Part 28 (1/2)
”Yes, certainly; why not?”
”You ought to go away a few weeks, and when you come back matters will be in a better condition. Other things will have happened in the meantime, and----You may believe me it would be well.”
Landolin shook his head, and said after a long silence: ”I know you mean thoroughly well; of course you do; but I shall not stir from this spot. I'll stay, if only to fool the rest of them. Already the honorable t.i.tus--the hypocrite!--has been trying to spread the rumor that I am going to sell my farm. I'll stay here and cry fie upon the whole country. We have owned our farm for hundreds and hundreds of years. You can ask Walderjorgli; he will testify.”
”I believe your word alone,” said the judge's wife; Landolin nodded well pleased, for it did him good to be so readily believed, and he continued, in a clear voice:
”Yes, madame, we farmers are not so easily displaced as the----people of rank. We at Reutershofen are a strong stock; people may dig as much as they choose at the roots; they will not bring it down.”
All his pride arose; his sunken face became full; his form seemed to grow larger. The judge's wife did not know what more to say; and she would have been heard no longer, for a thousand voices cried:
”Walderjorgli! The Master of Justice! Walderjorgli!”
The cry spread, the girls and children on the further meadow took it up; crying, ”Walderjorgli!”
A man appeared, who stood head and shoulders above all who surrounded him. His head was covered with soft, snow-white hair; his snow-white beard fell far down to his breast, and his face, with its heavy contracted brows and its large nose, looked as if chiseled with an axe.
”Hutadi! Hutadi!” screamed Landolin, springing up as if in a frenzy, and das.h.i.+ng into the crowd. ”Hutadi!” he screamed, stretching out his arms, and clenching his fist in t.i.tus' face.
CHAPTER LII.
”Be quiet, Landolin! The time for that has gone by,” said Walderjorgli in a commanding tone; and laid his broad hand between the combatants.
They stood still; but their chests heaved, and they looked down at the ground like chidden boys.
The ancient cry of defiance, ”Hutadi!”--no one knows exactly what it means; probably 'Beware' or 'Take care of yourself'--was formerly regarded as a challenge which no one could refuse. When it rang out, whether from forest or from meadow, whoever heard it must give battle to him who called.
In his youth, Walderjorgli had been considered the readiest and most powerful of combatants; but in his riper years he had become one of the most even-tempered and circ.u.mspect of men, so that he was elected Master of Justice for the forest republic in the mountain; which, as an independent peasant state, acknowledged no lord but the emperor.
Jorgli settled lawsuits, decreed punishments, and in conjunction with the council, apportioned the taxes; and all without appeal.
Jorgli was the only survivor of that last emba.s.sy which the forest peasants sent to the emperor at Vienna, to protest against being made subject to any prince. They desired to remain a free peasantry of the empire. Jorgli insisted that he was ninety-three years of age, but it was universally believed that he was already over a hundred; for the church registers had been burned with the church and parsonage in Napoleon's time.
The thought flashed through Landolin's mind that Walderjorgli could, with one stroke, reinstate him in all his old honor; so he said:
”From you, Master of Justice, I am glad to receive commands. All reverence is due you; and besides, you were my grandfather's dearest friend.”
He laid his hand on his heart, and hoped that Walderjorgli would grasp it; but the old man looked sternly at him from under his bushy, snow-white brows, and said:
”How is your wife?”
Landolin could scarcely answer. What did this mean? His health was not asked after! Had his wife then suddenly acquired any peculiar distinction? Did the old man ask after her only to avoid asking after Landolin's own health?
He stammered out an answer; and the old man sent a greeting by him to his wife, who was ”a good, honest housewife.” Landolin smiled. If nothing is given him, still it's well that one of his family gets something, for then he too has a share in it.
Landolin informed the bystanders that Walderjorgli's family and his own were the oldest in the country, for theirs had been the only two farmer families that had survived the war with Sweden. While he was talking, he noticed that n.o.body listened to him; but he went on, and finished what he was saying with his eyes fixed on the ground.
The judge's wife had approached, and t.i.tus gained an advantage by introducing her, and saying: