sisters +taught; and of a Sunday the children went also together to be instructed +by the Redemptorist Fathers in the way of godliness. So these little +ones grew in years and in knowledge and in grace together, and towards +each other they felt a sisterly love. + +[Illustration: Instructed by the Redemptorist Fathers 278] + +Insensibly, too, as Roschen grew out of childhood into girlhood, her +attitude towards her adoptive father changed. In the great matters +of her life he still cared for her, planning always for her good, and +withholding from her nothing suited to her station in life that money +could buy. In the matter of her music, Aunt Hedwig declared that he +was positively extravagant; yet accepted in good part his excuse that +a voice so beautiful deserved to be well trained. It was her mother's +voice alive again, he said; and as he spoke, Aunt Hedwig saw that there +were tears in his eyes. But while Andreas still continued the larger +of his parental duties, in the smaller matters of every-day life his +adopted daughter now cared for him; so beginning to pay the debt (though +to neither of them, such was their love for each other, did any thought +of debt or of payment ever occur) that she owed him for all his goodness +to her and to her dead father and mother in the past. + +In truth, it was a pretty sight to see Roschen first beginning to play +at keeping house for her father--for so she always called him--and +then, in a little while, keeping house for him most excellently in real +earnest. Here, again, the good qualities of Aunt Hedwig came to the +front, for to her intelligent direction was due the rather surprising +success that attended Roschen's ambitious attempt to become so early a +_hausfrau_. Time and again was a great culinary disaster averted by a +rapid dash on Roschen's part from her imperilled home to the bakery, +where Aunt Hedwig's advice was quickly obtained and then was promptly +acted upon. And if sometimes the advice came too late to avert the +catastrophe--as on that memorable and dreadful day when Roschen boiled +her sausage-dumplings without tying them in a bag--the lessons taught +by calamitous experience caused only passing trouble, and tended, in the +long-run, to good. + +Indeed, by the time that Roschen was sixteen years old, and had so far +passed through her apprenticeship that she no longer was compelled +to make sudden and frantic appeals to Aunt Hedwig for aid, the little +household over which she presided so blithely was very admirably +managed; and it certainly was as quaint and as pretty an establishment +as could be found anywhere upon the whole round globe. Whoever entered +the little shop was greeted with such a thrilling and warbling of sweet +notes that all the air seemed quivering with music, and the leader of +the bird choir was a certain wonderful songster that Andreas had named +the Kronprinz, and for which he repeatedly had refused quite fabulous +sums. Andreas himself had bred the Kronprinz, and had given him the +education that now made him such a wonder among birds, and that made +him also of such great value as an instructor of the young birds whose +musical education was still to be gained. After his adopted daughter, +Andreas held this bird, and justly, to be the most precious thing that +he owned. + +But far sweeter than the singing of the prized Kronprinz--at least, to +any but a bird-fancier's ears--was the singing that usually was to be +heard above the trilling of the canaries, and that came from the room +at the back of the shop where Roschen was engaged in her housewifely +duties. It was such music as the angels made, Andreas declared, yet +thinking most of all of one angel voice, the memory of which while still +on earth was very dear to him; and even in the case of those who were +moved by no tender association of the sweet tones of the living and the +dead this estimate of Roschen's singing did not seem unduly high. Gustav +Strauss, the son of the great bird-dealer over in the rich part of the +town, vowed that Andreas was entirely right in his angelic comparison; +and Ludwig Bauer, the young shoemaker, who lived next door but one, went +even further, and said that Hoschen's voice was as much sweeter than any +mere angel's voice as Roschen herself was sweeter and better than all +the angels in Paradise combined. There was nothing halting nor half-way +in Ludwig Bauer's opinion in this matter, it will be observed. + +The little room wherein Roschen sang so sweetly while at her work was +their kitchen and dining-room and parlor all in one. As noon-time drew +near there would come out into the shop from this room, through the open +door-way, such succulent and enticing odors of roasting pork and stewing +onions and boiling cabbages, that even Bielfrak--as the Spitz dog, +who was chained as a guard close beneath the cage of the Kronprinz, +appropriately was named--would fall to licking his chops as he hungrily +sniffed these smells delectable; and Andreas suddenly would discover +how hungry he was, and would make occasion to go to the door-way that he +might see if the setting of the table was begun. + +"Patience, father! Presently! You are as bad as Bielfrak himself!" +Roschen would say; and as this attribution of gluttony to her father +was a time-honored joke between them, they always would laugh over it +pleasantly. And then Andreas would stand and watch his little _hausfrau_ +with a far-away look in his gentle blue eyes as she bustled about her +work in the sunny room, her pretty dimpled arms bared to above the +elbow, her lovely cheeks (because of much stooping over the fire) +brighter even than the roses after which she had been named, her golden +hair done up in a trig, tight knot (as Aunt Hedwig had taught her was +the proper way for hair to be arranged while cooking was going on), and +over her tidy print gown a great white apron, fashioned in an ancient +German shape, as guard against the splash-ings and spillings which even +the most careful of cooks cannot always control. In the sunny windows, +opening to the south, flowers were growing; the Dutch clock, with +pendulous weights made in the similitude of pine-cones, ticked against +the wall merrily; Mädchen, the cat--who, being most prolific of kittens, +notoriously belied her name--sat bunched up in exceeding comfort on +a space expressly left for her upon the sunny window-ledge among the +plants; steam arose in light clouds from the various pots upon the +stove, and in the middle of the little room the table stood ready for +the dinner to be served. + +It was a very cheerful, home-like picture this; and yet many a time, as +Andreas stood in the doorway and contemplated it, there would be tears +in his eyes, and a strange feeling, half of glad thankfulness, half of +very sorrowful longing, in his heart. She was so like her dead mother! +In look, in speech, in motions of the body, in turns of the head, and +in gestures of the hands she was Christine over again. Sometimes Andreas +would forget his fifty years and all the sorrows of hope destroyed and +irrevocable death-parting which his fifty years had brought him, and +would fancy for a moment that he was young again, and that the dearest +wish of his life was here fulfilled. And then she would call him +"Father!" and his moment's dream of happiness would die coldly in his +heart. Yet would there come to him always an after-glow of solacing +warmth, as comforting thoughts would steal in upon him of the happiness +not a dream--different from that which he had hoped for in his youth, +but most sweet and real--that God's goodness had given him in these his +later years. + +Andreas truly was old Andreas now. As men's lives go, his age was not +great; but sorrow had made him, as it had made many another man, far +older than the mere number of years which he had lived. No, great store +of strength had been his at the beginning, and the heart-break that he +had suffered that day of his landing in the New World, when faith and +love and hope all died together at a single blow, was less a sentimental +figure than a physical reality. A like pang, yet not so keen, had +wrenched him when he first came to know of Christine's sharp trial of +poverty, and another seized him in the night-time following that sad day +when she passed away from earth. And now of late, without any cause at +all, these pangs had come again. Andreas was glad that they had come +always when he was alone; for the pain was too searching to be wholly +hidden, and his strong desire was that Roschen should be spared all +knowledge of his suffering. In his own mind he perceived quite clearly +what before long must come to pass. And it was a good happening, he +thought, that in Gottlieb Brekel and Aunt Hedwig, and the excellent Herr +Sohnstein, who, being a lawyer, could care well for the little store in +the bank and for the little house that Andreas now owned, Roschen had +such stanch and worthy friends. The only signs of these thoughts which +Roschen perceived was that her father grew much keener in the matter of +selling his birds at high prices; and that she was somewhat seriously +reproved when, in her housekeeping or in her occasional expeditions +to the fine shops in Grand Street, she ventured upon any small +extravagance. But Roschen would laugh when thus reproved, and would +declare that her father, who long had been a glutton, was become a miser +already in his old age; whereat Andreas also would laugh, yet not quite +so heartily as Roschen liked to hear him laugh when she cracked her +little jokes upon him, and would say that sometimes a miser was not +thought by his heirs so bad a fellow when they found what a snug little +fortune he had left behind him all safe in the bank. + +It was because of these thoughts, which he kept hidden from her, that +Andreas began to take a much more active interest in what Roschen had to +say from time to time about certain young men of her acquaintance. +The young man of whom she spoke most frequently, and with a frank +friendliness, was the handsome young assistant baker at the Café +Nürnberger; a very capable young fellow, Hans Kuhn by name, who of late +had brought that excellent bakery into great vogue because of the almost +miraculously good lebkuchen which he baked there. But Andreas was not at +all alarmed by this open friendship; for Hans and the stout Minna Brekel +were to be married presently, and Roschen's feeling obviously was no +more than hearty good-will towards the lover of her dear sister-friend. +Fine chatterings she and Minna had, as Andreas inferred from her +occasional brief reports of them, about the prodigious matrimonial event +that was so near at hand. As Andreas also inferred, these chatterings +put various notions of an exciting and somewhat disturbing sort into +Roschen's little head. If one young girl might get married, so might +another, no doubt she thought; and it is conceivable that from this +mental statement of a rational abstract possibility her thoughts may +have passed on to consideration of the concrete possibilities involved +in her own relations with the good-looking Gustav Strauss, son of the +rich bird-dealer, or with the good-looking young shoemaker, Ludwig +Bauer, who lived next door but one. + +It is certain that when Roschen had arrived at the dignity of eighteen +years, and her hitherto slim figure had taken on quite a plump, pleasing +womanly roundness, the business visits of the young Herr Strauss to the +little bird shop on the East Side became, as it struck Andreas, rather +curiously frequent. And about this time, also, their neighbor Ludwig +developed a very extraordinary interest in the business of raising +canary-birds. It was a business that he long had thought of engaging in, +he explained; and he truly did exhibit an aptitude in comprehending +and in practising its mysteries that greatly exalted him in the little +bird-dealer's esteem. The birds all seemed to recognize a friend in him; +and even those which were but partially tamed, and were gentle only with +Andreas himself, would perch willingly upon his hand. With Andreas +it long had been a maxim that canary-birds were rare judges of human +character, and the testimonial thus given to Lud-wig's worth counted +with him for a great deal--as did also the quite converse opinion of the +birds in regard to the young Herr Strauss: from whom, notwithstanding +his training in the care of their kind, they always flew away, and whose +mere presence in the shop sufficed to make every bird ruffle himself and +to chirp angrily in his cage. Yet Herr Strauss was most agreeable in his +manners, and was a very personable young man. As for his riches, they +spoke for themselves in his fine attire and in his fine gold watch and +chain; and he also spoke for them, making frequent allusions to his +comfortable present position in the world as his father's partner, and +to his still more comfortable prospective position as his father's sole +heir. + +Ludwig, on the other hand, could not boast of any great amount of +gilding upon, as Andreas believed it to be, the sterling metal of which +he was made. But he was by no means what would be considered by the +dwellers on the East Side a poor man. He was a steady and a good +master-workman, with three or four apprentices under him; and all day +long there was to be heard in his shop the cheerful, business-like sound +of the thumping of short hammers on lap-stones, together with the loud +clicking of the sewing-machine on which the delicate stitching of +uppers was done. In the window, screened with a green curtain of growing +vines--as is the pretty custom with most of the German shoemakers on the +East Side--there always might be seen a pair or two of well-made stout +shoes drying in the sunshine on their lasts; and with these a half-dozen +or more pairs of shoes newly soled and heeled in a substantial, +workmanlike fashion that would have done credit to Hans Sachs himself. +Making and mending together, it was a very good business that Ludwig +was doing; each year a better balance was lodged to his credit in the +savings-bank, and the great golden boot that hung above his door-way +told no more than the truth of the good work that was done and of the +good money that was well earned within. From the stand-point of public +opinion on the East Side, this thriving young shoemaker already was a +man of substance, whose still more substantial future was assured. + +There was in the nature of Ludwig much the same simplicity and +gentleness that characterized Andreas--which common qualities, no doubt, +had much to do with the strong friendship that there was between them; +and all his neighbors, remembering how good a son he had been, and +knowing also how deeply he still sorrowed for the dear mother lost to +him in death, were more than ready to vouch for the goodness of his +heart. Indeed, it was while trying to comfort him a little after this +great sorrow fell upon him that Roschen first felt towards him something +more than the passing interest that every maiden reasonably feels in +every seemly young man. Her disposition towards him, to be sure, even +when thus stimulated by a sympathetic melancholy, was only that of +friendliness; but it evidently was a friendliness so cordial and so +sincere that it made quite a tolerable foundation upon which Ludwig +freely built fine air-castles of hope. For his disposition towards +Roschen was altogether that of a lover--as anybody might have known +after hearing that decided expression of his opinion to the effect that +all the angels singing together could not make music so sweet as the +music of her voice. + +In due time, in accordance with the decorous German custom, both of +these young men made formal application to Andreas for permission to +be ranked formally as Roschen's suitors; and, as it chanced, they both +preferred their requests upon the same day. The young Herr Strauss +undeniably had some strong points to make in his own favor; and he made +them, to do him justice, without any hesitation or false modesty. As he +truly said--speaking with an easy assurance, and airily fingering his +gold watch-chain as he spoke--in marrying him Roschen would make an +excellent match. In rather marked contrast with this justifiable yet not +wholly pleasing assumption of self-importance, was the modest tone in +which Ludwig urged his suit; yet was Andreas not unfavorably impressed +by the fact that he dwelt less upon his deserts than upon his desire +to be deserving; and that in connection with the creditable presentment +that he made of the condition of his worldly affairs he did not insist, +as the Herr Strauss had insisted, upon a minute examination of Roschen's +dowry. As bearing indirectly yet forcibly upon a general consideration +of the cases of these young men, the statement may be added that one of +them had made for his proposed father-in-law several excellent pairs +of shoes, while the other had made for--or, rather, against--him only a +series of uncommonly sharp bargains. + +To neither of the lovers did Andreas give an immediate answer. He must +think a little, he said. The self-esteem of the Herr Strauss was a +trifle ruffled by the suggestion that in such a case waiting of any sort +was necessary; it seemed to him that an offer so desirable as that +which he had made was entitled to instant acceptance. But Ludwig noted +a certain trembling in the voice that bade him wait, and was not so +completely engrossed with his own hopes of happiness but that he could +perceive its cause and could feel sorrow for it. All these years had +Andreas cared for this sweet Roschen, and had cherished her as his +dearest treasure; and now, when the best time of her life had come, he +was asked to give her up to a love that rested its claim for recognition +upon nothing more substantial than promises of care taking which +the future might or might not make good. That Andreas, under such +circumstances, even should consider his request, touched Ludwig's good +heart with gratitude; and the love that he had for a long while felt +towards the old man led him now to pat an arm around his shoulder, as +a son might have done, and to tell him that the home which he had ready +for Roschen was ready for Roschen's father too. And Lud wig's voice also +trembled a little. Andreas did not speak, but he put his thin hand into +the big brown hand--much stained with the dark wax which shoemakers use +and with long handling of leather--that Ludwig held out to him; and +when they had stood together thus affectionately for a little time they +parted, silently. + +In truth, Andreas was more deeply moved than even Ludwig, for all his +affectionate sympathy, had divined. His love for Roschen was a double +love. With the love of a father he had watched over her these many +years; yet even stronger had come to be his love for her as her mother +born again. Sometimes, for whole days together, confusing the past with +the present, he would call her Christine; and in his heart he ever +gave greater room to the fancy that the life which he had hoped for was +realized, and that the life which he was living was a dream. No wonder, +then, that he asked for a little time in which to school himself to meet +the fate that at a single blow brought destruction to his dear home on +earth and to his dearer castle in the air. + +Roschen was abroad that afternoon, and as Andreas, alone with his birds, +turned over in his mind the answers which he must give to these young +men--who sought to take to themselves, for the greater pleasure of their +young lives, the single happiness which his old life had left to it--a +great bitterness possessed his soul. When they had so much and he so +little, it was cruel of them to seek to rob him thus, he thought. And +their love, after all, was but the growth of a day, while his love had +been growing steadily for forty years. Roschen was to him at once the +sweetheart of his youth and the dear daughter of his age. How could +these young fellows have the effrontery to place their own light love +fancies in rivalry with this profound love of his that was rooted in all +the years of a lifetime? His thoughts went back to those long-past days +when he and Christine first had known each other as little children on +the sunny slopes of the Andreas-berg, and when began the love that still +was a living reality. And then he followed downward through the years +his own love-story from this its beginning--the promise made in the +twilight, while the south wind, laden with the sweet smell of the +pine-trees of the Schwarzwald, played about them; the hard parting; his +joyous journey with his birds westward across the sea; the black day +when that journey ended; the years of sorrow which closed in still +keener sorrow when his Christine was lost to him utterly in death; and +then through the later years, which ever grew brighter and happier as +his love for Christine was born anew and lived its strange, half-real +life in his love for Christine's child, who also was the daughter given +him by Heaven to cheer and comfort him in his old age. And now at the +end of it all he was asked to give to another this sweet flower of love +that for his happiness, almost by a miracle, as it seemed, a second time +had bloomed. Was not this asking more of him, he thought, than rightly +should be asked? + +So heavy was the load of bitterness that oppressed him that even the +singing of the Kronprinz, who was moved to break forth into song just +then, failed for a time to arouse him. Yet presently the sweet sound +penetrated the thick substance of his sorrow, and slowly turned the +current of his sombre thoughts. Andreas loved all music; but because +of the long train of associations which it invoked, and because of his +skilled knowledge of its quality, there was no music so sweet to him as +the singing of a bird. And when the singer was the Kronprinz, who sang +with a mellow sweetness rare and wonderful, the music never failed to +move his tender nature to its very depths. And so, as he listened to the +singing of his bird, gentler and better thoughts possessed him; and then +he reproached himself for the selfishness that had so filled his +heart. He had no right, he thought, to stand in the way of Roschen's +happiness--to compel her to take the old love that he had to give in +place of the fresh young love that was offered to her. It was only a +foolish fancy, this that he had cherished, that she was his sweetheart +of long ago; it was the rational truth that he had to deal with--that +she was his daughter, who had given him in full measure a daughter's +love and duty, and for whom now, as was a father's duty, he must secure +a good husband, who would care for her well and loyally when death had +taken her father from her. This was the right conclusion, but all the +strength of his will was required to bring him to it; and when at last +He said to himself that what so plainly was right should be firmly done, +the color suddenly left his face, and there went through his heart the +sharp pang that he had learned to dread because of the agony of it. So +wrenching was the pain that he could not repress a cry; but it was not +a loud cry, and the sound of it was lost in the glad carolling of the +Kronprinz's song. + +When Roschen came home, a little later, she was frightened by finding +her father looking so pale and worn; but the sight of her dear face, and +her loving looks and words, revived him quickly, and her fear passed +by. And she forgot her fear the sooner because of the momentous question +which he then opened to her; for this last sharp seizure, keener than +any that had preceded it, had warned Andreas that the duty which he had +to do should not be delayed. + +Very tenderly and lovingly did he speak of this heart matter to his +little rose, his Roschen, as she sat beside him on a low stool, after +the childish habit that she never had relinquished, while her head was +nestled against his breast, and while he stroked her fair hair gently +with his thin, delicate hand. And as he made clear to her all that she +was to know, and explained to her that the decision between these rival +lovers, or the rejection of them both, must be made by herself, the +rosiness of this pretty Roschen became a deep crimson, and her head sank +down upon her father's breast so that her face was hid from him; and +as his arms clasped her closely to this loving haven she fell to crying +gently there, as in such cases is a proper maiden's rather unreasonable +way. + +"Does the thought of lovers make thee sad, my little one?" Andreas +asked; and he could not quite stifle, though he tried hard to stifle, +the hope that perhaps Roschen might settle this present matter so that +for a little time longer she still would be wholly his own. + +"It is not the thought of lovers, dear father," Roschen answered, and +her voice was low and broken, "but the thought that anything should take +me away from thee." + +The hope grew larger in the heart of Andreas, but he said: "The young +Herr Strauss will make thee a fine husband, my daughter. He is a rich +young man already, and--" + +But Roschen promptly cut short this eulogy by raising her head abruptly +and saying, with great decision: "He is a horrid young man, and nothing +is good about him at all. He tries to cheat thee whenever he comes here +to buy our birds; and--and he has said things to me; and he--and +he tried to kiss me. Ugh! I will have nothing to do with the Herr +Strauss--nothing at all!" + +As she spoke, Roschen held up her head firmly and looked Andreas +straight in the eyes. Her own eyes quite sparkled with anger, for all +the tears that were in them; and the tone in which she pronounced the +name of the Herr Strauss suggested pointedly that he was one of the +various unpleasant creatures which humanity disposes of with tongs. +All this was so emphatic that Andreas suffered his hope to grow yet +stronger; for now, certainly, one of these lovers was put safely out of +his way. + +"And Ludwig, my little one?" + +Roschen did not speak, but the angry sparkle that was in her eyes gave +place to a softer and much pleasanter brightness, and a still deeper +crimson showed in the pretty face that she hid again suddenly upon her +father's breast. + +"And Ludwig?" Andreas repeated. + +But still Roschen did not speak. She put her arms around her father's +neck, and nestled her head beneath his chin in a lovingly coaxing way +that she had devised when she was a little child; and then she fell +again to sobbing gently. + +"Hast thou, then, nothing to say of this friend of ours, my daughter?" +Andreas spoke eagerly, his hope being very strong within him now; for he +was not versed in the ways of maidens, and the silence that would have +been so eloquent to another woman or to a wiser man conveyed a very +false notion to his mind. + +"Thou hast told me, dear father, that Ludwig makes very good shoes," +Roschen said at last, speaking hesitatingly, and in a voice so low that +it was little more than a whisper. + +"Yes," Andreas answered, somewhat taken aback by the irrelevant and very +matter-of-fact nature of this remark; "yes, Ludwig makes good shoes." + +"And thou likest those which he has made for thee?" + +"Truly. They are good shoes. They have cured my corns." Andreas spoke +with feeling. He was sincerely grateful to Ludwig for having cured his +corns. "But it is not of Ludwig's shoes that we are talking now, my +Roschen," he went on. "It is of Ludwig himself. Hast thou nothing to say +in answer to what he asks?" + +Through her tears Roschen laughed a little, and she pressed her head +still more closely beneath her father's chin. "Thou dear foolish one," +she said, "canst thou not understand?" And then, after a moment of +silence, she went on: "Hast thou not seen, dear father, how all the +birds love Ludwig, and of their own accord go to him?" + +Then a little light broke in upon Andreas, and the hope that he had +cherished began to pale; but he answered stoutly: "Yes, the birds love +him, for he is a good young man. And thou, my daughter?" + +And Roschen answered in a voice so low and tremulous that Andreas +divined rather than heard the words she spoke: "Perhaps it is with me +also, dear father, as it is with the birds!" + +[Illustration: Perhaps it is with me also 298] + +For a little time there was silence--for Andreas did not trust himself +to speak while his hope was dying in his heart--then he raised the +pretty head from its resting-place upon his breast, and as he kissed the +forehead that was so like the dead Christine's. + +"'Perhaps it is with me also, dear father, as it is with the bird'" he +said, reverently and tenderly: "For thy good and happiness, my dear one, +may God's will be done." And as he clasped her again to him closely, the +Kronprinz once more lifted up his voice in sweetest song. + +When at last Roschen raised her rosy, happy face from her father's +breast, she was so full of the wonder that had come to pass that she did +not perceive his weary look, nor how pale he was; yet less pale now than +a little time before when his face was unseen by her. + +And presently the rosiness of this sweet Roschen grew still deeper as +the shop door opened, with a great tinkling of its little bell, and +Ludwig entered. Andreas arose from his chair slowly--but neither of them +noticed how feeble and labored were his motions, like those of a weak +old man--and clasped in both of his own Ludwig's great brown hand, while +with a look of love he said: "It is as thou wouldst have it, my son. +This dear rose of my growing will bloom in thy garden now"--and he +led Ludwig to where Roschen, who indeed was a true rose just then, was +standing and put her hand in his. + +And then, with a wistful eagerness, he went on: "And thou wilt care for +her very tenderly and well, in my place? Thou canst not understand what +my love has been; part of it, I know, has been foolishness--and that +which thou wilt give her, if it be strong and steadfast, will be far +better than ever was mine. For it is the way of life"--and here the +voice of Andreas trembled and fell a little--"that for young hearts love +also must be young." + +"With God's help, dear father, I will be true and good to her," Ludwig +answered, speaking with a stout heartiness that gave the ring of truth +to his words; "and I will care well for her and for thee too." + +"For me it will not be long," Andreas answered; "but give the care which +thou wouldst have given to me to these my birds." + +"Do not make us sad to-day, dear father, by such gloomy words," said +Roschen, as she put her arms around his neck. "To-day a beautiful time +of happiness has begun for us." + +"Truly a beautiful time of happiness has begun," Andreas answered; "and +I thank God that I have seen its beginning--for when grief comes to +thee, and grief must come to us all, my daughter, thou hast now a strong +young heart to stay and comfort thee. Yes, this is truly the beginning +of a happy time." It was with a very tender smile that Andreas spoke +these cheery words; and he added, cheerily: "Now go out into the Square, +my children, and say to each other the words which I know are in your +hearts. I will be glad in your happiness as I sit here among my birds." + +And so Andreas, for the second time in his life, was left alone with his +birds. + +As he sat there, desolate, he buried his face in his hands, and between +his thin fingers there was a glistening of tears. It was so hard to +bear! They might have waited just a little while, he thought; it would +not have been very long. For he forgot, and perhaps it would be unfair +to blame him for forgetting, his own desire that before that little time +should pass his Roschen should have assured to her the good care-taker +whom she surely would need when the season of sorrow came. A little +thrill of pain, a premonition of which he knew the meaning, ran through +him. + +Then it was that the Kronprinz began to sing. The notes at first were +low and liquid, and they fell soothingly upon the ears, and so into +the heart of this poor Andreas; and as they rose higher and fuller and +clearer, light began to show for him where only darkness had been. The +other birds, fired to emulation by these mellow warblings, joined in a +sweet chorus, above which the strong rich notes of the Kronprinz rose +in triumphant waves of harmony. And gladness came then into the heart of +Andreas, and great thankfulness; for as the music of the birds exalted +him he seemed to see with a strange clearness into the depths of the +future, and all that he saw there promised well for those whom he loved. +Such wonderful music was this that the very air about him seemed to be +growing goldenly radiant; and with a certain awe creeping into his heart +he seemed to hear low echoes of a music even more ravishingly beautiful +that came faintly yet with a bell-like clearness from very far away. + +Truly there was something strange about this music, for even Bielfrak, +who was grown to be a deaf, rheumatic old dog now, heard it and was +greatly moved by it. From his comfortable rug in the corner he raised +himself painfully upon his haunches, and, pointing his noise upward, +uttered a long melancholy howl. Then he came by slow effort across the +room to where his master sat and laid his head upon his master's knee. +And there was a puzzled look upon Bielfrak's face, for never before had +he thus manifested the love that was in his honest heart without finding +a quick response to it in the gentle touch of his master's hand. Yet now +that hand remained most strangely still, and it was strangely white, and +Bielfrak drew back suddenly from touching it--finding it most strangely +cold. + +[Illustration: page 286 303] + +The birds had been frightened into silence by Bielfrak's howl, but +now they all burst forth again into the song of strange and wonderful +sweetness that of a sudden they had learned to sing. In waves of +harmony the chorus rose and fell, and above all sounded the notes of +the Kronprinz, rich, full, clear, so delicately perfect as to seem a +blending of sunlight and of sound. And in this song there was a strain +that seemed to tell of restful triumph and eternal joy. And on the +gentle, kindly face of Andreas, as he sat there so very quietly while +all the air around him with these sweet sounds was vibrant, there was a +most tender smile that told of perfect peace. + + + + + + +End of Project Gutenberg's An Idyl Of The East Side, by Thomas A. Janvier + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK AN IDYL OF THE EAST SIDE *** + +***** This file should be named 23809-8.txt or 23809-8.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/2/3/8/0/23809/ + +Produced by David Widger + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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Janvier + </title> + <style type="text/css" xml:space="preserve"> + + body { margin:5%; text-align:justify} + P { text-indent: 1em; margin-top: .25em; margin-bottom: .25em; } + H1,H2,H3,H4,H5,H6 { text-align: center; margin-left: 15%; margin-right: 15%; } + hr { width: 50%; text-align: center;} + .foot { margin-left: 20%; margin-right: 20%; text-align: justify; text-indent: -3em; font-size: 90%; } + blockquote {font-size: 97%; font-style: italic; margin-left: 10%; margin-right: 10%;} + .mynote {background-color: #DDE; color: #000; padding: .5em; margin-left: 10%; margin-right: 10%; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 95%;} + .toc { margin-left: 10%; margin-bottom: .75em;} + .toc2 { margin-left: 20%;} + div.fig { display:block; margin:0 auto; text-align:center; } + div.middle { margin-left: 20%; margin-right: 20%; text-align: justify; } + .figleft {float: left; margin-left: 0%; margin-right: 1%;} + .figright {float: right; margin-right: 0%; margin-left: 1%;} + .pagenum {display:inline; font-size: 70%; font-style:normal; + margin: 0; padding: 0; position: absolute; right: 1%; + text-align: right;} + pre { font-style: italic; font-size: 90%; margin-left: 10%;} + +</style> + </head> + <body> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + +The Project Gutenberg EBook of An Idyl Of The East Side, by Thomas A. Janvier + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: An Idyl Of The East Side + 1891 + +Author: Thomas A. Janvier + +Illustrator: W. T. Smedley + +Release Date: December 10, 2007 [EBook #23809] +Last Updated: January 5, 2013 + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK AN IDYL OF THE EAST SIDE *** + + + + +Produced by David Widger + + + + + +</pre> + <div style="height: 8em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h1> + AN IDYL OF THE EAST SIDE + </h1> + <h2> + By Thomas A. Janvier <br /><br /> Copyright, 1891, by Harper & Brothers + </h2> + <p> + <br /> <br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /> <br /> + </p> + <h2> + List of Illustrations + </h2> + <table summary="" style="margin-right: auto; margin-left: auto"> + <tr> + <td> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#linkimage-0001"> High-peaked Roof, Partly Thatched </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#linkimage-0002"> Chorus of Sweetest Song </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#linkimage-0003"> Instructed by the Redemptorist Fathers + </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#linkimage-0004"> Perhaps It is With Me Also </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#linkimage-0005"> Page 286 </a> + </p> + </td> + </tr> + </table> + <p> + <br /> <br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /> <br /> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <p> + In the matter of raising canary-birds—at once strong of body and of + note, tamed to associate with humanity on rarely friendly terms, and + taught to sing with a sweetness nothing short of heavenly—Andreas + Stoffel was second to none. And this was not by any means surprising, for + he had been born (and for its saintly patron had been christened) close by + the small old town of Andreasberg: which stands barely within the verge of + the Black Forest, on the southern declivity of the Harz—and which, + while famous for its mines, is renowned above all other cities for the + excellence of the bird songsters which there and thereabouts are raised. + </p> + <p> + Canary-birds had been the close companions of this good Andreas through + all the fifty years of his lifetime. They had sung their sweet song of + rejoicing at his birth—when the storks had brought him one day, + while his father was far underground at work in the mines, and was vastly + well pleased, when he came home all grimy at night, to find what a brave + boy God had sent him by these winged messengers. They had sung over his + cradle as his mother, knitting, rocked it in the midst of the long patch + of sunlight that came through the low, wide window of the <i>bauernhaus</i>—the + comfortable home with high-peaked roof, partly thatched and partly + shingled, and with great drooping eaves, that was nooked snugly on the + warm southern slope of the Andreasberg beside a little stream. + </p> + <p> + <a name="linkimage-0001" id="linkimage-0001"> + <!-- IMG --></a> + </p> + <div class="fig" style="width:80%"> + <img src="images/258.jpg" alt="High-peaked Roof, Partly Thatched 258 " + width="100%" /><br /> + </div> + <p> + They had sung him awake many and many a bright summer morning; and one of + his tenderest memories of the time when he was a very little boy—and + was put to bed, as little boys should be, at sundown—was of their + faint, irregular, sleepy-headed chirpings and twitterings as they settled + themselves to slumber on their perches for the night. + </p> + <p> + And when the time came that Andreas, grown to man's estate, being + one-and-twenty years old, but not to man's strength, for he was small of + stature and frail, was left lonely in the world—the good father + killed by a rock-fall in the mines, and the dear mother thereafter pining + away from earth, and so to the heaven that gave her husband back to her—it + was his house-mates the birds who did their best to cheer him with their + songs. And presently, as it seemed to him, these songs began to tell of + new happiness in a new home far away across the mountains and beyond the + sea—in that distant America where already his father's brother + dwelt, and whereof he had heard wonderful stories of splendors and of + riches incalculable all his life long. Indeed, the adventurous uncle had + prospered amazingly in the twenty years of his American exile: rising, in + due course, from the position of a young man of most promiscuous all work + in a delicatessen shop in New York to the position of owner of the + business, shop and all. + </p> + <p> + To go to a land where such things as this were possible seemed to Andreas + most wise; and to be near his uncle, and the aunt and cousins whom he had + never seen, his sole remaining kin, held out to him a pleasant promise of + cheer and comfort in his loneliness. + </p> + <p> + But, in very truth, the sweet burden of the song of his birds was not born + of thoughts of mere commonplace family affection and commonplace worldly + wealth. Far more precious than these was the motive of the music that + Andreas listened to and understood, and yet scarcely would acknowledge, + even to himself; for in America it was that Christine now had her home—and + that which set his heartstrings a-thrilling, as he listened to the song of + his birds, was the deep, pure melody of love. + </p> + <p> + They had been children together, he and Christine, their homes side by + side on the flanks of the Andreasberg; and when, three years before, she + had gone with her father and her mother on the long journey westward, the + heart of Andreas Stoffel had gone with her, and only his body was left + behind among the mountains of the Harz. And Christine had dulled to him a + little the keen edge of the sorrow of their parting by admitting that she + left her own heart in the place of the heart that she bore away. + </p> + <p> + More than once had the rich uncle, owner of the delicatessen shop in New + York, written to urge that his nephew—whose frailty of body made him + unfit to enter upon the hard life of a worker in the mines—should + come to America; and with his large knowledge of affairs the uncle had + explained that the best bill of exchange in which money could be carried + from Andreasberg to New York was canary-birds, that could be bought for + comparatively little in the German town, and that would be worth in the + American city a very great sum. And now on this shrewd advice Andreas + acted. The dear old <i>bauernhaus</i> was sold, and its furnishing with + it; and all the money thus gained, together with the greater sum that, + little by little, his father had added to the store in the old leather bag + (saving only what the journey would cost) was spent in buying the finest + canary-birds which money could buy; so that for a long while after that + time Andreasberg was desolate, for all of its sweetest singers were gone. + </p> + <p> + Thus it fell out that even in the time of his long journey his birds still + sang to him; and his fellow-travellers by land and sea regarded curiously + this slim, pale youth, who shyly kept apart from human converse and + communed with his companions the birds. And so lovingly well did Andreas + care for his little feathered friends that not one died throughout the + whole long passage; and as the ship came up the beautiful bay of New York + on a sunny May morning, while Andreas stood on the deck with his cages + about him, very blithely and sweetly did the birds sing their hopeful song + of greeting to the New World. + </p> + <p> + But it was a false song of hope, after all. Hearts were fickle thirty + years ago, even as hearts are fickle to-day; and the first news that + Andreas heard when he was come to his uncle's home (a very fine home, over + a very fine shop, indeed) was that Christine had been a twelvemonth + married—in very complete forgetfulness of all her fine words about + the heart left behind her, and of all her fine promises that she would be + true! + </p> + <p> + That there be such things as broken hearts is an open question. Yet when + this news came suddenly to Andreas a keen agony of pain went through his + heart as though it were really breaking; and with his hands pressed + tightly against his breast, and with a face as pale as death itself, he + fell to the floor. He would have died then very willingly; and it was very + unwillingly—the fierce pain leaving him as suddenly as it had come—that + he returned to life. Whatever may be said for or against the probability + of broken hearts, there can be no question as to the verity of broken + lives. That day, assuredly, the life of Andreas Stoffel was broken, and it + never wholly mended again. For a while even the song of his birds lost all + its sweetness, and seemed to him but a discordant sound. + </p> + <p> + Yet even a broken life, until it be snuffed out entirely, must battle in + the world for standing-room. Luckily for Andreas, there was no need for + him to question how his own particular battle should be made. The shape in + which his little store of worldly wealth was cast obviously determined the + lines on which he should seek maintenance. It was plain that by the + rearing and the selling of canary-birds he must gain support until the + time should come (and he hoped that it would come soon) when he might find + release from this earth, where love so soon grows false and cold. + </p> + <p> + The rich uncle, who was a kind-hearted man, gave his help in the matter of + finding a shop wherein the canary-bird business might be advantageously + carried on, and gave also the benefit of his commercial wisdom and + knowledge of American ways. And so, with no great difficulty, Andreas was + soon established in a snug little place of his own on the East Side; where + the friendly German speech sounded almost constantly in his ears, and + where the friendly German customs obtained almost as completely as in his + own dear German home. But, after all, the change was a dismal one. As his + unaccustomed nose was assailed by the rank oil-vapors blown across from + Hunter's Point he longed regretfully for the fresh, aromatic air that the + south winds swept up and over his old home from the pines of the + Schwarz-wald; and the contrast was a sorry one between a home on the + slopes of the Harz Mountains and a home in Avenue B. + </p> + <p> + Yet had these been his only sorrows, and had he borne them—as he had + hoped to bear them—with Christine, his lot would have been anything + but hard. It was the deep heart-wound that he had suffered that made his + life for many a year a very dreary one; too dreary for him to find much + pleasure even in the singing of his birds. Now and again he met Christine. + At their first meeting—in his uncle's fine parlor over the fine + delicatessen shop, one Sunday afternoon—she was, as she well might + be, confused in her speech and very shamefaced in her ways. Her husband + was with her, quite a prosperous person, so Andreas was told, who had + built up a great business in the pork and sausage line. He was a + loud-voiced, merry man; and he aired his wit freely, though evidently with + no intent to be unkind, upon the lover out of whose lucklessness his own + luck had come. Even as pretty a girl as Christine could not have more than + one husband at a time, said this big Conrad, with great good-humor; and + so, since they could not both marry her, Andreas would do well to stop + crying over spilled milk. They all would be very good friends, he added, + and Andreas would be godfather to the first child. He put out his big hand + as he made this proffer of friendship; and although Andreas could not + refuse to clasp it, there was not, in truth, any great store of + friendliness for Christine's loud-voiced husband in his heart. So soon as + this was possible, he was glad to get away from the merry Sunday afternoon + gathering in his uncle's fine parlor to the more sympathetic society of + his birds. Yet there did not seem to him much music in the singing of his + birds that day. + </p> + <p> + Christine was vastly proud of her big, rosy-faced, noisy husband, whose + sausage-making greatly prospered, and to whom the American dollars rolled + in bravely. But even in these days of her good-luck she sometimes found + herself thinking—when Conrad's rough love-making was still further + roughened, and his noisiness greatly increased, by too free draughts of + heady German beer—of the gentler ways and constant tenderness of her + earlier lover, whose love, with her own promise to be true to it, she had + so lightly cast aside. Thoughts of this sort, it is true, did not often + trouble her, but now and then they gave her a little heart-pang; and the + pang would be intensified, sometimes, as the thought also would come to + her that perhaps it was because she had broken her plighted troth that her + many prayers to become a mother remained unanswered. + </p> + <p> + As time went on, Christine's sorrows came to be of a more instant sort. + Her too jolly husband's fondness for heady beer grew upon him, and with + its increase came a decrease in the success that until then had been + attendent upon his sausage-making. His business fell away from him by + degrees into soberer and steadier hands, which had the effect of making + him take to stronger drinks than beer in order that he might the more + effectually forget his troubles. He lost his merriness, and somewhat of + his loudness, and became sullen; and the wolf always was shrewdly near the + door. Thus, in a very bad way indeed, things went on for half a dozen + years; then the big Conrad, what with drink and worry, fell ill—so + ill, that for a long while he lay close to the open jaws of Death. + </p> + <p> + No one ever knew—though several people quite accurately guessed—why + the wolf did not fairly get into the house during that dismal time. It is + certain that when Conrad arose from his bed at last, a thin remnant of his + former bigness, there were few high-priced birds left in Andreas Stoffel's + little shop, where there had been a score or more when his sickness began. + And, possibly, it was something more than a mere coincidence that nearly + all of the few which remained were sold about the time that Conrad started + again, in a very humble way, his business of sausage-making. + </p> + <p> + But if Andreas did thus sacrifice his birds for Christine's good, he did + not grudge the sacrifice; for upon the big Conrad poverty and sickness had + exercised a chastening and most wholesome influence. He got up out of his + bed a changed man; and the change, morally at least, was greatly for the + better. Physically the result was less salutary; indeed, he never quite + recovered from his sharp attack; and three or four years later, just as + his business was getting into good shape again, he sickened suddenly, and + then promptly paid to nature the debt that all men owe, and that his + partial return to health had but a little time delayed. + </p> + <p> + But Christine was not left desolate in the world, for in the last year of + her husband's life the strong yearning that so possessed her had been + satisfied, and she was the mother of a baby girl. Andreas, claiming the + fulfilment of the promise made so long before, had stood godfather to the + little Rosa—for so, because of her fresh rosiness, was she named; + and there was a strange, sorrowful longing in his heart when, the rite + being ended, he came again to his lonely home and sat him down to be + comforted by the singing of his birds: for while the children of Alice + call Bartram father, there must be ever a weary weight of sadness in the + world. + </p> + <p> + Life had not given so much of happiness to Christine—though, + possibly, her happiness was equal to her deserts—that her hold upon + life was a very firm one; and although she tried, for the little Roschen's + sake, to put fresh strength into her grasp, the pressure of poverty and + care and sorrow all combined to make her loosen it. Gently, a little at a + time, her hold gave way. She knew what was coming, and so did Andreas. + Once or twice they spoke about it; and spoke also of the old days on the + Andreasberg, when began the love that in one of their hearts at least + never had grown cold. And for this old love's sake Andreas promised that + when she was gone the little Rosehen should find a home with him and with + his birds. It was not a great while after this promise was made that the + end came. + </p> + <p> + Some of the women laughed a little, and cried a little too, when, after + the funeral, old Andreas—for so already had they begun to call him, + because of his silent habit and quaint, old-fashioned ways—asked to + be shown how a baby should be carried; and, being in this matter properly + instructed, bore away with careful tenderness in his arms the little + Rosehen to her new home. And when he was come home with her, the birds, as + though in welcome—which seemed the more real because certain of the + tamer ones among them came forth from their open cages and perched upon + his arm— + </p> + <p> + <a name="linkimage-0002" id="linkimage-0002"> + <!-- IMG --></a> + </p> + <div class="fig" style="width:80%"> + <img src="images/268.jpg" alt="Chorus of Sweetest Song 268 " width="100%" /><br /> + </div> + <p> + The good-wives living thereabouts were somewhat shocked at the thought of + risking a baby's life in the care of a man who was qualified only to + minister intelligently to the needs of baby canary-birds; yet were they + not a little touched when they came—in unnecessary numbers, as + Andreas thought—to give him the benefit of their superior wisdom in + the premises by finding how well, in a queer, awkward way, he was + discharging the duties of his office; and such gentleness in a man they + all vowed that they had never seen. Yet it was not surprising that his + quaint effort was crowned with so signal a success; as the birds could + have explained, had their song-notes been rendered into human speech, + Andreas had served an apprenticeship in caring for them which well fitted + him to care with a mother's tenderness for this little girl, who, such was + his love for her, seemed to him in all verity to be his own proper child. + Benefiting by the advice which so lavishly was bestowed upon him, he + presently became—as even the most critical of the women were forced + to admit—a much better mother to the little Roschen than many a real + mother might have been. It was, indeed, a sight worth travelling far to + see, this of Andreas washing and dressing the baby in the sunny room at + the back of the shop where hung the cages in which were the choicest of + his birds. Roschen's first conscious memory was of laughing and splashing + in her little tub in the sunshine, while all around her was a carolling of + song. + </p> + <p> + In the course of the years which had drifted by since Andreas came with + his birds to New York that May morning he had not made for himself many + friends. To be a friend of birds a man must have a quiet habit of body, + and great gentleness of nature, and a true tenderness of heart; which + qualities tend also to solitariness, being for the most part harmed rather + than fostered by association with mankind. As suited him well, his + business was not one that called him much abroad, nor that brought him + greatly into contact with his fellows. In his good care the famous stock + of songsters which he had brought with him from the fatherland had + increased prodigiously; and even the sale of nearly all his best old + birds, about the time that Conrad was ill, had worked, in the long run, to + his benefit; for he had taken these birds to one and another of the great + dealers, who thus came to know that in the little shop on Avenue B were to + be found canaries the like of which for tameness and for rare beauty of + note could not be bought elsewhere in all New York. Thereafter, as his + young birds grew up, learning from Andreas himself the lesson of + gentleness, and from his teaching-birds the lesson of sweetness of note, + he had no lack of high-paying customers; so that from his business he + derived an income far in excess of his modest needs. What went with the + overplus was known only to certain of his country-folk, whose ill venture + after greater fortune in America had proved to be but a fiercer struggle + with still greater poverty than they had struggled with at home; and no + doubt the angels also kept track of his modest benefactions, for such is + reputed to be their way. + </p> + <p> + Many a wounded life was healed by these hidden ministrations on the part + of Andreas; and, as rightly followed, great love there was for him in many + a humble heart. But love of this sort is not friendship, for friendship + requires some one plane at least of equality, and also association and + converse, which conditions were lacking in the case of Andreas and those + to whom he gave his aid; for the shyness of his nature led him to keep + himself apart—save when the demand upon his charity was for that + comfort and sympathy which can only be given in person—from those + whose burdens he lightened; so that, for the most part, while the needed + help was given the hand that gave it remained concealed. + </p> + <p> + Yet with a few of his country-folk in New York Andreas had established, in + course of time, relations of warm friendliness. Of his kin only two + cousins were left; for the rich, good uncle, from overmuch eating of his + own delicatessen, had come to a bilious ending; and his uncle's widow, + wise in her generation, had returned to her native town in Saxony, where + she was enabled, by reason of the fortune that the delicatessen-shop had + brought to her, to outshine the local baroness, and presently to attain + the summit of her highest hopes and happiness by wedding an impoverished + local baron, and so becoming a baroness herself. Her two sons were well + pleased with this marriage. They were carrying on a great business in hog + products, and had purchased for themselves fine estates in the country and + fine houses in town. To be able to speak of their mother as "the baroness" + suited them very well. Andreas saw but little of these gilded relatives—who + yet were good-hearted men, and very kindly disposed towards him—for + their magnificent surroundings were appalling to his simple mind. His few + friends were more nearly in his own walk in life, and his friendship with + them had been built up, as substantial friendship should be, by slow + degrees. + </p> + <p> + At the Café Nürnberger, near by his own little shop—a bakery + celebrated for the excellence of its bread, and for the great variety of + its toothsome. German cakes—it was his custom to make daily + purchases. With the plump, rosy Aunt Hedwig, who presided over the bakery, + he passed the good word of the day shyly; he responded shyly to the + friendly nod of the baker, Gottlieb Brekel, when that worthy chanced to be + in the shop; and he shyly greeted a certain jolly Herr Sohnstein, a German + lawyer of distinction, who was about the bakery a great deal and who + popularly was believed to be a suitor for the plump Hedwig's plump hand. + And these shy greetings might have gone on day after day for all eternity—or + at least for so much of it as these several persons were entitled to live + out on earth—without increasing one particle in cordiality, had + there not been one other dweller in the bakery to act as a solvent upon + the bird-dealer's reserve. This was the baker's daughter Minna, a child a + year or two older than Roschen and cast in a sturdier mould. + </p> + <p> + There was that about Andreas which drew all children to him, even as his + birds were drawn to him; and a part of the spell certainly was the love + for children that always was in his heart. The small Minna was disposed + not a little to caprice—for she was a motherless child, and Aunt + Hedwig humored her waywardness a trifle more than was good for her—and + she manifested, usually, a certain haughtiness towards those who sought to + make friends with her. Yet of her own accord one day, when Andreas had + ceased to be a stranger to her, she went up to him and offered him a kiss. + Aunt Hedwig volubly explained to Andreas the honor that had been done him, + and from that moment was disposed herself to be most friendly with him—as + was also the baker, and as was also Herr Sohnstein, when the story of this + extraordinary performance duly was related to them. And thus there began a + real friendship between Andreas and these kindly souls that ever grew + riper as the years went on. Sometimes of an evening, when his birds were + all asleep and he was left lonely, Andreas would step around to the + bakery; and would sit for an hour or so in the little room back of the + shop, listening pleasantly to the talk of Gottlieb and Herr Sohnstein, as + they smoked their long pipes, and even laughing in a quiet way at the + merry sallies thrown into the conversation by Aunt Hedwig as she sat + knitting beside the fire. Andreas himself rarely spoke—it was not + his way; but there was such a sympathetic quality in his silence that his + lack of words passed almost unobserved. Much more attention was attracted + by the fact that he did not smoke—a fact that was looked upon as + most extraordinary. But this also went unheeded after a while, as it well + might in a small room wherein Gottlieb and Herr Sohnstein were smoking + with such vigor that the air was a deep, heavy blue. It was because his + birds did not like smoke that he had given up his pipe, he explained, + simply; and only to Minna did it occur to say, after she had turned the + matter over in her small mind for a while, that the Herr Stoffel must be a + very kind-hearted man to go without smoking because the smell of + tobacco-smoke wasn't nice for his birds. + </p> + <p> + When Andreas took the little Roschen to his home, that sad day after the + funeral, the good Hedwig was among the first of the womenkind to go to him + with tenders of instruction and advice; for while Hedwig was only, as it + were, a matron by brevet, she was deeply impressed by the extent of her + own knowledge in the matter of how motherless children should be raised; + and it is but just to add that this self-confidence was fully warranted by + the good results that had attended upon her care of her brother's child. + Something of the story of Andreas and Christine, and something of what he + had done for her and for her husband, was known in the bakery; and enough + more was guessed to make these friends of his feel towards him, because of + it all, a still stronger and more earnest friendship. Herr Sohnstein, who, + being a lawyer with an extensive practice in the criminal courts, was not + by any means in the habit of praising his fellow-men indiscriminately, + even went so far as to say that Andréas was "better than any of the saints + already." And when Aunt Hedwig, somewhat shocked at this comparison to the + disfavor at a single thrust of the whole body of saints put together, + reproved Herr Sohnstein for his irreverence, he stoutly declared that + while his knowledge of saints was comparatively limited—since they + did not come within the jurisdiction of the courts—he certainly + never had read of one who had shown a finer quality of charity, both in + forgiveness and in self-sacrifice, than that which Andreas had displayed. + </p> + <p> + "Don't you make believe, Hedwig," Herr Sohnstein continued, "that if you + go off after promising yourself to me and marry another fellow, that I'll + take care of him when he's sick, and set him up in business when he gets + well, and wind up by giving him a first-class funeral; and don't you get + it into your head that I'm going to adopt any of your children that are + not mine too—for I'm not a saint already, even if Andreas is." + </p> + <p> + To which general declaration Aunt Hedwig replied, with much spirit, that + in the first place Herr Sohnstein had better wait until she promised to + marry him—or to marry anybody, for that matter—before he took + to preaching to her; that in the second place it was unnecessary for him + to declare that he was not a saint, since only a deaf blind man would be + likely to take him for one; and that in the third place he would do well + to save his breath to cool his broth: at which lively sally they all + laughed together very comfortably. + </p> + <p> + With these good friends Andreas consulted in all important matters + relating to Roschen's well-being. Aunt Hedwig's practical advice in regard + to clothing and food and general care-taking was of high value in the + early years; and it was Gottlieb's suggestion, when the time came for + beginning the sowing of seeds of wisdom in her small mind, that Roschen + should go with his own Minna to the school where the Sisters taught; and + of a Sunday the children went also together to be instructed by the + Redemptorist Fathers in the way of godliness. So these little ones grew in + years and in knowledge and in grace together, and towards each other they + felt a sisterly love. + </p> + <p> + <a name="linkimage-0003" id="linkimage-0003"> + <!-- IMG --></a> + </p> + <div class="fig" style="width:80%"> + <img src="images/278.jpg" alt="Instructed by the Redemptorist Fathers 278 " + width="100%" /><br /> + </div> + <p> + Insensibly, too, as Roschen grew out of childhood into girlhood, her + attitude towards her adoptive father changed. In the great matters of her + life he still cared for her, planning always for her good, and withholding + from her nothing suited to her station in life that money could buy. In + the matter of her music, Aunt Hedwig declared that he was positively + extravagant; yet accepted in good part his excuse that a voice so + beautiful deserved to be well trained. It was her mother's voice alive + again, he said; and as he spoke, Aunt Hedwig saw that there were tears in + his eyes. But while Andreas still continued the larger of his parental + duties, in the smaller matters of every-day life his adopted daughter now + cared for him; so beginning to pay the debt (though to neither of them, + such was their love for each other, did any thought of debt or of payment + ever occur) that she owed him for all his goodness to her and to her dead + father and mother in the past. + </p> + <p> + In truth, it was a pretty sight to see Roschen first beginning to play at + keeping house for her father—for so she always called him—and + then, in a little while, keeping house for him most excellently in real + earnest. Here, again, the good qualities of Aunt Hedwig came to the front, + for to her intelligent direction was due the rather surprising success + that attended Roschen's ambitious attempt to become so early a <i>hausfrau</i>. + Time and again was a great culinary disaster averted by a rapid dash on + Roschen's part from her imperilled home to the bakery, where Aunt Hedwig's + advice was quickly obtained and then was promptly acted upon. And if + sometimes the advice came too late to avert the catastrophe—as on + that memorable and dreadful day when Roschen boiled her sausage-dumplings + without tying them in a bag—the lessons taught by calamitous + experience caused only passing trouble, and tended, in the long-run, to + good. + </p> + <p> + Indeed, by the time that Roschen was sixteen years old, and had so far + passed through her apprenticeship that she no longer was compelled to make + sudden and frantic appeals to Aunt Hedwig for aid, the little household + over which she presided so blithely was very admirably managed; and it + certainly was as quaint and as pretty an establishment as could be found + anywhere upon the whole round globe. Whoever entered the little shop was + greeted with such a thrilling and warbling of sweet notes that all the air + seemed quivering with music, and the leader of the bird choir was a + certain wonderful songster that Andreas had named the Kronprinz, and for + which he repeatedly had refused quite fabulous sums. Andreas himself had + bred the Kronprinz, and had given him the education that now made him such + a wonder among birds, and that made him also of such great value as an + instructor of the young birds whose musical education was still to be + gained. After his adopted daughter, Andreas held this bird, and justly, to + be the most precious thing that he owned. + </p> + <p> + But far sweeter than the singing of the prized Kronprinz—at least, + to any but a bird-fancier's ears—was the singing that usually was to + be heard above the trilling of the canaries, and that came from the room + at the back of the shop where Roschen was engaged in her housewifely + duties. It was such music as the angels made, Andreas declared, yet + thinking most of all of one angel voice, the memory of which while still + on earth was very dear to him; and even in the case of those who were + moved by no tender association of the sweet tones of the living and the + dead this estimate of Roschen's singing did not seem unduly high. Gustav + Strauss, the son of the great bird-dealer over in the rich part of the + town, vowed that Andreas was entirely right in his angelic comparison; and + Ludwig Bauer, the young shoemaker, who lived next door but one, went even + further, and said that Hoschen's voice was as much sweeter than any mere + angel's voice as Roschen herself was sweeter and better than all the + angels in Paradise combined. There was nothing halting nor half-way in + Ludwig Bauer's opinion in this matter, it will be observed. + </p> + <p> + The little room wherein Roschen sang so sweetly while at her work was + their kitchen and dining-room and parlor all in one. As noon-time drew + near there would come out into the shop from this room, through the open + door-way, such succulent and enticing odors of roasting pork and stewing + onions and boiling cabbages, that even Bielfrak—as the Spitz dog, + who was chained as a guard close beneath the cage of the Kronprinz, + appropriately was named—would fall to licking his chops as he + hungrily sniffed these smells delectable; and Andreas suddenly would + discover how hungry he was, and would make occasion to go to the door-way + that he might see if the setting of the table was begun. + </p> + <p> + "Patience, father! Presently! You are as bad as Bielfrak himself!" Roschen + would say; and as this attribution of gluttony to her father was a + time-honored joke between them, they always would laugh over it + pleasantly. And then Andreas would stand and watch his little <i>hausfrau</i> + with a far-away look in his gentle blue eyes as she bustled about her work + in the sunny room, her pretty dimpled arms bared to above the elbow, her + lovely cheeks (because of much stooping over the fire) brighter even than + the roses after which she had been named, her golden hair done up in a + trig, tight knot (as Aunt Hedwig had taught her was the proper way for + hair to be arranged while cooking was going on), and over her tidy print + gown a great white apron, fashioned in an ancient German shape, as guard + against the splash-ings and spillings which even the most careful of cooks + cannot always control. In the sunny windows, opening to the south, flowers + were growing; the Dutch clock, with pendulous weights made in the + similitude of pine-cones, ticked against the wall merrily; Mädchen, the + cat—who, being most prolific of kittens, notoriously belied her name—sat + bunched up in exceeding comfort on a space expressly left for her upon the + sunny window-ledge among the plants; steam arose in light clouds from the + various pots upon the stove, and in the middle of the little room the + table stood ready for the dinner to be served. + </p> + <p> + It was a very cheerful, home-like picture this; and yet many a time, as + Andreas stood in the doorway and contemplated it, there would be tears in + his eyes, and a strange feeling, half of glad thankfulness, half of very + sorrowful longing, in his heart. She was so like her dead mother! In look, + in speech, in motions of the body, in turns of the head, and in gestures + of the hands she was Christine over again. Sometimes Andreas would forget + his fifty years and all the sorrows of hope destroyed and irrevocable + death-parting which his fifty years had brought him, and would fancy for a + moment that he was young again, and that the dearest wish of his life was + here fulfilled. And then she would call him "Father!" and his moment's + dream of happiness would die coldly in his heart. Yet would there come to + him always an after-glow of solacing warmth, as comforting thoughts would + steal in upon him of the happiness not a dream—different from that + which he had hoped for in his youth, but most sweet and real—that + God's goodness had given him in these his later years. + </p> + <p> + Andreas truly was old Andreas now. As men's lives go, his age was not + great; but sorrow had made him, as it had made many another man, far older + than the mere number of years which he had lived. No, great store of + strength had been his at the beginning, and the heart-break that he had + suffered that day of his landing in the New World, when faith and love and + hope all died together at a single blow, was less a sentimental figure + than a physical reality. A like pang, yet not so keen, had wrenched him + when he first came to know of Christine's sharp trial of poverty, and + another seized him in the night-time following that sad day when she + passed away from earth. And now of late, without any cause at all, these + pangs had come again. Andreas was glad that they had come always when he + was alone; for the pain was too searching to be wholly hidden, and his + strong desire was that Roschen should be spared all knowledge of his + suffering. In his own mind he perceived quite clearly what before long + must come to pass. And it was a good happening, he thought, that in + Gottlieb Brekel and Aunt Hedwig, and the excellent Herr Sohnstein, who, + being a lawyer, could care well for the little store in the bank and for + the little house that Andreas now owned, Roschen had such stanch and + worthy friends. The only signs of these thoughts which Roschen perceived + was that her father grew much keener in the matter of selling his birds at + high prices; and that she was somewhat seriously reproved when, in her + housekeeping or in her occasional expeditions to the fine shops in Grand + Street, she ventured upon any small extravagance. But Roschen would laugh + when thus reproved, and would declare that her father, who long had been a + glutton, was become a miser already in his old age; whereat Andreas also + would laugh, yet not quite so heartily as Roschen liked to hear him laugh + when she cracked her little jokes upon him, and would say that sometimes a + miser was not thought by his heirs so bad a fellow when they found what a + snug little fortune he had left behind him all safe in the bank. + </p> + <p> + It was because of these thoughts, which he kept hidden from her, that + Andreas began to take a much more active interest in what Roschen had to + say from time to time about certain young men of her acquaintance. The + young man of whom she spoke most frequently, and with a frank + friendliness, was the handsome young assistant baker at the Café + Nürnberger; a very capable young fellow, Hans Kuhn by name, who of late + had brought that excellent bakery into great vogue because of the almost + miraculously good lebkuchen which he baked there. But Andreas was not at + all alarmed by this open friendship; for Hans and the stout Minna Brekel + were to be married presently, and Roschen's feeling obviously was no more + than hearty good-will towards the lover of her dear sister-friend. Fine + chatterings she and Minna had, as Andreas inferred from her occasional + brief reports of them, about the prodigious matrimonial event that was so + near at hand. As Andreas also inferred, these chatterings put various + notions of an exciting and somewhat disturbing sort into Roschen's little + head. If one young girl might get married, so might another, no doubt she + thought; and it is conceivable that from this mental statement of a + rational abstract possibility her thoughts may have passed on to + consideration of the concrete possibilities involved in her own relations + with the good-looking Gustav Strauss, son of the rich bird-dealer, or with + the good-looking young shoemaker, Ludwig Bauer, who lived next door but + one. + </p> + <p> + It is certain that when Roschen had arrived at the dignity of eighteen + years, and her hitherto slim figure had taken on quite a plump, pleasing + womanly roundness, the business visits of the young Herr Strauss to the + little bird shop on the East Side became, as it struck Andreas, rather + curiously frequent. And about this time, also, their neighbor Ludwig + developed a very extraordinary interest in the business of raising + canary-birds. It was a business that he long had thought of engaging in, + he explained; and he truly did exhibit an aptitude in comprehending and in + practising its mysteries that greatly exalted him in the little + bird-dealer's esteem. The birds all seemed to recognize a friend in him; + and even those which were but partially tamed, and were gentle only with + Andreas himself, would perch willingly upon his hand. With Andreas it long + had been a maxim that canary-birds were rare judges of human character, + and the testimonial thus given to Lud-wig's worth counted with him for a + great deal—as did also the quite converse opinion of the birds in + regard to the young Herr Strauss: from whom, notwithstanding his training + in the care of their kind, they always flew away, and whose mere presence + in the shop sufficed to make every bird ruffle himself and to chirp + angrily in his cage. Yet Herr Strauss was most agreeable in his manners, + and was a very personable young man. As for his riches, they spoke for + themselves in his fine attire and in his fine gold watch and chain; and he + also spoke for them, making frequent allusions to his comfortable present + position in the world as his father's partner, and to his still more + comfortable prospective position as his father's sole heir. + </p> + <p> + Ludwig, on the other hand, could not boast of any great amount of gilding + upon, as Andreas believed it to be, the sterling metal of which he was + made. But he was by no means what would be considered by the dwellers on + the East Side a poor man. He was a steady and a good master-workman, with + three or four apprentices under him; and all day long there was to be + heard in his shop the cheerful, business-like sound of the thumping of + short hammers on lap-stones, together with the loud clicking of the + sewing-machine on which the delicate stitching of uppers was done. In the + window, screened with a green curtain of growing vines—as is the + pretty custom with most of the German shoemakers on the East Side—there + always might be seen a pair or two of well-made stout shoes drying in the + sunshine on their lasts; and with these a half-dozen or more pairs of + shoes newly soled and heeled in a substantial, workmanlike fashion that + would have done credit to Hans Sachs himself. Making and mending together, + it was a very good business that Ludwig was doing; each year a better + balance was lodged to his credit in the savings-bank, and the great golden + boot that hung above his door-way told no more than the truth of the good + work that was done and of the good money that was well earned within. From + the stand-point of public opinion on the East Side, this thriving young + shoemaker already was a man of substance, whose still more substantial + future was assured. + </p> + <p> + There was in the nature of Ludwig much the same simplicity and gentleness + that characterized Andreas—which common qualities, no doubt, had + much to do with the strong friendship that there was between them; and all + his neighbors, remembering how good a son he had been, and knowing also + how deeply he still sorrowed for the dear mother lost to him in death, + were more than ready to vouch for the goodness of his heart. Indeed, it + was while trying to comfort him a little after this great sorrow fell upon + him that Roschen first felt towards him something more than the passing + interest that every maiden reasonably feels in every seemly young man. Her + disposition towards him, to be sure, even when thus stimulated by a + sympathetic melancholy, was only that of friendliness; but it evidently + was a friendliness so cordial and so sincere that it made quite a + tolerable foundation upon which Ludwig freely built fine air-castles of + hope. For his disposition towards Roschen was altogether that of a lover—as + anybody might have known after hearing that decided expression of his + opinion to the effect that all the angels singing together could not make + music so sweet as the music of her voice. + </p> + <p> + In due time, in accordance with the decorous German custom, both of these + young men made formal application to Andreas for permission to be ranked + formally as Roschen's suitors; and, as it chanced, they both preferred + their requests upon the same day. The young Herr Strauss undeniably had + some strong points to make in his own favor; and he made them, to do him + justice, without any hesitation or false modesty. As he truly said—speaking + with an easy assurance, and airily fingering his gold watch-chain as he + spoke—in marrying him Roschen would make an excellent match. In + rather marked contrast with this justifiable yet not wholly pleasing + assumption of self-importance, was the modest tone in which Ludwig urged + his suit; yet was Andreas not unfavorably impressed by the fact that he + dwelt less upon his deserts than upon his desire to be deserving; and that + in connection with the creditable presentment that he made of the + condition of his worldly affairs he did not insist, as the Herr Strauss + had insisted, upon a minute examination of Roschen's dowry. As bearing + indirectly yet forcibly upon a general consideration of the cases of these + young men, the statement may be added that one of them had made for his + proposed father-in-law several excellent pairs of shoes, while the other + had made for—or, rather, against—him only a series of + uncommonly sharp bargains. + </p> + <p> + To neither of the lovers did Andreas give an immediate answer. He must + think a little, he said. The self-esteem of the Herr Strauss was a trifle + ruffled by the suggestion that in such a case waiting of any sort was + necessary; it seemed to him that an offer so desirable as that which he + had made was entitled to instant acceptance. But Ludwig noted a certain + trembling in the voice that bade him wait, and was not so completely + engrossed with his own hopes of happiness but that he could perceive its + cause and could feel sorrow for it. All these years had Andreas cared for + this sweet Roschen, and had cherished her as his dearest treasure; and + now, when the best time of her life had come, he was asked to give her up + to a love that rested its claim for recognition upon nothing more + substantial than promises of care taking which the future might or might + not make good. That Andreas, under such circumstances, even should + consider his request, touched Ludwig's good heart with gratitude; and the + love that he had for a long while felt towards the old man led him now to + pat an arm around his shoulder, as a son might have done, and to tell him + that the home which he had ready for Roschen was ready for Roschen's + father too. And Lud wig's voice also trembled a little. Andreas did not + speak, but he put his thin hand into the big brown hand—much stained + with the dark wax which shoemakers use and with long handling of leather—that + Ludwig held out to him; and when they had stood together thus + affectionately for a little time they parted, silently. + </p> + <p> + In truth, Andreas was more deeply moved than even Ludwig, for all his + affectionate sympathy, had divined. His love for Roschen was a double + love. With the love of a father he had watched over her these many years; + yet even stronger had come to be his love for her as her mother born + again. Sometimes, for whole days together, confusing the past with the + present, he would call her Christine; and in his heart he ever gave + greater room to the fancy that the life which he had hoped for was + realized, and that the life which he was living was a dream. No wonder, + then, that he asked for a little time in which to school himself to meet + the fate that at a single blow brought destruction to his dear home on + earth and to his dearer castle in the air. + </p> + <p> + Roschen was abroad that afternoon, and as Andreas, alone with his birds, + turned over in his mind the answers which he must give to these young men—who + sought to take to themselves, for the greater pleasure of their young + lives, the single happiness which his old life had left to it—a + great bitterness possessed his soul. When they had so much and he so + little, it was cruel of them to seek to rob him thus, he thought. And + their love, after all, was but the growth of a day, while his love had + been growing steadily for forty years. Roschen was to him at once the + sweetheart of his youth and the dear daughter of his age. How could these + young fellows have the effrontery to place their own light love fancies in + rivalry with this profound love of his that was rooted in all the years of + a lifetime? His thoughts went back to those long-past days when he and + Christine first had known each other as little children on the sunny + slopes of the Andreas-berg, and when began the love that still was a + living reality. And then he followed downward through the years his own + love-story from this its beginning—the promise made in the twilight, + while the south wind, laden with the sweet smell of the pine-trees of the + Schwarzwald, played about them; the hard parting; his joyous journey with + his birds westward across the sea; the black day when that journey ended; + the years of sorrow which closed in still keener sorrow when his Christine + was lost to him utterly in death; and then through the later years, which + ever grew brighter and happier as his love for Christine was born anew and + lived its strange, half-real life in his love for Christine's child, who + also was the daughter given him by Heaven to cheer and comfort him in his + old age. And now at the end of it all he was asked to give to another this + sweet flower of love that for his happiness, almost by a miracle, as it + seemed, a second time had bloomed. Was not this asking more of him, he + thought, than rightly should be asked? + </p> + <p> + So heavy was the load of bitterness that oppressed him that even the + singing of the Kronprinz, who was moved to break forth into song just + then, failed for a time to arouse him. Yet presently the sweet sound + penetrated the thick substance of his sorrow, and slowly turned the + current of his sombre thoughts. Andreas loved all music; but because of + the long train of associations which it invoked, and because of his + skilled knowledge of its quality, there was no music so sweet to him as + the singing of a bird. And when the singer was the Kronprinz, who sang + with a mellow sweetness rare and wonderful, the music never failed to move + his tender nature to its very depths. And so, as he listened to the + singing of his bird, gentler and better thoughts possessed him; and then + he reproached himself for the selfishness that had so filled his heart. He + had no right, he thought, to stand in the way of Roschen's happiness—to + compel her to take the old love that he had to give in place of the fresh + young love that was offered to her. It was only a foolish fancy, this that + he had cherished, that she was his sweetheart of long ago; it was the + rational truth that he had to deal with—that she was his daughter, + who had given him in full measure a daughter's love and duty, and for whom + now, as was a father's duty, he must secure a good husband, who would care + for her well and loyally when death had taken her father from her. This + was the right conclusion, but all the strength of his will was required to + bring him to it; and when at last He said to himself that what so plainly + was right should be firmly done, the color suddenly left his face, and + there went through his heart the sharp pang that he had learned to dread + because of the agony of it. So wrenching was the pain that he could not + repress a cry; but it was not a loud cry, and the sound of it was lost in + the glad carolling of the Kronprinz's song. + </p> + <p> + When Roschen came home, a little later, she was frightened by finding her + father looking so pale and worn; but the sight of her dear face, and her + loving looks and words, revived him quickly, and her fear passed by. And + she forgot her fear the sooner because of the momentous question which he + then opened to her; for this last sharp seizure, keener than any that had + preceded it, had warned Andreas that the duty which he had to do should + not be delayed. + </p> + <p> + Very tenderly and lovingly did he speak of this heart matter to his little + rose, his Roschen, as she sat beside him on a low stool, after the + childish habit that she never had relinquished, while her head was nestled + against his breast, and while he stroked her fair hair gently with his + thin, delicate hand. And as he made clear to her all that she was to know, + and explained to her that the decision between these rival lovers, or the + rejection of them both, must be made by herself, the rosiness of this + pretty Roschen became a deep crimson, and her head sank down upon her + father's breast so that her face was hid from him; and as his arms clasped + her closely to this loving haven she fell to crying gently there, as in + such cases is a proper maiden's rather unreasonable way. + </p> + <p> + "Does the thought of lovers make thee sad, my little one?" Andreas asked; + and he could not quite stifle, though he tried hard to stifle, the hope + that perhaps Roschen might settle this present matter so that for a little + time longer she still would be wholly his own. + </p> + <p> + "It is not the thought of lovers, dear father," Roschen answered, and her + voice was low and broken, "but the thought that anything should take me + away from thee." + </p> + <p> + The hope grew larger in the heart of Andreas, but he said: "The young Herr + Strauss will make thee a fine husband, my daughter. He is a rich young man + already, and—" + </p> + <p> + But Roschen promptly cut short this eulogy by raising her head abruptly + and saying, with great decision: "He is a horrid young man, and nothing is + good about him at all. He tries to cheat thee whenever he comes here to + buy our birds; and—and he has said things to me; and he—and he + tried to kiss me. Ugh! I will have nothing to do with the Herr Strauss—nothing + at all!" + </p> + <p> + As she spoke, Roschen held up her head firmly and looked Andreas straight + in the eyes. Her own eyes quite sparkled with anger, for all the tears + that were in them; and the tone in which she pronounced the name of the + Herr Strauss suggested pointedly that he was one of the various unpleasant + creatures which humanity disposes of with tongs. All this was so emphatic + that Andreas suffered his hope to grow yet stronger; for now, certainly, + one of these lovers was put safely out of his way. + </p> + <p> + "And Ludwig, my little one?" + </p> + <p> + Roschen did not speak, but the angry sparkle that was in her eyes gave + place to a softer and much pleasanter brightness, and a still deeper + crimson showed in the pretty face that she hid again suddenly upon her + father's breast. + </p> + <p> + "And Ludwig?" Andreas repeated. + </p> + <p> + But still Roschen did not speak. She put her arms around her father's + neck, and nestled her head beneath his chin in a lovingly coaxing way that + she had devised when she was a little child; and then she fell again to + sobbing gently. + </p> + <p> + "Hast thou, then, nothing to say of this friend of ours, my daughter?" + Andreas spoke eagerly, his hope being very strong within him now; for he + was not versed in the ways of maidens, and the silence that would have + been so eloquent to another woman or to a wiser man conveyed a very false + notion to his mind. + </p> + <p> + "Thou hast told me, dear father, that Ludwig makes very good shoes," + Roschen said at last, speaking hesitatingly, and in a voice so low that it + was little more than a whisper. + </p> + <p> + "Yes," Andreas answered, somewhat taken aback by the irrelevant and very + matter-of-fact nature of this remark; "yes, Ludwig makes good shoes." + </p> + <p> + "And thou likest those which he has made for thee?" + </p> + <p> + "Truly. They are good shoes. They have cured my corns." Andreas spoke with + feeling. He was sincerely grateful to Ludwig for having cured his corns. + "But it is not of Ludwig's shoes that we are talking now, my Roschen," he + went on. "It is of Ludwig himself. Hast thou nothing to say in answer to + what he asks?" + </p> + <p> + Through her tears Roschen laughed a little, and she pressed her head still + more closely beneath her father's chin. "Thou dear foolish one," she said, + "canst thou not understand?" And then, after a moment of silence, she went + on: "Hast thou not seen, dear father, how all the birds love Ludwig, and + of their own accord go to him?" + </p> + <p> + Then a little light broke in upon Andreas, and the hope that he had + cherished began to pale; but he answered stoutly: "Yes, the birds love + him, for he is a good young man. And thou, my daughter?" + </p> + <p> + And Roschen answered in a voice so low and tremulous that Andreas divined + rather than heard the words she spoke: "Perhaps it is with me also, dear + father, as it is with the birds!" + </p> + <p> + <a name="linkimage-0004" id="linkimage-0004"> + <!-- IMG --></a> + </p> + <div class="fig" style="width:80%"> + <img src="images/298.jpg" alt="Perhaps It is With Me Also 298 " + width="100%" /><br /> + </div> + <p> + For a little time there was silence—for Andreas did not trust + himself to speak while his hope was dying in his heart—then he + raised the pretty head from its resting-place upon his breast, and as he + kissed the forehead that was so like the dead Christine's. + </p> + <p> + "'Perhaps it is with me also, dear father, as it is with the bird'" he + said, reverently and tenderly: "For thy good and happiness, my dear one, + may God's will be done." And as he clasped her again to him closely, the + Kronprinz once more lifted up his voice in sweetest song. + </p> + <p> + When at last Roschen raised her rosy, happy face from her father's breast, + she was so full of the wonder that had come to pass that she did not + perceive his weary look, nor how pale he was; yet less pale now than a + little time before when his face was unseen by her. + </p> + <p> + And presently the rosiness of this sweet Roschen grew still deeper as the + shop door opened, with a great tinkling of its little bell, and Ludwig + entered. Andreas arose from his chair slowly—but neither of them + noticed how feeble and labored were his motions, like those of a weak old + man—and clasped in both of his own Ludwig's great brown hand, while + with a look of love he said: "It is as thou wouldst have it, my son. This + dear rose of my growing will bloom in thy garden now"—and he led + Ludwig to where Roschen, who indeed was a true rose just then, was + standing and put her hand in his. + </p> + <p> + And then, with a wistful eagerness, he went on: "And thou wilt care for + her very tenderly and well, in my place? Thou canst not understand what my + love has been; part of it, I know, has been foolishness—and that + which thou wilt give her, if it be strong and steadfast, will be far + better than ever was mine. For it is the way of life"—and here the + voice of Andreas trembled and fell a little—"that for young hearts + love also must be young." + </p> + <p> + "With God's help, dear father, I will be true and good to her," Ludwig + answered, speaking with a stout heartiness that gave the ring of truth to + his words; "and I will care well for her and for thee too." + </p> + <p> + "For me it will not be long," Andreas answered; "but give the care which + thou wouldst have given to me to these my birds." + </p> + <p> + "Do not make us sad to-day, dear father, by such gloomy words," said + Roschen, as she put her arms around his neck. "To-day a beautiful time of + happiness has begun for us." + </p> + <p> + "Truly a beautiful time of happiness has begun," Andreas answered; "and I + thank God that I have seen its beginning—for when grief comes to + thee, and grief must come to us all, my daughter, thou hast now a strong + young heart to stay and comfort thee. Yes, this is truly the beginning of + a happy time." It was with a very tender smile that Andreas spoke these + cheery words; and he added, cheerily: "Now go out into the Square, my + children, and say to each other the words which I know are in your hearts. + I will be glad in your happiness as I sit here among my birds." + </p> + <p> + And so Andreas, for the second time in his life, was left alone with his + birds. + </p> + <p> + As he sat there, desolate, he buried his face in his hands, and between + his thin fingers there was a glistening of tears. It was so hard to bear! + They might have waited just a little while, he thought; it would not have + been very long. For he forgot, and perhaps it would be unfair to blame him + for forgetting, his own desire that before that little time should pass + his Roschen should have assured to her the good care-taker whom she surely + would need when the season of sorrow came. A little thrill of pain, a + premonition of which he knew the meaning, ran through him. + </p> + <p> + Then it was that the Kronprinz began to sing. The notes at first were low + and liquid, and they fell soothingly upon the ears, and so into the heart + of this poor Andreas; and as they rose higher and fuller and clearer, + light began to show for him where only darkness had been. The other birds, + fired to emulation by these mellow warblings, joined in a sweet chorus, + above which the strong rich notes of the Kronprinz rose in triumphant + waves of harmony. And gladness came then into the heart of Andreas, and + great thankfulness; for as the music of the birds exalted him he seemed to + see with a strange clearness into the depths of the future, and all that + he saw there promised well for those whom he loved. Such wonderful music + was this that the very air about him seemed to be growing goldenly + radiant; and with a certain awe creeping into his heart he seemed to hear + low echoes of a music even more ravishingly beautiful that came faintly + yet with a bell-like clearness from very far away. + </p> + <p> + Truly there was something strange about this music, for even Bielfrak, who + was grown to be a deaf, rheumatic old dog now, heard it and was greatly + moved by it. From his comfortable rug in the corner he raised himself + painfully upon his haunches, and, pointing his noise upward, uttered a + long melancholy howl. Then he came by slow effort across the room to where + his master sat and laid his head upon his master's knee. And there was a + puzzled look upon Bielfrak's face, for never before had he thus manifested + the love that was in his honest heart without finding a quick response to + it in the gentle touch of his master's hand. Yet now that hand remained + most strangely still, and it was strangely white, and Bielfrak drew back + suddenly from touching it—finding it most strangely cold. + </p> + <p> + <a name="linkimage-0005" id="linkimage-0005"> + <!-- IMG --></a> + </p> + <div class="fig" style="width:80%"> + <img src="images/303.jpg" alt="Page 286 303 " width="100%" /><br /> + </div> + <p> + The birds had been frightened into silence by Bielfrak's howl, but now + they all burst forth again into the song of strange and wonderful + sweetness that of a sudden they had learned to sing. In waves of harmony + the chorus rose and fell, and above all sounded the notes of the + Kronprinz, rich, full, clear, so delicately perfect as to seem a blending + of sunlight and of sound. And in this song there was a strain that seemed + to tell of restful triumph and eternal joy. And on the gentle, kindly face + of Andreas, as he sat there so very quietly while all the air around him + with these sweet sounds was vibrant, there was a most tender smile that + told of perfect peace. + </p> + <div style="height: 6em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + + + + + +End of Project Gutenberg's An Idyl Of The East Side, by Thomas A. 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Janvier + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: An Idyl Of The East Side + 1891 + +Author: Thomas A. Janvier + +Illustrator: W. T. Smedley + +Release Date: December 10, 2007 [EBook #23809] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK AN IDYL OF THE EAST SIDE *** + + + + +Produced by David Widger + + + + + + +AN IDYL OF THE EAST SIDE + +By Thomas A. Janvier + +Copyright, 1891, by Harper & Brothers + + +In the matter of raising canary-birds--at once strong of body and of +note, tamed to associate with humanity on rarely friendly terms, and +taught to sing with a sweetness nothing short of heavenly--Andreas +Stoffel was second to none. And this was not by any means surprising, +for he had been born (and for its saintly patron had been christened) +close by the small old town of Andreasberg: which stands barely +within the verge of the Black Forest, on the southern declivity of the +Harz--and which, while famous for its mines, is renowned above all +other cities for the excellence of the bird songsters which there and +thereabouts are raised. + +Canary-birds had been the close companions of this good Andreas through +all the fifty years of his lifetime. They had sung their sweet song of +rejoicing at his birth--when the storks had brought him one day, while +his father was far underground at work in the mines, and was vastly well +pleased, when he came home all grimy at night, to find what a brave +boy God had sent him by these winged messengers. They had sung over his +cradle as his mother, knitting, rocked it in the midst of the long +patch of sunlight that came through the low, wide window of the +_bauernhaus_--the comfortable home with high-peaked roof, partly +thatched and partly shingled, and with great drooping eaves, that was +nooked snugly on the warm southern slope of the Andreasberg beside a +little stream. + +[Illustration: High-peaked roof, partly thatched 258] + +They had sung him awake many and many a bright summer morning; and one +of his tenderest memories of the time when he was a very little boy--and +was put to bed, as little boys should be, at sundown--was of their +faint, irregular, sleepy-headed chirpings and twitterings as they +settled themselves to slumber on their perches for the night. + +And when the time came that Andreas, grown to man's estate, being +one-and-twenty years old, but not to man's strength, for he was small of +stature and frail, was left lonely in the world--the good father killed +by a rock-fall in the mines, and the dear mother thereafter pining away +from earth, and so to the heaven that gave her husband back to her--it +was his house-mates the birds who did their best to cheer him with their +songs. And presently, as it seemed to him, these songs began to tell of +new happiness in a new home far away across the mountains and beyond the +sea--in that distant America where already his father's brother dwelt, +and whereof he had heard wonderful stories of splendors and of riches +incalculable all his life long. Indeed, the adventurous uncle had +prospered amazingly in the twenty years of his American exile: rising, +in due course, from the position of a young man of most promiscuous all +work in a delicatessen shop in New York to the position of owner of the +business, shop and all. + +To go to a land where such things as this were possible seemed to +Andreas most wise; and to be near his uncle, and the aunt and cousins +whom he had never seen, his sole remaining kin, held out to him a +pleasant promise of cheer and comfort in his loneliness. + +But, in very truth, the sweet burden of the song of his birds was not +born of thoughts of mere commonplace family affection and commonplace +worldly wealth. Far more precious than these was the motive of the +music that Andreas listened to and understood, and yet scarcely would +acknowledge, even to himself; for in America it was that Christine now +had her home--and that which set his heartstrings a-thrilling, as he +listened to the song of his birds, was the deep, pure melody of love. + +They had been children together, he and Christine, their homes side by +side on the flanks of the Andreasberg; and when, three years before, +she had gone with her father and her mother on the long journey +westward, the heart of Andreas Stoffel had gone with her, and only his +body was left behind among the mountains of the Harz. And Christine had +dulled to him a little the keen edge of the sorrow of their parting by +admitting that she left her own heart in the place of the heart that she +bore away. + +More than once had the rich uncle, owner of the delicatessen shop in New +York, written to urge that his nephew--whose frailty of body made him +unfit to enter upon the hard life of a worker in the mines--should +come to America; and with his large knowledge of affairs the uncle had +explained that the best bill of exchange in which money could be carried +from Andreasberg to New York was canary-birds, that could be bought for +comparatively little in the German town, and that would be worth in the +American city a very great sum. And now on this shrewd advice Andreas +acted. The dear old _bauernhaus_ was sold, and its furnishing with +it; and all the money thus gained, together with the greater sum that, +little by little, his father had added to the store in the old leather +bag (saving only what the journey would cost) was spent in buying the +finest canary-birds which money could buy; so that for a long while +after that time Andreasberg was desolate, for all of its sweetest +singers were gone. + +Thus it fell out that even in the time of his long journey his birds +still sang to him; and his fellow-travellers by land and sea regarded +curiously this slim, pale youth, who shyly kept apart from human +converse and communed with his companions the birds. And so lovingly +well did Andreas care for his little feathered friends that not one died +throughout the whole long passage; and as the ship came up the beautiful +bay of New York on a sunny May morning, while Andreas stood on the deck +with his cages about him, very blithely and sweetly did the birds sing +their hopeful song of greeting to the New World. + +But it was a false song of hope, after all. Hearts were fickle thirty +years ago, even as hearts are fickle to-day; and the first news that +Andreas heard when he was come to his uncle's home (a very fine home, +over a very fine shop, indeed) was that Christine had been a twelvemonth +married--in very complete forgetfulness of all her fine words about the +heart left behind her, and of all her fine promises that she would be +true! + +That there be such things as broken hearts is an open question. Yet when +this news came suddenly to Andreas a keen agony of pain went through +his heart as though it were really breaking; and with his hands pressed +tightly against his breast, and with a face as pale as death itself, he +fell to the floor. He would have died then very willingly; and it was +very unwillingly--the fierce pain leaving him as suddenly as it had +come--that he returned to life. Whatever may be said for or against the +probability of broken hearts, there can be no question as to the verity +of broken lives. That day, assuredly, the life of Andreas Stoffel was +broken, and it never wholly mended again. For a while even the song of +his birds lost all its sweetness, and seemed to him but a discordant +sound. + +Yet even a broken life, until it be snuffed out entirely, must battle in +the world for standing-room. Luckily for Andreas, there was no need for +him to question how his own particular battle should be made. The +shape in which his little store of worldly wealth was cast obviously +determined the lines on which he should seek maintenance. It was plain +that by the rearing and the selling of canary-birds he must gain support +until the time should come (and he hoped that it would come soon) when +he might find release from this earth, where love so soon grows false +and cold. + +The rich uncle, who was a kind-hearted man, gave his help in the +matter of finding a shop wherein the canary-bird business might be +advantageously carried on, and gave also the benefit of his commercial +wisdom and knowledge of American ways. And so, with no great difficulty, +Andreas was soon established in a snug little place of his own on the +East Side; where the friendly German speech sounded almost constantly +in his ears, and where the friendly German customs obtained almost as +completely as in his own dear German home. But, after all, the change +was a dismal one. As his unaccustomed nose was assailed by the rank +oil-vapors blown across from Hunter's Point he longed regretfully for +the fresh, aromatic air that the south winds swept up and over his old +home from the pines of the Schwarz-wald; and the contrast was a sorry +one between a home on the slopes of the Harz Mountains and a home in +Avenue B. + +Yet had these been his only sorrows, and had he borne them--as he had +hoped to bear them--with Christine, his lot would have been anything +but hard. It was the deep heart-wound that he had suffered that made his +life for many a year a very dreary one; too dreary for him to find +much pleasure even in the singing of his birds. Now and again he met +Christine. At their first meeting--in his uncle's fine parlor over the +fine delicatessen shop, one Sunday afternoon--she was, as she well might +be, confused in her speech and very shamefaced in her ways. Her husband +was with her, quite a prosperous person, so Andreas was told, who +had built up a great business in the pork and sausage line. He was a +loud-voiced, merry man; and he aired his wit freely, though evidently +with no intent to be unkind, upon the lover out of whose lucklessness +his own luck had come. Even as pretty a girl as Christine could not +have more than one husband at a time, said this big Conrad, with great +good-humor; and so, since they could not both marry her, Andreas would +do well to stop crying over spilled milk. They all would be very good +friends, he added, and Andreas would be godfather to the first child. He +put out his big hand as he made this proffer of friendship; and although +Andreas could not refuse to clasp it, there was not, in truth, any great +store of friendliness for Christine's loud-voiced husband in his heart. +So soon as this was possible, he was glad to get away from the merry +Sunday afternoon gathering in his uncle's fine parlor to the more +sympathetic society of his birds. Yet there did not seem to him much +music in the singing of his birds that day. + +Christine was vastly proud of her big, rosy-faced, noisy husband, whose +sausage-making greatly prospered, and to whom the American dollars +rolled in bravely. But even in these days of her good-luck she sometimes +found herself thinking--when Conrad's rough love-making was still +further roughened, and his noisiness greatly increased, by too free +draughts of heady German beer--of the gentler ways and constant +tenderness of her earlier lover, whose love, with her own promise to be +true to it, she had so lightly cast aside. Thoughts of this sort, it is +true, did not often trouble her, but now and then they gave her a little +heart-pang; and the pang would be intensified, sometimes, as the thought +also would come to her that perhaps it was because she had broken +her plighted troth that her many prayers to become a mother remained +unanswered. + +As time went on, Christine's sorrows came to be of a more instant sort. +Her too jolly husband's fondness for heady beer grew upon him, and with +its increase came a decrease in the success that until then had been +attendent upon his sausage-making. His business fell away from him by +degrees into soberer and steadier hands, which had the effect of making +him take to stronger drinks than beer in order that he might the more +effectually forget his troubles. He lost his merriness, and somewhat of +his loudness, and became sullen; and the wolf always was shrewdly near +the door. Thus, in a very bad way indeed, things went on for half +a dozen years; then the big Conrad, what with drink and worry, fell +ill--so ill, that for a long while he lay close to the open jaws of +Death. + +No one ever knew--though several people quite accurately guessed--why +the wolf did not fairly get into the house during that dismal time. It +is certain that when Conrad arose from his bed at last, a thin remnant +of his former bigness, there were few high-priced birds left in Andreas +Stoffel's little shop, where there had been a score or more when +his sickness began. And, possibly, it was something more than a mere +coincidence that nearly all of the few which remained were sold about +the time that Conrad started again, in a very humble way, his business +of sausage-making. + +But if Andreas did thus sacrifice his birds for Christine's good, he did +not grudge the sacrifice; for upon the big Conrad poverty and sickness +had exercised a chastening and most wholesome influence. He got up out +of his bed a changed man; and the change, morally at least, was greatly +for the better. Physically the result was less salutary; indeed, he +never quite recovered from his sharp attack; and three or four years +later, just as his business was getting into good shape again, he +sickened suddenly, and then promptly paid to nature the debt that all +men owe, and that his partial return to health had but a little time +delayed. + +But Christine was not left desolate in the world, for in the last year +of her husband's life the strong yearning that so possessed her had been +satisfied, and she was the mother of a baby girl. Andreas, claiming the +fulfilment of the promise made so long before, had stood godfather to +the little Rosa--for so, because of her fresh rosiness, was she named; +and there was a strange, sorrowful longing in his heart when, the rite +being ended, he came again to his lonely home and sat him down to be +comforted by the singing of his birds: for while the children of Alice +call Bartram father, there must be ever a weary weight of sadness in the +world. + +Life had not given so much of happiness to Christine--though, possibly, +her happiness was equal to her deserts--that her hold upon life was a +very firm one; and although she tried, for the little Roschen's sake, to +put fresh strength into her grasp, the pressure of poverty and care and +sorrow all combined to make her loosen it. Gently, a little at a time, +her hold gave way. She knew what was coming, and so did Andreas. Once +or twice they spoke about it; and spoke also of the old days on the +Andreasberg, when began the love that in one of their hearts at least +never had grown cold. And for this old love's sake Andreas promised that +when she was gone the little Rosehen should find a home with him and +with his birds. It was not a great while after this promise was made +that the end came. + +Some of the women laughed a little, and cried a little too, when, after +the funeral, old Andreas--for so already had they begun to call him, +because of his silent habit and quaint, old-fashioned ways--asked to be +shown how a baby should be carried; and, being in this matter properly +instructed, bore away with careful tenderness in his arms the little +Rosehen to her new home. And when he was come home with her, the birds, +as though in welcome--which seemed the more real because certain of the +tamer ones among them came forth from their open cages and perched upon +his arm-- + +[Illustration: Chorus of sweetest song 268] + +The good-wives living thereabouts were somewhat shocked at the thought +of risking a baby's life in the care of a man who was qualified only to +minister intelligently to the needs of baby canary-birds; yet were they +not a little touched when they came--in unnecessary numbers, as Andreas +thought--to give him the benefit of their superior wisdom in the +premises by finding how well, in a queer, awkward way, he was +discharging the duties of his office; and such gentleness in a man they +all vowed that they had never seen. Yet it was not surprising that his +quaint effort was crowned with so signal a success; as the birds could +have explained, had their song-notes been rendered into human speech, +Andreas had served an apprenticeship in caring for them which well +fitted him to care with a mother's tenderness for this little girl, who, +such was his love for her, seemed to him in all verity to be his own +proper child. Benefiting by the advice which so lavishly was bestowed +upon him, he presently became--as even the most critical of the women +were forced to admit--a much better mother to the little Roschen than +many a real mother might have been. It was, indeed, a sight worth +travelling far to see, this of Andreas washing and dressing the baby +in the sunny room at the back of the shop where hung the cages in which +were the choicest of his birds. Roschen's first conscious memory was +of laughing and splashing in her little tub in the sunshine, while all +around her was a carolling of song. + +In the course of the years which had drifted by since Andreas came with +his birds to New York that May morning he had not made for himself many +friends. To be a friend of birds a man must have a quiet habit of body, +and great gentleness of nature, and a true tenderness of heart; which +qualities tend also to solitariness, being for the most part harmed +rather than fostered by association with mankind. As suited him well, +his business was not one that called him much abroad, nor that brought +him greatly into contact with his fellows. In his good care the famous +stock of songsters which he had brought with him from the fatherland +had increased prodigiously; and even the sale of nearly all his best old +birds, about the time that Conrad was ill, had worked, in the long run, +to his benefit; for he had taken these birds to one and another of the +great dealers, who thus came to know that in the little shop on Avenue +B were to be found canaries the like of which for tameness and for +rare beauty of note could not be bought elsewhere in all New York. +Thereafter, as his young birds grew up, learning from Andreas himself +the lesson of gentleness, and from his teaching-birds the lesson of +sweetness of note, he had no lack of high-paying customers; so that from +his business he derived an income far in excess of his modest +needs. What went with the overplus was known only to certain of his +country-folk, whose ill venture after greater fortune in America had +proved to be but a fiercer struggle with still greater poverty than they +had struggled with at home; and no doubt the angels also kept track of +his modest benefactions, for such is reputed to be their way. + +Many a wounded life was healed by these hidden ministrations on the part +of Andreas; and, as rightly followed, great love there was for him +in many a humble heart. But love of this sort is not friendship, +for friendship requires some one plane at least of equality, and also +association and converse, which conditions were lacking in the case of +Andreas and those to whom he gave his aid; for the shyness of his nature +led him to keep himself apart--save when the demand upon his charity was +for that comfort and sympathy which can only be given in person--from +those whose burdens he lightened; so that, for the most part, while the +needed help was given the hand that gave it remained concealed. + +Yet with a few of his country-folk in New York Andreas had established, +in course of time, relations of warm friendliness. Of his kin only two +cousins were left; for the rich, good uncle, from overmuch eating of his +own delicatessen, had come to a bilious ending; and his uncle's widow, +wise in her generation, had returned to her native town in Saxony, where +she was enabled, by reason of the fortune that the delicatessen-shop had +brought to her, to outshine the local baroness, and presently to attain +the summit of her highest hopes and happiness by wedding an impoverished +local baron, and so becoming a baroness herself. Her two sons were well +pleased with this marriage. They were carrying on a great business +in hog products, and had purchased for themselves fine estates in the +country and fine houses in town. To be able to speak of their mother as +"the baroness" suited them very well. Andreas saw but little of these +gilded relatives--who yet were good-hearted men, and very kindly +disposed towards him--for their magnificent surroundings were appalling +to his simple mind. His few friends were more nearly in his own walk +in life, and his friendship with them had been built up, as substantial +friendship should be, by slow degrees. + +At the Cafe Nuernberger, near by his own little shop--a bakery celebrated +for the excellence of its bread, and for the great variety of its +toothsome. German cakes--it was his custom to make daily purchases. With +the plump, rosy Aunt Hedwig, who presided over the bakery, he passed the +good word of the day shyly; he responded shyly to the friendly nod of +the baker, Gottlieb Brekel, when that worthy chanced to be in the shop; +and he shyly greeted a certain jolly Herr Sohnstein, a German lawyer of +distinction, who was about the bakery a great deal and who popularly was +believed to be a suitor for the plump Hedwig's plump hand. And these shy +greetings might have gone on day after day for all eternity--or at least +for so much of it as these several persons were entitled to live out on +earth--without increasing one particle in cordiality, had there not +been one other dweller in the bakery to act as a solvent upon the +bird-dealer's reserve. This was the baker's daughter Minna, a child a +year or two older than Roschen and cast in a sturdier mould. + +There was that about Andreas which drew all children to him, even as his +birds were drawn to him; and a part of the spell certainly was the love +for children that always was in his heart. The small Minna was disposed +not a little to caprice--for she was a motherless child, and Aunt Hedwig +humored her waywardness a trifle more than was good for her--and she +manifested, usually, a certain haughtiness towards those who sought to +make friends with her. Yet of her own accord one day, when Andreas had +ceased to be a stranger to her, she went up to him and offered him a +kiss. Aunt Hedwig volubly explained to Andreas the honor that had been +done him, and from that moment was disposed herself to be most friendly +with him--as was also the baker, and as was also Herr Sohnstein, when +the story of this extraordinary performance duly was related to them. +And thus there began a real friendship between Andreas and these +kindly souls that ever grew riper as the years went on. Sometimes of an +evening, when his birds were all asleep and he was left lonely, Andreas +would step around to the bakery; and would sit for an hour or so in +the little room back of the shop, listening pleasantly to the talk of +Gottlieb and Herr Sohnstein, as they smoked their long pipes, and +even laughing in a quiet way at the merry sallies thrown into the +conversation by Aunt Hedwig as she sat knitting beside the fire. +Andreas himself rarely spoke--it was not his way; but there was such a +sympathetic quality in his silence that his lack of words passed almost +unobserved. Much more attention was attracted by the fact that he did +not smoke--a fact that was looked upon as most extraordinary. But +this also went unheeded after a while, as it well might in a small room +wherein Gottlieb and Herr Sohnstein were smoking with such vigor that +the air was a deep, heavy blue. It was because his birds did not like +smoke that he had given up his pipe, he explained, simply; and only to +Minna did it occur to say, after she had turned the matter over in +her small mind for a while, that the Herr Stoffel must be a +very kind-hearted man to go without smoking because the smell of +tobacco-smoke wasn't nice for his birds. + +When Andreas took the little Roschen to his home, that sad day after the +funeral, the good Hedwig was among the first of the womenkind to go to +him with tenders of instruction and advice; for while Hedwig was only, +as it were, a matron by brevet, she was deeply impressed by the extent +of her own knowledge in the matter of how motherless children should be +raised; and it is but just to add that this self-confidence was fully +warranted by the good results that had attended upon her care of her +brother's child. Something of the story of Andreas and Christine, and +something of what he had done for her and for her husband, was known +in the bakery; and enough more was guessed to make these friends of his +feel towards him, because of it all, a still stronger and more earnest +friendship. Herr Sohnstein, who, being a lawyer with an extensive +practice in the criminal courts, was not by any means in the habit of +praising his fellow-men indiscriminately, even went so far as to say +that Andreas was "better than any of the saints already." And when Aunt +Hedwig, somewhat shocked at this comparison to the disfavor at a single +thrust of the whole body of saints put together, reproved Herr Sohnstein +for his irreverence, he stoutly declared that while his knowledge of +saints was comparatively limited--since they did not come within the +jurisdiction of the courts--he certainly never had read of one who +had shown a finer quality of charity, both in forgiveness and in +self-sacrifice, than that which Andreas had displayed. + +"Don't you make believe, Hedwig," Herr Sohnstein continued, "that if +you go off after promising yourself to me and marry another fellow, that +I'll take care of him when he's sick, and set him up in business when +he gets well, and wind up by giving him a first-class funeral; and don't +you get it into your head that I'm going to adopt any of your children +that are not mine too--for I'm not a saint already, even if Andreas is." + +To which general declaration Aunt Hedwig replied, with much spirit, that +in the first place Herr Sohnstein had better wait until she promised +to marry him--or to marry anybody, for that matter--before he took to +preaching to her; that in the second place it was unnecessary for him +to declare that he was not a saint, since only a deaf blind man would be +likely to take him for one; and that in the third place he would do well +to save his breath to cool his broth: at which lively sally they all +laughed together very comfortably. + +With these good friends Andreas consulted in all important matters +relating to Roschen's well-being. Aunt Hedwig's practical advice in +regard to clothing and food and general care-taking was of high value +in the early years; and it was Gottlieb's suggestion, when the time +came for beginning the sowing of seeds of wisdom in her small mind, that +Roschen should go with his own Minna to the school where the Sisters +taught; and of a Sunday the children went also together to be instructed +by the Redemptorist Fathers in the way of godliness. So these little +ones grew in years and in knowledge and in grace together, and towards +each other they felt a sisterly love. + +[Illustration: Instructed by the Redemptorist Fathers 278] + +Insensibly, too, as Roschen grew out of childhood into girlhood, her +attitude towards her adoptive father changed. In the great matters +of her life he still cared for her, planning always for her good, and +withholding from her nothing suited to her station in life that money +could buy. In the matter of her music, Aunt Hedwig declared that he +was positively extravagant; yet accepted in good part his excuse that +a voice so beautiful deserved to be well trained. It was her mother's +voice alive again, he said; and as he spoke, Aunt Hedwig saw that there +were tears in his eyes. But while Andreas still continued the larger +of his parental duties, in the smaller matters of every-day life his +adopted daughter now cared for him; so beginning to pay the debt (though +to neither of them, such was their love for each other, did any thought +of debt or of payment ever occur) that she owed him for all his goodness +to her and to her dead father and mother in the past. + +In truth, it was a pretty sight to see Roschen first beginning to play +at keeping house for her father--for so she always called him--and +then, in a little while, keeping house for him most excellently in real +earnest. Here, again, the good qualities of Aunt Hedwig came to the +front, for to her intelligent direction was due the rather surprising +success that attended Roschen's ambitious attempt to become so early a +_hausfrau_. Time and again was a great culinary disaster averted by a +rapid dash on Roschen's part from her imperilled home to the bakery, +where Aunt Hedwig's advice was quickly obtained and then was promptly +acted upon. And if sometimes the advice came too late to avert the +catastrophe--as on that memorable and dreadful day when Roschen boiled +her sausage-dumplings without tying them in a bag--the lessons taught +by calamitous experience caused only passing trouble, and tended, in the +long-run, to good. + +Indeed, by the time that Roschen was sixteen years old, and had so far +passed through her apprenticeship that she no longer was compelled +to make sudden and frantic appeals to Aunt Hedwig for aid, the little +household over which she presided so blithely was very admirably +managed; and it certainly was as quaint and as pretty an establishment +as could be found anywhere upon the whole round globe. Whoever entered +the little shop was greeted with such a thrilling and warbling of sweet +notes that all the air seemed quivering with music, and the leader of +the bird choir was a certain wonderful songster that Andreas had named +the Kronprinz, and for which he repeatedly had refused quite fabulous +sums. Andreas himself had bred the Kronprinz, and had given him the +education that now made him such a wonder among birds, and that made +him also of such great value as an instructor of the young birds whose +musical education was still to be gained. After his adopted daughter, +Andreas held this bird, and justly, to be the most precious thing that +he owned. + +But far sweeter than the singing of the prized Kronprinz--at least, to +any but a bird-fancier's ears--was the singing that usually was to be +heard above the trilling of the canaries, and that came from the room +at the back of the shop where Roschen was engaged in her housewifely +duties. It was such music as the angels made, Andreas declared, yet +thinking most of all of one angel voice, the memory of which while still +on earth was very dear to him; and even in the case of those who were +moved by no tender association of the sweet tones of the living and the +dead this estimate of Roschen's singing did not seem unduly high. Gustav +Strauss, the son of the great bird-dealer over in the rich part of the +town, vowed that Andreas was entirely right in his angelic comparison; +and Ludwig Bauer, the young shoemaker, who lived next door but one, went +even further, and said that Hoschen's voice was as much sweeter than any +mere angel's voice as Roschen herself was sweeter and better than all +the angels in Paradise combined. There was nothing halting nor half-way +in Ludwig Bauer's opinion in this matter, it will be observed. + +The little room wherein Roschen sang so sweetly while at her work was +their kitchen and dining-room and parlor all in one. As noon-time drew +near there would come out into the shop from this room, through the open +door-way, such succulent and enticing odors of roasting pork and stewing +onions and boiling cabbages, that even Bielfrak--as the Spitz dog, +who was chained as a guard close beneath the cage of the Kronprinz, +appropriately was named--would fall to licking his chops as he hungrily +sniffed these smells delectable; and Andreas suddenly would discover +how hungry he was, and would make occasion to go to the door-way that he +might see if the setting of the table was begun. + +"Patience, father! Presently! You are as bad as Bielfrak himself!" +Roschen would say; and as this attribution of gluttony to her father +was a time-honored joke between them, they always would laugh over it +pleasantly. And then Andreas would stand and watch his little _hausfrau_ +with a far-away look in his gentle blue eyes as she bustled about her +work in the sunny room, her pretty dimpled arms bared to above the +elbow, her lovely cheeks (because of much stooping over the fire) +brighter even than the roses after which she had been named, her golden +hair done up in a trig, tight knot (as Aunt Hedwig had taught her was +the proper way for hair to be arranged while cooking was going on), and +over her tidy print gown a great white apron, fashioned in an ancient +German shape, as guard against the splash-ings and spillings which even +the most careful of cooks cannot always control. In the sunny windows, +opening to the south, flowers were growing; the Dutch clock, with +pendulous weights made in the similitude of pine-cones, ticked against +the wall merrily; Maedchen, the cat--who, being most prolific of kittens, +notoriously belied her name--sat bunched up in exceeding comfort on +a space expressly left for her upon the sunny window-ledge among the +plants; steam arose in light clouds from the various pots upon the +stove, and in the middle of the little room the table stood ready for +the dinner to be served. + +It was a very cheerful, home-like picture this; and yet many a time, as +Andreas stood in the doorway and contemplated it, there would be tears +in his eyes, and a strange feeling, half of glad thankfulness, half of +very sorrowful longing, in his heart. She was so like her dead mother! +In look, in speech, in motions of the body, in turns of the head, and +in gestures of the hands she was Christine over again. Sometimes Andreas +would forget his fifty years and all the sorrows of hope destroyed and +irrevocable death-parting which his fifty years had brought him, and +would fancy for a moment that he was young again, and that the dearest +wish of his life was here fulfilled. And then she would call him +"Father!" and his moment's dream of happiness would die coldly in his +heart. Yet would there come to him always an after-glow of solacing +warmth, as comforting thoughts would steal in upon him of the happiness +not a dream--different from that which he had hoped for in his youth, +but most sweet and real--that God's goodness had given him in these his +later years. + +Andreas truly was old Andreas now. As men's lives go, his age was not +great; but sorrow had made him, as it had made many another man, far +older than the mere number of years which he had lived. No, great store +of strength had been his at the beginning, and the heart-break that he +had suffered that day of his landing in the New World, when faith and +love and hope all died together at a single blow, was less a sentimental +figure than a physical reality. A like pang, yet not so keen, had +wrenched him when he first came to know of Christine's sharp trial of +poverty, and another seized him in the night-time following that sad day +when she passed away from earth. And now of late, without any cause at +all, these pangs had come again. Andreas was glad that they had come +always when he was alone; for the pain was too searching to be wholly +hidden, and his strong desire was that Roschen should be spared all +knowledge of his suffering. In his own mind he perceived quite clearly +what before long must come to pass. And it was a good happening, he +thought, that in Gottlieb Brekel and Aunt Hedwig, and the excellent Herr +Sohnstein, who, being a lawyer, could care well for the little store in +the bank and for the little house that Andreas now owned, Roschen had +such stanch and worthy friends. The only signs of these thoughts which +Roschen perceived was that her father grew much keener in the matter of +selling his birds at high prices; and that she was somewhat seriously +reproved when, in her housekeeping or in her occasional expeditions +to the fine shops in Grand Street, she ventured upon any small +extravagance. But Roschen would laugh when thus reproved, and would +declare that her father, who long had been a glutton, was become a miser +already in his old age; whereat Andreas also would laugh, yet not quite +so heartily as Roschen liked to hear him laugh when she cracked her +little jokes upon him, and would say that sometimes a miser was not +thought by his heirs so bad a fellow when they found what a snug little +fortune he had left behind him all safe in the bank. + +It was because of these thoughts, which he kept hidden from her, that +Andreas began to take a much more active interest in what Roschen had to +say from time to time about certain young men of her acquaintance. +The young man of whom she spoke most frequently, and with a frank +friendliness, was the handsome young assistant baker at the Cafe +Nuernberger; a very capable young fellow, Hans Kuhn by name, who of late +had brought that excellent bakery into great vogue because of the almost +miraculously good lebkuchen which he baked there. But Andreas was not at +all alarmed by this open friendship; for Hans and the stout Minna Brekel +were to be married presently, and Roschen's feeling obviously was no +more than hearty good-will towards the lover of her dear sister-friend. +Fine chatterings she and Minna had, as Andreas inferred from her +occasional brief reports of them, about the prodigious matrimonial event +that was so near at hand. As Andreas also inferred, these chatterings +put various notions of an exciting and somewhat disturbing sort into +Roschen's little head. If one young girl might get married, so might +another, no doubt she thought; and it is conceivable that from this +mental statement of a rational abstract possibility her thoughts may +have passed on to consideration of the concrete possibilities involved +in her own relations with the good-looking Gustav Strauss, son of the +rich bird-dealer, or with the good-looking young shoemaker, Ludwig +Bauer, who lived next door but one. + +It is certain that when Roschen had arrived at the dignity of eighteen +years, and her hitherto slim figure had taken on quite a plump, pleasing +womanly roundness, the business visits of the young Herr Strauss to the +little bird shop on the East Side became, as it struck Andreas, rather +curiously frequent. And about this time, also, their neighbor Ludwig +developed a very extraordinary interest in the business of raising +canary-birds. It was a business that he long had thought of engaging in, +he explained; and he truly did exhibit an aptitude in comprehending +and in practising its mysteries that greatly exalted him in the little +bird-dealer's esteem. The birds all seemed to recognize a friend in him; +and even those which were but partially tamed, and were gentle only with +Andreas himself, would perch willingly upon his hand. With Andreas +it long had been a maxim that canary-birds were rare judges of human +character, and the testimonial thus given to Lud-wig's worth counted +with him for a great deal--as did also the quite converse opinion of the +birds in regard to the young Herr Strauss: from whom, notwithstanding +his training in the care of their kind, they always flew away, and whose +mere presence in the shop sufficed to make every bird ruffle himself and +to chirp angrily in his cage. Yet Herr Strauss was most agreeable in his +manners, and was a very personable young man. As for his riches, they +spoke for themselves in his fine attire and in his fine gold watch and +chain; and he also spoke for them, making frequent allusions to his +comfortable present position in the world as his father's partner, and +to his still more comfortable prospective position as his father's sole +heir. + +Ludwig, on the other hand, could not boast of any great amount of +gilding upon, as Andreas believed it to be, the sterling metal of which +he was made. But he was by no means what would be considered by the +dwellers on the East Side a poor man. He was a steady and a good +master-workman, with three or four apprentices under him; and all day +long there was to be heard in his shop the cheerful, business-like sound +of the thumping of short hammers on lap-stones, together with the loud +clicking of the sewing-machine on which the delicate stitching of +uppers was done. In the window, screened with a green curtain of growing +vines--as is the pretty custom with most of the German shoemakers on the +East Side--there always might be seen a pair or two of well-made stout +shoes drying in the sunshine on their lasts; and with these a half-dozen +or more pairs of shoes newly soled and heeled in a substantial, +workmanlike fashion that would have done credit to Hans Sachs himself. +Making and mending together, it was a very good business that Ludwig +was doing; each year a better balance was lodged to his credit in the +savings-bank, and the great golden boot that hung above his door-way +told no more than the truth of the good work that was done and of the +good money that was well earned within. From the stand-point of public +opinion on the East Side, this thriving young shoemaker already was a +man of substance, whose still more substantial future was assured. + +There was in the nature of Ludwig much the same simplicity and +gentleness that characterized Andreas--which common qualities, no doubt, +had much to do with the strong friendship that there was between them; +and all his neighbors, remembering how good a son he had been, and +knowing also how deeply he still sorrowed for the dear mother lost to +him in death, were more than ready to vouch for the goodness of his +heart. Indeed, it was while trying to comfort him a little after this +great sorrow fell upon him that Roschen first felt towards him something +more than the passing interest that every maiden reasonably feels in +every seemly young man. Her disposition towards him, to be sure, even +when thus stimulated by a sympathetic melancholy, was only that of +friendliness; but it evidently was a friendliness so cordial and so +sincere that it made quite a tolerable foundation upon which Ludwig +freely built fine air-castles of hope. For his disposition towards +Roschen was altogether that of a lover--as anybody might have known +after hearing that decided expression of his opinion to the effect that +all the angels singing together could not make music so sweet as the +music of her voice. + +In due time, in accordance with the decorous German custom, both of +these young men made formal application to Andreas for permission to +be ranked formally as Roschen's suitors; and, as it chanced, they both +preferred their requests upon the same day. The young Herr Strauss +undeniably had some strong points to make in his own favor; and he made +them, to do him justice, without any hesitation or false modesty. As he +truly said--speaking with an easy assurance, and airily fingering his +gold watch-chain as he spoke--in marrying him Roschen would make an +excellent match. In rather marked contrast with this justifiable yet not +wholly pleasing assumption of self-importance, was the modest tone in +which Ludwig urged his suit; yet was Andreas not unfavorably impressed +by the fact that he dwelt less upon his deserts than upon his desire +to be deserving; and that in connection with the creditable presentment +that he made of the condition of his worldly affairs he did not insist, +as the Herr Strauss had insisted, upon a minute examination of Roschen's +dowry. As bearing indirectly yet forcibly upon a general consideration +of the cases of these young men, the statement may be added that one of +them had made for his proposed father-in-law several excellent pairs +of shoes, while the other had made for--or, rather, against--him only a +series of uncommonly sharp bargains. + +To neither of the lovers did Andreas give an immediate answer. He must +think a little, he said. The self-esteem of the Herr Strauss was a +trifle ruffled by the suggestion that in such a case waiting of any sort +was necessary; it seemed to him that an offer so desirable as that +which he had made was entitled to instant acceptance. But Ludwig noted +a certain trembling in the voice that bade him wait, and was not so +completely engrossed with his own hopes of happiness but that he could +perceive its cause and could feel sorrow for it. All these years had +Andreas cared for this sweet Roschen, and had cherished her as his +dearest treasure; and now, when the best time of her life had come, he +was asked to give her up to a love that rested its claim for recognition +upon nothing more substantial than promises of care taking which +the future might or might not make good. That Andreas, under such +circumstances, even should consider his request, touched Ludwig's good +heart with gratitude; and the love that he had for a long while felt +towards the old man led him now to pat an arm around his shoulder, as +a son might have done, and to tell him that the home which he had ready +for Roschen was ready for Roschen's father too. And Lud wig's voice also +trembled a little. Andreas did not speak, but he put his thin hand into +the big brown hand--much stained with the dark wax which shoemakers use +and with long handling of leather--that Ludwig held out to him; and +when they had stood together thus affectionately for a little time they +parted, silently. + +In truth, Andreas was more deeply moved than even Ludwig, for all his +affectionate sympathy, had divined. His love for Roschen was a double +love. With the love of a father he had watched over her these many +years; yet even stronger had come to be his love for her as her mother +born again. Sometimes, for whole days together, confusing the past with +the present, he would call her Christine; and in his heart he ever +gave greater room to the fancy that the life which he had hoped for was +realized, and that the life which he was living was a dream. No wonder, +then, that he asked for a little time in which to school himself to meet +the fate that at a single blow brought destruction to his dear home on +earth and to his dearer castle in the air. + +Roschen was abroad that afternoon, and as Andreas, alone with his birds, +turned over in his mind the answers which he must give to these young +men--who sought to take to themselves, for the greater pleasure of their +young lives, the single happiness which his old life had left to it--a +great bitterness possessed his soul. When they had so much and he so +little, it was cruel of them to seek to rob him thus, he thought. And +their love, after all, was but the growth of a day, while his love had +been growing steadily for forty years. Roschen was to him at once the +sweetheart of his youth and the dear daughter of his age. How could +these young fellows have the effrontery to place their own light love +fancies in rivalry with this profound love of his that was rooted in all +the years of a lifetime? His thoughts went back to those long-past days +when he and Christine first had known each other as little children on +the sunny slopes of the Andreas-berg, and when began the love that still +was a living reality. And then he followed downward through the years +his own love-story from this its beginning--the promise made in the +twilight, while the south wind, laden with the sweet smell of the +pine-trees of the Schwarzwald, played about them; the hard parting; his +joyous journey with his birds westward across the sea; the black day +when that journey ended; the years of sorrow which closed in still +keener sorrow when his Christine was lost to him utterly in death; and +then through the later years, which ever grew brighter and happier as +his love for Christine was born anew and lived its strange, half-real +life in his love for Christine's child, who also was the daughter given +him by Heaven to cheer and comfort him in his old age. And now at the +end of it all he was asked to give to another this sweet flower of love +that for his happiness, almost by a miracle, as it seemed, a second time +had bloomed. Was not this asking more of him, he thought, than rightly +should be asked? + +So heavy was the load of bitterness that oppressed him that even the +singing of the Kronprinz, who was moved to break forth into song just +then, failed for a time to arouse him. Yet presently the sweet sound +penetrated the thick substance of his sorrow, and slowly turned the +current of his sombre thoughts. Andreas loved all music; but because +of the long train of associations which it invoked, and because of his +skilled knowledge of its quality, there was no music so sweet to him as +the singing of a bird. And when the singer was the Kronprinz, who sang +with a mellow sweetness rare and wonderful, the music never failed to +move his tender nature to its very depths. And so, as he listened to the +singing of his bird, gentler and better thoughts possessed him; and then +he reproached himself for the selfishness that had so filled his +heart. He had no right, he thought, to stand in the way of Roschen's +happiness--to compel her to take the old love that he had to give in +place of the fresh young love that was offered to her. It was only a +foolish fancy, this that he had cherished, that she was his sweetheart +of long ago; it was the rational truth that he had to deal with--that +she was his daughter, who had given him in full measure a daughter's +love and duty, and for whom now, as was a father's duty, he must secure +a good husband, who would care for her well and loyally when death had +taken her father from her. This was the right conclusion, but all the +strength of his will was required to bring him to it; and when at last +He said to himself that what so plainly was right should be firmly done, +the color suddenly left his face, and there went through his heart the +sharp pang that he had learned to dread because of the agony of it. So +wrenching was the pain that he could not repress a cry; but it was not +a loud cry, and the sound of it was lost in the glad carolling of the +Kronprinz's song. + +When Roschen came home, a little later, she was frightened by finding +her father looking so pale and worn; but the sight of her dear face, and +her loving looks and words, revived him quickly, and her fear passed +by. And she forgot her fear the sooner because of the momentous question +which he then opened to her; for this last sharp seizure, keener than +any that had preceded it, had warned Andreas that the duty which he had +to do should not be delayed. + +Very tenderly and lovingly did he speak of this heart matter to his +little rose, his Roschen, as she sat beside him on a low stool, after +the childish habit that she never had relinquished, while her head was +nestled against his breast, and while he stroked her fair hair gently +with his thin, delicate hand. And as he made clear to her all that she +was to know, and explained to her that the decision between these rival +lovers, or the rejection of them both, must be made by herself, the +rosiness of this pretty Roschen became a deep crimson, and her head sank +down upon her father's breast so that her face was hid from him; and +as his arms clasped her closely to this loving haven she fell to crying +gently there, as in such cases is a proper maiden's rather unreasonable +way. + +"Does the thought of lovers make thee sad, my little one?" Andreas +asked; and he could not quite stifle, though he tried hard to stifle, +the hope that perhaps Roschen might settle this present matter so that +for a little time longer she still would be wholly his own. + +"It is not the thought of lovers, dear father," Roschen answered, and +her voice was low and broken, "but the thought that anything should take +me away from thee." + +The hope grew larger in the heart of Andreas, but he said: "The young +Herr Strauss will make thee a fine husband, my daughter. He is a rich +young man already, and--" + +But Roschen promptly cut short this eulogy by raising her head abruptly +and saying, with great decision: "He is a horrid young man, and nothing +is good about him at all. He tries to cheat thee whenever he comes here +to buy our birds; and--and he has said things to me; and he--and +he tried to kiss me. Ugh! I will have nothing to do with the Herr +Strauss--nothing at all!" + +As she spoke, Roschen held up her head firmly and looked Andreas +straight in the eyes. Her own eyes quite sparkled with anger, for all +the tears that were in them; and the tone in which she pronounced the +name of the Herr Strauss suggested pointedly that he was one of the +various unpleasant creatures which humanity disposes of with tongs. +All this was so emphatic that Andreas suffered his hope to grow yet +stronger; for now, certainly, one of these lovers was put safely out of +his way. + +"And Ludwig, my little one?" + +Roschen did not speak, but the angry sparkle that was in her eyes gave +place to a softer and much pleasanter brightness, and a still deeper +crimson showed in the pretty face that she hid again suddenly upon her +father's breast. + +"And Ludwig?" Andreas repeated. + +But still Roschen did not speak. She put her arms around her father's +neck, and nestled her head beneath his chin in a lovingly coaxing way +that she had devised when she was a little child; and then she fell +again to sobbing gently. + +"Hast thou, then, nothing to say of this friend of ours, my daughter?" +Andreas spoke eagerly, his hope being very strong within him now; for he +was not versed in the ways of maidens, and the silence that would have +been so eloquent to another woman or to a wiser man conveyed a very +false notion to his mind. + +"Thou hast told me, dear father, that Ludwig makes very good shoes," +Roschen said at last, speaking hesitatingly, and in a voice so low that +it was little more than a whisper. + +"Yes," Andreas answered, somewhat taken aback by the irrelevant and very +matter-of-fact nature of this remark; "yes, Ludwig makes good shoes." + +"And thou likest those which he has made for thee?" + +"Truly. They are good shoes. They have cured my corns." Andreas spoke +with feeling. He was sincerely grateful to Ludwig for having cured his +corns. "But it is not of Ludwig's shoes that we are talking now, my +Roschen," he went on. "It is of Ludwig himself. Hast thou nothing to say +in answer to what he asks?" + +Through her tears Roschen laughed a little, and she pressed her head +still more closely beneath her father's chin. "Thou dear foolish one," +she said, "canst thou not understand?" And then, after a moment of +silence, she went on: "Hast thou not seen, dear father, how all the +birds love Ludwig, and of their own accord go to him?" + +Then a little light broke in upon Andreas, and the hope that he had +cherished began to pale; but he answered stoutly: "Yes, the birds love +him, for he is a good young man. And thou, my daughter?" + +And Roschen answered in a voice so low and tremulous that Andreas +divined rather than heard the words she spoke: "Perhaps it is with me +also, dear father, as it is with the birds!" + +[Illustration: Perhaps it is with me also 298] + +For a little time there was silence--for Andreas did not trust himself +to speak while his hope was dying in his heart--then he raised the +pretty head from its resting-place upon his breast, and as he kissed the +forehead that was so like the dead Christine's. + +"'Perhaps it is with me also, dear father, as it is with the bird'" he +said, reverently and tenderly: "For thy good and happiness, my dear one, +may God's will be done." And as he clasped her again to him closely, the +Kronprinz once more lifted up his voice in sweetest song. + +When at last Roschen raised her rosy, happy face from her father's +breast, she was so full of the wonder that had come to pass that she did +not perceive his weary look, nor how pale he was; yet less pale now than +a little time before when his face was unseen by her. + +And presently the rosiness of this sweet Roschen grew still deeper as +the shop door opened, with a great tinkling of its little bell, and +Ludwig entered. Andreas arose from his chair slowly--but neither of them +noticed how feeble and labored were his motions, like those of a weak +old man--and clasped in both of his own Ludwig's great brown hand, while +with a look of love he said: "It is as thou wouldst have it, my son. +This dear rose of my growing will bloom in thy garden now"--and he +led Ludwig to where Roschen, who indeed was a true rose just then, was +standing and put her hand in his. + +And then, with a wistful eagerness, he went on: "And thou wilt care for +her very tenderly and well, in my place? Thou canst not understand what +my love has been; part of it, I know, has been foolishness--and that +which thou wilt give her, if it be strong and steadfast, will be far +better than ever was mine. For it is the way of life"--and here the +voice of Andreas trembled and fell a little--"that for young hearts love +also must be young." + +"With God's help, dear father, I will be true and good to her," Ludwig +answered, speaking with a stout heartiness that gave the ring of truth +to his words; "and I will care well for her and for thee too." + +"For me it will not be long," Andreas answered; "but give the care which +thou wouldst have given to me to these my birds." + +"Do not make us sad to-day, dear father, by such gloomy words," said +Roschen, as she put her arms around his neck. "To-day a beautiful time +of happiness has begun for us." + +"Truly a beautiful time of happiness has begun," Andreas answered; "and +I thank God that I have seen its beginning--for when grief comes to +thee, and grief must come to us all, my daughter, thou hast now a strong +young heart to stay and comfort thee. Yes, this is truly the beginning +of a happy time." It was with a very tender smile that Andreas spoke +these cheery words; and he added, cheerily: "Now go out into the Square, +my children, and say to each other the words which I know are in your +hearts. I will be glad in your happiness as I sit here among my birds." + +And so Andreas, for the second time in his life, was left alone with his +birds. + +As he sat there, desolate, he buried his face in his hands, and between +his thin fingers there was a glistening of tears. It was so hard to +bear! They might have waited just a little while, he thought; it would +not have been very long. For he forgot, and perhaps it would be unfair +to blame him for forgetting, his own desire that before that little time +should pass his Roschen should have assured to her the good care-taker +whom she surely would need when the season of sorrow came. A little +thrill of pain, a premonition of which he knew the meaning, ran through +him. + +Then it was that the Kronprinz began to sing. The notes at first were +low and liquid, and they fell soothingly upon the ears, and so into +the heart of this poor Andreas; and as they rose higher and fuller and +clearer, light began to show for him where only darkness had been. The +other birds, fired to emulation by these mellow warblings, joined in a +sweet chorus, above which the strong rich notes of the Kronprinz rose +in triumphant waves of harmony. And gladness came then into the heart of +Andreas, and great thankfulness; for as the music of the birds exalted +him he seemed to see with a strange clearness into the depths of the +future, and all that he saw there promised well for those whom he loved. +Such wonderful music was this that the very air about him seemed to be +growing goldenly radiant; and with a certain awe creeping into his heart +he seemed to hear low echoes of a music even more ravishingly beautiful +that came faintly yet with a bell-like clearness from very far away. + +Truly there was something strange about this music, for even Bielfrak, +who was grown to be a deaf, rheumatic old dog now, heard it and was +greatly moved by it. From his comfortable rug in the corner he raised +himself painfully upon his haunches, and, pointing his noise upward, +uttered a long melancholy howl. Then he came by slow effort across the +room to where his master sat and laid his head upon his master's knee. +And there was a puzzled look upon Bielfrak's face, for never before had +he thus manifested the love that was in his honest heart without finding +a quick response to it in the gentle touch of his master's hand. Yet now +that hand remained most strangely still, and it was strangely white, and +Bielfrak drew back suddenly from touching it--finding it most strangely +cold. + +[Illustration: page 286 303] + +The birds had been frightened into silence by Bielfrak's howl, but +now they all burst forth again into the song of strange and wonderful +sweetness that of a sudden they had learned to sing. In waves of +harmony the chorus rose and fell, and above all sounded the notes of +the Kronprinz, rich, full, clear, so delicately perfect as to seem a +blending of sunlight and of sound. And in this song there was a strain +that seemed to tell of restful triumph and eternal joy. And on the +gentle, kindly face of Andreas, as he sat there so very quietly while +all the air around him with these sweet sounds was vibrant, there was a +most tender smile that told of perfect peace. + + + + + + +End of Project Gutenberg's An Idyl Of The East Side, by Thomas A. Janvier + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK AN IDYL OF THE EAST SIDE *** + +***** This file should be named 23809.txt or 23809.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/2/3/8/0/23809/ + +Produced by David Widger + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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