Decorated Heading.DUMB OTHMAR
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Onceupon a time there was a village on the top of a mountain, where during the winter months the villagers saw no one but each other, for the mountain was so steep and the path so narrow that, when it was blocked with ice, it was dangerous to ascend: so during the winter months the people lived by themselves, and cheered themselves as they might in the long dreary evenings, with games and dancing and singing and playing on pipes, for they were cheerful folk, joyous and light-hearted. The sweetest singer in the village was a lad namedOthmar; his voice was as sweet as a nightingale’s before the dawn, and also he was the handsomest young fellow in all the country round. Strangers turned to look after him as he went by; he was tall and straight, and had curly brown hair, and big brown eyes, and lips that always smiled. He lived with his old mother, who was a widow, and he worked for them both in the fields and on the farms. When he was a boy he learned the notes of all the birds, and could imitate them so exactly that they would fly down to him and settle on his shoulders. When the farmers had sown their fields, and the birds would have come to pick up the grain, they sent for Othmar, and he sang and whistled till they all left the field and flew after him. So often he was called the bird-boy.
One evening before the winter had set in, or the roads were blocked with ice, there came along the high road into the village, a dwarf in a yellow cap leading a donkey, on whose back were fastened numberless musical instruments. Fiddles of all sorts, and viols, horns, trumpets, and pipes, and a big drum, and a small one with triangles and cymbals.In the middle of the village the little man stopped and looked about him. “Who would like to hear my music?” he cried, and then as the villagers came crowding around him, he bade them all sit down while he unpacked his mule, but he forbade any of them to help him, or to touch one of the instruments. “For mine is no common music,” he quoth; “all these I have made myself, and in each is a machine which makes it go on playing by itself, if once I start it. See here!” and he took up a long pipe and began to blow, and there came forth the sweetest notes that had ever been heard from any pipe. The little man paused for a minute, with the pipe in his hand, and then laid it down on the ground, when, wonderful to relate, it went on playing of itself.
All the villagers stared with surprise, and some called out that it was magic, and crossed themselves, but the little man took up another pipe, and set that going too, and then the horns and the trumpets, and the drums and the cymbals, and then he took a fiddle and drew the bow across it, and how it played! It made the people weep and laugh. Othmar lay on the ground listening, and it seemed to him as if the sound weremade of silver, and when the musician had started them, and all the other fiddles were playing together, he felt as if he should go mad for joy to hear anything so lovely.
Just behind where Othmar lay sat a young girl, named Hulda. She was an orphan, and dwelt alone with an old woman, who gave her food and lodging for sweeping out her room, and cleaning and cooking. Also Hulda made money for her by going out to work for the other women in the village. She was neither pretty nor clever, but she was a good girl, and if any of the villagers were ill or in trouble, it was for Hulda they would send at once, because they knew she would spare no pains to help them, and would think nothing too much trouble. She had played with Othmar ever since they were babies, and loved him dearly. She was the only one who listened to the music who did not think it beautiful. She shuddered as she heard it, and she sat and watched Othmar and saw that there were tears in his eyes, and she grieved that she did not love it as he did.
When at last the instruments stopped and the listeners began to feelfor money for the musician, he laughed and said, “You need not give me money, for I am very rich, and don’t need it. In return for my playing, I only ask for one recompense. Let any of your young folks who sing, sing me a song, for I too love hearing music that is not my own.” On this the villagers began to look round for all who could sing, and they chose out some three or four, and begged them to sing their very best to the wonderful musician. Among them was Othmar, but they all bid him wait to the last, as his would be the best. Whilst the others were singing, the little man did not seem to heed them much, though they tried hard to sing well, and chose their prettiest songs, but their voices sounded very rough and poor after the playing.
But when Othmar began he stopped twanging the fiddle-strings and watched him. Othmar’s voice rang out clear and sweet, and all the village folk felt proud of his singing, even after hearing the wonderful instruments. When he ceased the little man rose, and said—
“You have a sweet voice, my boy, be sure that you always use it well; and now I must be going my way, but as I am a stranger here, perhapsyou would not mind setting me on my road, and showing me the best way over the hill.”
Othmar sprang up, delighted to go with him, but Hulda, who watched from behind, came up to him and whispered—
“Oh, Othmar, don’t let him take you far—come back soon.”
“How silly you are, Hulda!” said Othmar, almost angrily. “Of course I shall come back, but I shall go with him as far as he wants, and then, perhaps, he will let me hear him play again.”
Othmar and the little dwarf started with the mule laden with instruments, and Othmar led the way down the best road. The dwarf did not speak at all, and so they went on in silence till they had got on to the top of a high hill where they could see the country all round for miles, and the moon was beginning to rise. Here the musician stopped his mule, and stood for a while looking all round. Then he turned, and said to Othmar—“I know now where I am, and here will I stay for to-night, but first before you leave me, would you not like to hear my fiddles and horns again?”
“That I would,” cried Othmar, and he sat himself down on the ground delighted, while the little man unloaded the mule.
“And now,” he said to Othmar with a twisted smile, “you shall hear them play as no one has ever heard them. Yes, and you shall see them too;” then he laid them in rows—the fiddles first, and the viols, and then the horns and trumpets, and last the drums and cymbals and triangles, and clapped his hands, giving a long, shrill whistle. As he whistled, the instruments rose from the ground, and they began to swell, and their shapes to change till no longer did they look like musical instruments, but like human beings, only each had in a strange way kept the shape it had formerly. The flutes and pipes were tall and thin, and they and the violins had changed into beautiful girls with slender throats, and the trumpets were all men and boys of different sizes, but the drum was the strangest of all, for it was a fat man with very short legs. The moon had risen and Othmar could see them all quite clearly, and though he trembled with fear and his heart beat high, yet still he watched. They stood silent together for a space in a weird crowd,and then the dwarf waved his arms and called, “Ay! are you all there, my children?—yes, one, two three four five, six seven eight, nine ten eleven twelve, thirteen—that is right. Come practice, practice, practice, and then you shall have a game, and see who Othmar loves best, and who he will kiss first.”
Then they all began to sing together, but each voice was like the sound of its own instrument, only it said words through its tones, and in Othmar’s ears their music sounded as never music had sounded before. The voices of the violin girls were so sweet that he felt as if he must weep to hear them, while the sound of the pipes and trumpets filled him with longing to go into the world and fight and win battles. He sat on the ground and listened to them like one in a trance, and he felt as if he never wished to rise or go away again. The dwarf sat on a hillock near, and did not seem to heed them much. When Othmar took his eyes from the dancers for a minute, he found that the place was quite full of all the animals who are never seen by day, but who fly out by night. There were crowds of bats and owls, and odd moths, all poised in the air, and seeming to watch the musicians and listen to their singing.Then when he looked on the ground, he saw that strange wood-snakes and toads had come out boldly, and with their heads turned towards the dancers remained motionless and watched them, whilst near him green and brown lizards lay still as stone, with heads on one side, all staring through the dusky night at the singers. Othmar thought he only had watched them for a few minutes, when suddenly the dwarf cried out—“The dawn, the dawn, my children; see, there is red in the sky. Come, be quick, see who will win Othmar’s gift before we go on our way.” When he was silent all the singing girls approached Othmar, but before the others came one who looked slighter and younger, and whose voice though as sweet was weaker.
“See, Othmar,” she cried, “before we go on and leave you, let us try to sing one song together. Sing you as I do.” And Othmar sang with her as she sang, in a clear voice like a bird’s—
“Ere the sun shines in the sky,We will sing together, my love and I;But none shall hear him sing again,’Neath moon or sun, in shine or rain.”
“Ere the sun shines in the sky,We will sing together, my love and I;But none shall hear him sing again,’Neath moon or sun, in shine or rain.”
“Ere the sun shines in the sky,We will sing together, my love and I;But none shall hear him sing again,’Neath moon or sun, in shine or rain.”
“Ere the sun shines in the sky,
We will sing together, my love and I;
But none shall hear him sing again,
’Neath moon or sun, in shine or rain.”
And then ere the last notes had left Othmar’s mouth, she bent forward, and clasped him in her slender arms, and kissed him on the lips while still they were open to sing.
“Good-bye, Othmar,” cried she, “and that will be your last note for many a long year, for surely you will have no need to sing after I am gone,” and at that all the strange folk standing near gave a laugh that was more a chord of music than a laugh. And when her lips touched Othmar’s he quivered all over as a fiddle-string does when the bow is drawn across it; and he gave a cry which was like the sweet sound of a bell.
“Mine, mine!” cried the girl, as he fell back from her frightened. “Now my voice will be the sweetest and best of all, for I have got Othmar’s too. No one will hear Othmar now,—Othmar who sang like the birds. And never will he call the birds again, but I can sing as he sang, and all who hear me will think that Othmar sings too. Rejoice, my sisters, sing and rejoice,” but at that moment the dwarf started up crying out—