WALTER'S FRIEND."Wilt thou draw near the nature of the gods?Draw near them, then, in being merciful!"
WALTER'S FRIEND.
"Wilt thou draw near the nature of the gods?Draw near them, then, in being merciful!"
Thechildren stood before a very handsome house, and played many of their best pieces; yet no window was opened, no friendly face looked out, no kind hands threw gentle gifts to the little musicians. The children and people who were passing by would indeed stop and look at them for a moment; but as soon as Walter came near them with his hat for a collection, they would suddenly turn upon their heels and go away. Minnie and Walter both looked sad, for it was almost noon, and their pockets were yet empty; they were very hungry, and unless they should chance to meet with some wonderful piece ofgood luck, they had everything to fear from the anger of Father Pommer on their return in the evening.
With redoubled eagerness and force the children were playing their last new Polka. Walter's eyes were steadily fixed upon a window, from which he thought he could discern some one watching them, seated behind a curtain, and he hoped to receive something from the half-hidden form. But he felt his arm suddenly seized: he was startled, and looked round to ascertain what it could be; and in the benevolent face that was gazing upon him he instantly recognized, to his unutterable delight, the little man whose name he had forgotten, and whom he had so longed to see.
"God be thanked that I have found you! that you are really here! Now, indeed, everything must go right!" he cried, almost beside himself with joy, as he extended his hand to the stranger.
"If you really had such a strong desire to see me, why did you not come to my house? for I gave you my name, and you might easily have found me," said the clock-maker.
"You did, indeed, but I forgot it! I could not recollect it: that was my bad luck!" said the poor child eagerly.
"Did you really forget my name? Did you try hard to recollect it?" asked the little man, doubtingly. "Come, children, they do not seem inclined to give you anything here. Come, I will walk with you a little way."
Minnie took her harp, looking very much astonished, and gazing distrustfully at the watch-maker, who did not seem to concern himself at all about the maiden. He asked Walter to tell honestly and truly all that had happened to him since their parting, and what he had done to support himself.
The boy related concisely all that had occurred. He told him that, having no passport, he was very much afraid of the police, and of being put into prison; but that the stout man had taken him as his son, and that he played about in all the streets with Minnie, who accompanied his violin with the harp, in order to get as much money as they could.
"Then you have found a father, and require no other?" said the clock-maker. "Now everything goes on happily with you: this wild kind of life suits you, and you desire nothing better?"
Tears filled the large, dark eyes of the poor orphan; he looked sadly at the stranger, and shook his head.
"You are not happy?" answered the stranger; "if you will try to accustom yourself to a regular and industrious life, and if you will promise to be a good, truthful boy, you may come with me. I will take you into my own house, and take care of you as long as you show yourself worthy of my protection."
Walter remained motionless for a moment, as if turning into stone; then his eyes sparkled with delight, and with a cry of joy he threw his arms round the neck of the clock-maker, who tried to calm his stormy transport, and said to him: "Gently! gently, my boy! the people in the street are stopping to look and laugh at us as they go by. Once inside of my house, we can talk about it, and rejoice. Come! come quickly with me home!"
But Minnie now took Walter's hand, and said defiantly: "I will not let Walter go with you; he must stay with me, because I cannot play or earn anything without him. My father stands at the corner of the next street; I will go and bring him here, for I am sure he will never consent to Walter's leaving us."
Walter clung, trembling all over with fear, to his protector, who said sternly to the girl, while he filled her hand with small coins: "Here, child! here is more money than you and Walter would have earned all day to-day and all day to-morrow! Your father has no right to this boy; tell him he must take care to do nothing more against the laws, or I will expose him to the police. You had better join him now; and you, Walter, follow me!"
The boy's heart throbbed with joy when, having turned the corner of the street, he could see nothing more of the Pommer family, and he found himself quite alone with his benefactor. He kissed his hand again, and bounded joyfully on beside him. The little clock-maker put all kind of questions to him, which the boy readily and candidly answered.The face of the little man grew more and more friendly and cheerful. They soon arrived at the house. They opened a handsomely ornamented iron gate, and stepped into a pretty garden. The paths were strewed with gravel, the beds were well laid out, and bordered with boxwood. Lilacs, pinks, roses, lilies, and many other beautiful flowers, smiled in luxuriant and variegated bloom around. In the midst of this neat garden stood a small dwelling-house, whose white walls were almost hidden by the clinging vines, which seemed to love to twine about them. In front of the house there was a small place shaped like a semicircle, strewed nicely over with sand almost as white and shining as silver, which was partly shaded by a trellised woodbine, and partly by the low and spreading branches of a large apple-tree. A small table and several seats stood in this place, and a very pretty spinning-wheel, pushed a little to one side, betrayed that the spinner had just left the spot. Mr. Burg called softly, "Christina!" and the called one made her appearance immediately on the threshold of thehouse. Christina was the twin-sister of the clock-maker Burg. Like him, she was very short, but she was well formed. She wore a dark-colored dress, and a cap and neck-handkerchief of dazzling whiteness, while the large bunch of keys which were fastened to her side spoke of household cares and household thrift.
"Here, Christina!" said Burg, in a tone which betrayed suppressed emotion, "here is Walter, of whom I have already spoken to you. He will be our son, and make us happy. Sweetest sister, I think I have brought you a treasure to be valued, as a present from the fair!"
Christina took the boy, who was almost as tall as herself, in her arms, and pressed him to her heart; then she laid her hand upon his brow, and said, with a tender yet solemn voice: "God bless thy entrance into this house, my dear child! May his Holy Spirit descend upon thee, so that thou mayest become a pious Christian and a useful man! May his grace be with thee evermore! Amen!"
The tears rushed to Walter's eyes,—he did not himself know why, for the soft, friendlyface of Christina inspired no sadness or timidity, but the most heartfelt confidence.
"I have found the boy in the street, my sweet sister, and I have no doubt that he is really suffering with hunger. I hope your pantry is full enough to satisfy the appetite of the starving child."
"Do not be afraid of that," said Christina, laughing. "As I have expected the arrival of our son every hour during the last three days, I have provided for all his wants. Come! come in, brother, and see!"
Everything was clean and neat in the little house; everything seemed to correspond with the character of the brother and sister. That especially pleased Walter. His new parents took him by the hand, and led him about the house, showing him the cheerful sitting-room with its vine-curtained windows. At one of these windows stood a table, with very fine tools upon it, and several watches hanging near it, suspended to the wall; at the other, the sewing-table of Christina was placed, her comfortable cushioned chair, and her footstool. The brother and sister worked together in thesame room, and it was only over some very delicate piece of mechanism that the clock-maker shut himself up in the apartment at the other side of the house. A savory smell of a good dinner proceeded from the clean kitchen, and it was very agreeable to poor, hungry Walter. They led him about into all the rooms and chambers; at last they took him up a story higher, into a lovely little, friendly room. A neat bed, covered with a white quilt, stood near the wall; chairs, tables, a bureau and a wardrobe, a dressing-glass and a handsome timepiece, were all in their appropriate places, and the snowy window-curtains gave the room a most comfortable appearance.
"How do you like this chamber?" said Christina, friendlily, to Walter.
"O, it is delightful! Even the Mayor himself in Geremberg has not a single room as beautiful as this one is."
"This is your own little room, my boy," said Christina. "You are to sleep in this quiet bed, and if you never forget to say your evening prayers devoutly, God's winged angels will watch over your sleep."
"Me? Am I really to sleep in this soft, white, beautiful bed?" said the delighted boy to his benefactress. "Ah, I have never seen one half so beautiful! I have always slept upon straw, or upon the bare ground. O dear sir! O dear, kind lady! how very good you are to poor, forsaken Walter!"
He threw his arms around them both, and then sprang delightedly about, gazing on everything around him with rapturous and grateful astonishment.
"As several days have passed since we first expected you," said Christina, "I have provided clean linen and new clothes for you, which I think will fit you. You will find everything ready for you in this wardrobe. You must wash yourself very clean, comb your fine hair nicely, put on your new clothes, and always try to keep yourself very neat. We should suffer no stain upon us,—neither upon our souls nor our clothing. Make haste, my son, and get ready. In the mean time, I will set the table, and flavor the soup."
With a friendly greeting, Christina left them, while Burg stayed to help the boy to dress.When Walter was well washed, combed, and dressed in his new clothes, his appearance was strikingly handsome. The clock-maker looked at him with undisguised pleasure, while the boy exclaimed, in grateful rapture,—
"My dear, dear sir, how am I to thank you? how am I ever to compensate you for all this?"
"I shall be fully compensated, if you will only be good and obedient," answered Burg. "But before all things else, thank God, my son! He has led you, in the most wonderful manner, through much tribulation, to us. It was certainly his kind hand which led me to you, just when I had determined to seek out, and adopt as my own, some forsaken orphan. Do you not acknowledge that you have a Father in heaven, who, even when he appeared to have forsaken you, yet wonderfully led you upon the right way?"
Walter was silent, and seemed lost in thought. "Yes," he at last replied, "yes, I now see that he has graciously cared for me. Last night, I prayed to him with all my heart that he would let things go well with me, ifonly for once; and see! already to-day he has heard and fulfilled my prayer! I believe that, if I had learned to pray to him sooner, he would never have let it gone so badly with me."
"Never forget it, then, in the future, my son," said Burg. "Trust always in the good Father above, with a childlike and firm faith; and even if you should be unfortunate in this life, never cease to rely upon the only firm support,—the Father above."
"Yes, yes, dear sir! I will certainly trust him," said the boy.
"Call me no longer 'Dear sir,' but 'Dear father'; and call my sister, 'Mother.' With God's help, we will try to be kind and conscientious parents to you; and I believe you will be a pious and true son," said Burg, as he kindly pressed the hands of the orphan.
Christina's clear voice now called them to dinner. As they entered the dining-room, her eyes fell upon Walter. She looked astonished, and yet full of contentment, for his beauty was very striking in the neat clothes which her care had provided for him.
Walter was, as if through magic, suddenly transported into a life differing in all things from the life of his earlier days. He had been abused and forsaken,—driven from the only home he had ever known; he had struggled with cold and want, and lived in poverty, hunger, and dirt. He now lived in the bosom of a tranquil, industrious, and pious family. The brother and sister, secluded from the noisy world, surrounded by their beautiful garden, and in the possession of a fortune more than adequate to their wants, led a pious and charitable life. Christina's character was childlike and simple. She had never known nor ever desired any other happiness than to serve God and to love her twin-brother. With a far keener intellect, the brother's character, in its simplicity and piety, resembled that of the sister. He was an excellent clock-maker, but he gave his clocks into other hands to be sold, as he knew nothing of trading, and hated to be annoyed with it. He said it disturbed the quiet of his soul, and wasted his valuable time. His favorite employment was to imagine ingenious and artistic fancy works, andset them in motion by clock-work. He never sold any of these. He kept them in his parlor, and on festival occasions he would exhibit them to his own and his sister's friends. He had made, among other things, a very complete paper-mill, and a most beautiful church. In the paper-mill, the mill-clappers rattled up and down, the wheels ran merrily round, the mechanism worked well, and all the preparations for making paper were really there; everywhere was seen the appropriate labor, and at last tiny sheets of real paper were made, which the mechanist would kindly distribute among his own and his sister's friends, as remembrancers of them and of his novel invention. The church was lighted up, the many-colored windows glittered, the bells rang, the organ played, and people were seen going in at the various doors, and walking round in the beautiful building. These pieces of artistic mechanism were his delight; he often passed whole nights without sleep in inventing and executing things still more curious and ingenious. The pastor of the parish, and his wife, were his most intimate friends; indeed, it wasonly upon rare occasions that any other guests were to be met in his house.
The brother and sister had lived together nearly half a century in unbroken peace, in heartfelt unity and love, when the melancholy thought presented itself to them, that after their death there would be no one to inherit their highly improved property, no one to take care of and cherish the works of mechanism invented by the clock-maker, no one to whom Christina could confide her pretty house, and carefully and tastefully cultivated garden. They consulted seriously together what would be best to do. We will leave it for the benefit of the poor, said they with one voice; but they sighed, and looked sadly around them.
"Our beloved house and garden must in that case be sold," sighed Christina. "God only knows in what hands it will fall, and how it will be taken care of! All that I have planted and nurtured with so much love will be rooted up, or trampled under foot!"
"And all my beautiful works of art will be sold," said the brother, in a still more melancholy tone. "If an unskilful hand touchesthem, if a single wheel gets out of order, they are ruined for ever!"
"It is very sad, indeed!" said they both.
"Yes, Christina, it is truly melancholy," again commenced the clock-maker, after a long pause; "but it is very sinful to attach ourselves so firmly to such fleeting things. During the whole course of his life, man is constantly forced to struggle with himself that he may not break the holy commandment: 'Thou shalt have no other gods before me.' Our clinging so firmly to these passing things of earth is nothing but a species of idolatry. Therefore, my dearest sister, we will try to free ourselves from the thraldom of this sin; we will simply leave our property to the poor, and give ourselves no trouble about what shall become of it after we are dead and gone!"
Christina secretly wiped the tears from her streaming eyes, answered nothing, but spun industriously on. After a considerable time had elapsed, she said, in a trembling tone: "Listen to me, my dear brother! I would like to make a proposition to you, which Ihave long cherished in silence. What do you think of our taking some poor, forsaken orphan child into the house, bringing it up to truth and industry, and adopting it as our own son or daughter? We might then divide our property between it and other poor people. In this way we might fulfil our own wishes without being guilty of the sin of idolatry. Indeed, who knows but that, through our careful instruction and education, we might aid in saving the soul of some unfortunate orphan?"
The brother gazed upon her with approving and deep tenderness. "My dear Christina," he said, "have you considered fully how much trouble, anxiety, and care the reception of such a charge would entail upon you?"
"O, no thought of that kind should ever prevent me," she answered. "I love children dearly, and I have long wished to have the charge of one. I will make but little account of care, anxiety, and trouble for myself, if with the help of the Lord we can only succeed in bringing a forsaken child up to be a good Christian. Then it would doubtless love usas if it were really our own. The human heart constantly longs for love; and, as we grow older, what could be a greater source of pure pleasure for us, than to have a young, innocent, loving, childlike creature constantly with us?"
The brother sprang to his feet, seized Christina in his arms, kissed her fondly, and said: "Sister, your words flow from my own heart! I have long cherished the same wish, but could not venture to ask you to assume this additional burden. But now all things seem to have arranged themselves in the happiest manner; and with God's help we will soon find the child we seek!"
The good people made a happy choice in selecting Walter; or rather God had graciously provided for the fulfilment of their wishes, and led to them the forsaken boy. They brought him up with prudence and with love. His many and excellent faculties were developed in the highest degree through the best of teachers. The good pastor was his instructor in all that belonged to religion, while the truly Christian life of the piousbrother and sister exerted a most beneficial influence upon the heart of the poor boy, and all the bad habits which he had acquired from the vicious examples which had been constantly before his eyes, from the first moment of the precocious awakening of his intelligence until his fortunate reception into the house of his present protectors, rapidly and for ever vanished. His days always began and ended with prayer, and the consciousness of the perpetual presence of the Almighty, in the fulness of his strange love and enduring mercy, was with him in the hours of labor and the moments of relaxation.
Burg was anxious that Walter should adopt his own profession, so that when he became the inheritor of his property he might also inherit his artistic skill. But Walter evinced no disposition to embrace it. He was astonished at the works of art, clapped his hands joyfully at the appearance of life in the movements of the diminutive figures, and wished he had the skill to make them; but his desire rapidly vanished when he saw his adopted father at work. His attention was only fastenedupon such objects, by their entire novelty, for a few moments; then he would bound away to bring his beloved violin, and play hour after hour upon it with real joy of heart. The clock-maker soon knew what were Walter's peculiar talents, and, very far from wishing to contend with the gifts of nature, at once relinquished his own cherished wish. He shall have every opportunity to cultivate his genius, he said to himself; I will give him every advantage. He took his adopted son by the hand, and led him to the town, where he placed him with a master of high distinction. The master tested the talents of the boy for music, and found them so quick and promising that he readily undertook their cultivation.
A new life dawned for Walter; he lived in and for music; for he now heard it in a perfection of which he had never dreamed in his childish years. He pursued his studies with assiduity and delight, and soon surpassed all his associates. His master was astonished at the rapidity of his progress, and every day increased his attachment to the talented boy. After a comparatively short time he found himsufficiently advanced to introduce him into the study of harmony, and thus to open a way for him into the very depths of the art he loved. The glowing and creative imagination of the boy now found the proper element in which to work, while laws and rules based on nature opened and defined his paths through the boundless regions of the tone world.
Years sped on. The days which he passed in the peaceful home of his kind protectors, sheltered and cherished by their constant love and care, warmed and lighted by the glittering rays of the science he loved, were as happy as those of his earlier childhood had been miserable. In later years he often spoke, with rapturous gratitude, of the untroubled bliss of the studious, youthful, innocent days of his first introduction into the enchanted realm of Art.