Part 10 (2/2)

Pa.s.sers-by plucked its blossoms, gathered its fruit, and broke its branches. Well might one say, as one says of men, ”This was not its destiny as it lay in its cradle.” So fair its prospects, that this should be the end! Neglected, forsaken, no longer tended, there between field and highway it stood--bare to the storm, shattered and rent. As the years roll by it puts forth fewer blossoms, less fruit--and its story comes to a close!

So mused Anthony many a lonely evening in his room in the wooden booth in a strange land, in the narrow street in Copenhagen, whither his rich master sent him bound by his vow not to marry.

Marriage, forsooth, for him! Ha, ha! he laughed a strange laugh.

The winter was early that year with sharp frost. Outside raged a blinding snowstorm, so that every one that could stayed indoors. And so it befell that his neighbors never saw that for two days his shop was unopened, nor Anthony been seen, for who would venture out if not compelled to?

Those were sad, dismal days in his room, where the panes were not of gla.s.s, and--at best but faintly lighted--it was often pitch dark. For two days did Anthony keep his bed; he lacked strength to rise. The bitter weather affected his old joints. Forgotten was the pepper-fogey; helpless he lay. Scarce could he reach the water-jug by the bedside, and the last drop was drunk. Not fever, not sickness, laid him low: it was old age.

It was perpetual night to him as he lay there.

A little spider spun a web over the bed, as if for a pall when he should close his eyes forever.

Long and very dreary was the time. Yet he shed no tears, nor did he suffer pain. His only thought was that the world and its turmoil were not for him; that he was away from them even as he had pa.s.sed from the thoughts of others.

At one time he seemed to feel the pangs of hunger, to faint with thirst. Was no one coming? None could come. He thought of those who perished of thirst, thought how the saintly Elizabeth, the n.o.ble lady of Thuringen, visited the lowliest hovels, bearing hope to and succoring the sick. Her pious deeds inspired his thoughts; he remembered how she would console those in pain, bind up their wounds, and though her stern lord and master stormed with rage, bear sustenance to the starving. He called to mind the legend how her husband followed her as she bore a well-stocked basket to the poor, and confronting her demanded what lay within. How in her great dread she replied, ”Flowers I have culled in the garden.” How when he s.n.a.t.c.hed aside the cloth to see whether her words were true, wine, bread, and all the basket held miraculously changed to roses.

Such was the picture of the saint; so his weary eyes imagined her standing by his bed in the little room in a strange land. He raised his head and gazed into her gentle eyes. All round seemed bright and rosy-hued. The flowers expanded, and now he smelt the perfume of apple-blossoms; he saw an apple tree in bloom, its branches waving above him. It was the tree the children had planted in the flower-pot together.

And the drooping leaves fanned his burning brow and cooled his parched lips; they were as wine and bread on his breast. He felt calm and serene, and composed himself to sleep.

”Now I will sleep, and it will bring relief. To-morrow I shall be well; to-morrow I will rise. I planted it in love; I see it now in heavenly radiance.” And he sunk to rest.

On the morrow--the third day--the storm abated, and his neighbors came to see old Anthony. p.r.o.ne he lay, clasping in death his old nightcap in his hands.

Where were the tears he had shed, where the pearls? They were still in the nightcap. True pearls change not. The old thoughts, the tears of long ago--yes, they remained in the nightcap of the old pepper-fogey.

Covet not the old nightcap. It would make your brow burn, your pulse beat fast. It brings strange dreams. The first to put it on was to know this. It was fifty years later that the Burgomaster, who lived in luxury with wife and children, put it on. His dreams were of unhappy love, ruin, and starvation.

”Phew! how the nightcap burns,” said he, and tore it off, and pearl after pearl fell from it to the ground. ”Good gracious!” cried the Burgomaster, ”I must be feverish; how they sparkle before my eyes.”

They were tears, wept half a century before by old Anthony of Eisenach.

To all who thereafter put on the nightcap came agitating visions and dreams. His own history was changed to that of Anthony, till it became quite a story. There may be many such stories; we, however, leave others to tell them.

We have told the first, and our last words shall be, ”Don't wish for the old bachelor's nightcap.”

THE GARDEN OF PARADISE.

THE FOUR WINDS.

There once lived a king's son, who possessed a larger and more beautiful collection of books than anybody ever had before. He could read in their pages all the events that had ever taken place in the world, and see them ill.u.s.trated by the most exquisite engravings. He could obtain information about any people or any country, only not a word could he ever find as to the geographical position of the Garden of the World; and this was just what he was most desirous of ascertaining.

His grandmother had told him, when he was quite a little boy, and beginning to go to school, that each flower in the Garden of the World was the most delicious cake, and had its stamina filled with luscious wine; on one stood written historical facts, on another geography or arithmetical tables--and so one need only eat cakes to learn one's lesson, and the more one ate, the more history, geography, and arithmetic one acquired.

He used to believe this. But when he grew a little older, and had learned more and become wiser, he began to understand that there must be better delights than these in the Garden of the World.

<script>