Rübezahl (translation) Part 4: Rübezahl and the Glass merchant.

Rübezahl and the Glass merchant.

    As much as the gnome's favorite had taken pains to conceal the true source of his good fortune, so as not to provoke impetuous beggars to overwhelm the mountain patron with similar donations with brazen intrusiveness, the matter finally became known; for when a man's secret hovers between a woman's lips, the slightest breeze blows it away like a soap bubble from a straw. Veit's wife confided it to a discreet neighbor, who told her godmother, who told her godfather, the village barber, who told all his beard customers; and so it spread throughout the village and then throughout the entire parish. Then the depraved landlords, the loafers and idlers pricked up their ears, flocked to the mountains, reviled the gnome, began to call him and conjure him; they were joined by treasure hunters and vagabonds who roamed the mountains, struck everywhere and thought they could lift the treasure in the brewing pan. Rübezahl let them do as they pleased for a while, not bothering to get angry with the fools, merely mocking them, letting a blue flame flare up here and there at night, and when the fools came and threw their caps and hats on it, he let them dig up some heavy pots of money, which they carried home with joy, kept them in silence for days, and when they came back to look at the treasure, they found stench and filth in the pot, or shards and stones. Nevertheless, they did not tire of playing the old game again and causing new mischief. Finally, the spirit became angry, drove the loose rabble out of his domain with a powerful hail of stones, and became so harsh and grim toward all travelers that no one entered the mountains without fear, and rarely escaped without a lesson learned, and the name Rübezahl was no longer heard in the mountains since time immemorial. One day, the spirit was sunning himself by the hedge in his garden when a woman came along, walking very naturally, whose strange attire caught his attention. She had one child at her breast, one on her back, one by the hand, and a slightly older boy carrying an empty basket and a rake, for she wanted to load a load of leaves for the cattle. “A mother,” thought Rübezahl, “is truly a good creature, lugging around four children and doing her job without complaint, and now she will have to burden herself with the weight of the basket as well.” This observation put him in a good-natured mood, which made him inclined to engage in conversation with the woman. She sat her children down on the grass and brushed leaves off the bushes, but the little ones grew restless and began to cry loudly. The mother immediately stopped what she was doing, played and frolicked with the children, picked them up, jumped around with them singing and joking, rocked them to sleep, and then went back to her work. Soon after, the mosquitoes began to bite the sleepers, and they started their concert all over again. The mother did not become impatient about this; she ran into the woods, picked strawberries and raspberries, and laid the smallest child to her breast. The gnome enjoyed this maternal treatment immensely. But the crybaby, who had been riding on his mother's back, would not be satisfied by anything. He was a stubborn, obstinate boy who threw away the strawberries his loving mother offered him and screamed as if he had been skewered. This finally broke her patience: “Rübezahl,” she cried, “come and eat the screamer.” Immediately, the spirit appeared in the form of a charcoal burner, stepped up to the woman, and said, “Here I am, what is your wish?” The woman was greatly frightened by this apparition, but since she was a fresh, hearty woman, she soon gathered herself and took courage. “I only called you,” she said, “to silence my children; now that they are quiet, I have no need of you, but thank you for your good will.” “Do you know,” replied the spirit, “that one does not call me here with impunity? I take you at your word. Give me your screamer so that I may eat him. I have not had such a tasty morsel in a long time.” With that, he stretched out his sooty hand to receive the boy.     Like a mother hen, when the hawk hovers high above the roof in the air or the mischievous Spitz rushes into the yard, she first lures her chicks into the safety of the chicken coop with anxious clucking, then ruffles her feathers, spreads her wings, and begins an unequal fight with the stronger enemy: so the woman furiously grabbed the black charcoal burner by the beard, clenched her powerful fist and shouted: “Monster! You'll have to tear my mother's heart out of my body before you can steal my child from me.” Rübezahl had not anticipated such a courageous attack, and he shyly backed away; he had never encountered such tangible experience in human nature before. He smiled kindly at the woman: "Don't be angry! I am not a man-eater, as you imagine, nor do I wish to harm you or your children; but let me have the boy, I like the little screamer, I will keep him as a squire, clothe him in velvet and silk, and raise him to be a brave fellow who will one day provide for his father and brothers. Ask for a hundred Schreckenbergers*), and I will pay you." “Ha!” laughed the quick-witted woman, “do you like the boy? Yes, he's a boy like Daus, I wouldn't trade him for all the treasures in the world!” “Fool!” replied Rübezahl, “don't you have three children who are a burden and a nuisance to you? You have to feed them poorly and struggle with them day and night!” The woman: “That's true, but I'm a mother, so I have to do what my job requires. Children are a burden, but they also bring a lot of joy!” The spirit: “What a joy it is to lug around the bellows every day, to boss them around, to clean them, to put up with their bad behavior and shouting!” She: "Truly, sir! You know little of the joys of motherhood. All the work and effort is sweetened by a single friendly glance, the sweet smile and babbling of the little innocent worms. Just look at my golden boy there, how he clings to me, the little charmer! Well, wasn't it him who cried out? Oh, if only I had a hundred hands that could lift and carry you and work for you, my dear little ones!" The Spirit: “So! Does your husband not have hands that can work?” *) Old Saxon coin. She: “Oh yes, he does! He stirs them too, and I can feel it sometimes!” The spirit, enraged: “What? Your husband dares to raise his hand against you? Against such a woman? I will break his neck, the murderer!” She laughs: “You'd have a lot of necks to break if all men who assault women had to pay with their necks. Men are a terrible bunch, that's why they say marriage is misery; I have to resign myself to it, why did I get married!” The spirit: “Well, if you knew that men were a bad lot, it was a foolish thing to do to court them.” She said, “Perhaps! But Steffen was a nimble fellow who earned a good living, and I was a poor maid with no dowry. So he came to me and asked for my hand in marriage, gave me a Wildemann taler for the purchase, and the deal was done. Afterwards, he took the taler back from me, but I still have the wild man.” The ghost smiled. “Perhaps you made him wild with your stubbornness.” She: “Oh, he's already driven that out of me! But Steffen is a miser; if I ask him for a penny, he rages in the house worse than you sometimes do in the mountains, reproaches me for my poverty, and then I have to keep quiet. If I had brought him a dowry, I would have kept my thumb on his eye!” The spirit: “What kind of business does your husband do?” She: “He is a glass merchant and has to work hard for his money: the poor fellow hauls his heavy load from Bohemia year after year; if a glass breaks on the way, I and the poor children have to pay for it, of course; but blows of love don't hurt.” The spirit: “You can still love the man who treats you so badly?” She: “Why not love him? Isn't he the father of my children? They will make up for everything and reward us when they grow up!” The spirit: “What a pitiful consolation! Children also thank their parents for their toil and worries! Will the boys squeeze the last penny out of your sweat cloth when the emperor sends them to the army in distant Ungerland, where the Turks will kill them?” The woman: “Well, I don't care about that either; if they are killed, they will die for the emperor and for their country in their profession; but they may also make spoils and care for their old parents!”     Then the spirit repeated his offer to trade for the boy, but the woman did not respond. She gathered the leaves into the basket, tied the little screamer to the top with a cord, and Rübezahl turned as if to leave. But the burden was too heavy for the woman to lift, so she called him back: “I called you once,” she said, “so now help me up, and if you want to do something else, give the boy you liked a Good Friday coin*) and a pair of rolls; tomorrow his father will come home and bring us white bread from Bohemia.” The spirit replied, “I will help you up, but if you do not give me the boy, he shall have no gift!” “Very well!” replied the woman, and went on her way. *) A Silesian coin worth three pennies, which was formerly minted by the princes of Liegnitz and distributed to the poor as alms on Good Friday.     The further she walked, the heavier the basket became, so that she almost succumbed to the weight and had to pause every ten steps to catch her breath. This did not seem right to her; she thought that Rübezahl had played a trick on her and placed a load of stones under the leaves, so she set the basket down on the nearest edge and tipped it over. But only leaves fell out, not stones. So she filled it halfway again and gathered as many leaves as she could into her apron, but soon the load was too heavy for her again and she had to empty it once more, which greatly surprised the sprightly woman, for she had often carried home heavy loads of grass and had never felt such fatigue. Nevertheless, when she got home, she took care of the household, threw the leaves to the goats and young kids, gave the children their supper, put them to bed, said her evening prayers, and fell asleep quickly and happily.     The early dawn and the alert infant, who loudly demanded his breakfast, woke the busy woman from her sound sleep to begin her daily work. She first went to the goat shed with her milking pail, as was her custom. What a terrible sight! The good, nutritious animal, the old goat, lay there stiff and cold, all four legs stretched out, dead; but the kids rolled their eyes horribly in their heads, stuck out their tongues far from their mouths, and violent convulsions revealed that death was also shaking them. Such a misfortune had never befallen the good woman since she had been managing the farm; completely stunned by horror, she sank down on a bundle of straw, held her apron before her eyes, for she could not bear to look at the misery of the dying animals, and sighed deeply: "I am an unfortunate woman, what shall I do! And what will my harsh husband do when he comes home? Alas, all my blessings in this world are gone!"— She immediately punished her heart for this thought. “If your beloved livestock is your only blessing from God in this world, what about Steffen and your children?” She was ashamed of her hastiness; “Let go of all the riches in the world,” she thought, "you still have your husband and your four children. The source of milk for the dear infant has not yet dried up, and there is water in the well for the other children. Even if there is a quarrel with Steffen and he beats me badly, what is that more than a moment of marital discord; I have neglected nothing. The harvest is coming, so I can go cutting, and in winter I will spin until deep into the night; I will surely be able to acquire a goat again, and once I have that, there will be no shortage of kids!" As she thought about this, her spirits lifted again, she dried her tears, and when she looked up, there at her feet lay a little leaf that glittered and sparkled as brightly and as yellow as pure gold; she picked it up, looked at it, and it was as heavy as gold. She quickly jumped up, ran to her neighbor, the Jewish woman, showed her the find with great joy, and the Jewish woman recognized it as pure gold, haggled with her, and counted out two thick talers in cash on the table. All her heartache was now forgotten. The poor woman had never possessed such a treasure in cash before. She ran to the baker, bought Striezel and butter cookies and a leg of mutton for Steffen, which she wanted to prepare when he came home tired and hungry from his journey in the evening. How the little ones fidgeted toward their happy mother as she entered and handed out such an unusual breakfast to them. She devoted herself entirely to the maternal joy of feeding her hungry brood, and now her first concern was to remove the livestock that she believed had been killed by a monster and to hide this domestic misfortune from her husband for as long as possible. But her astonishment knew no bounds when she happened to look into the feeding trough and saw a whole pile of golden leaves inside. A suspicion arose in her heart. She quickly ran back into the house, sharpened the kitchen knife, cut open the goat's carcass, and found a lump of gold as big as a Pauliner apple in its stomach, and similarly in the stomachs of the kids. Johann armed himself with all his little prayers. (S. 75.) Now she knew no end to her wealth; but with the acquisition of her possessions, she also felt the oppressive worries that came with them. She became restless and shy, felt her heart pounding, did not know whether to lock the treasure in a chest or bury it in the cellar, feared thieves and treasure hunters, and did not want to let the miserly Steffen know everything right away, out of a justified concern that, driven by a spirit of usury, he would take the mammon for himself and still leave her and the children to starve. She pondered for a long time how she could handle it wisely and could not find any advice. Then she remembered the village priest, whom all women in distress used to turn to for advice. So she sought refuge with the comforting pastor, told him openly about her adventure with Rübezahl, how he had helped her to great wealth, and what her concerns were, proving the truth of the matter with all the treasure she carried with her. The pastor crossed himself at the wonder of this event, rejoiced at the poor woman's good fortune, and then shifted his cap back and forth, seeking good advice for her so that she could keep her wealth quietly, without haunting or causing a stir, and also finding a way to prevent the stubborn Steffen from seizing it. After thinking long and hard, he said: "Listen, my daughter, I have good advice for everything. Weigh out the gold for me, and I will keep it safe for you. Then I will write a letter in Italian, which will read as follows: Your brother, who went abroad years ago, was shipped to India in the service of Venice and died there, and he bequeathed all his possessions to you in his will on the condition that the parish priest take care of you, so that you alone and no one else may benefit from them. I desire neither reward nor thanks from you, only remember that you owe thanks to the Holy Church for the blessing that heaven has bestowed upon you, and vow to donate a rich chasuble to the sacristy." This advice pleased the woman greatly, and she vowed the chasuble to the pastor; he weighed the gold conscientiously in her presence, down to the last grain, placed it in the church treasury, and the woman departed from him with a joyful and light heart. As much as the brave village woman had won Rübezahl's favor with her attitudes and behavior, he was all the more indignant toward the harsh Steffen, and he had a great desire to take revenge on him for the good woman, to play a prank on him that would cause him fear and pain and thereby confuse him so much that he would become subservient to the woman and she could hold her thumb to his eye as she wished. To this end, he saddled the swift morning wind, mounted it, galloped over mountains and valleys, and spied on all the country roads and crossroads of Bohemia, and wherever he saw a wanderer carrying a burden, he followed him and searched for his load with the keen eyesight of a basket inspector. Fortunately, no wanderer traveling this road was carrying glassware, otherwise he would have had to pay for the damage and ridicule without hope of compensation, even if he had not been the man Rübezahl was looking for. However, Steffen, heavily laden, could not escape him at these establishments. At snack time, a sprightly, fresh-faced man came walking along with a large burden on his back. With every firm, confident step he took, the load he was carrying clattered loudly. As soon as he caught sight of him in the distance, Laurer rejoiced that his prey was now certain and prepared to carry out his masterstroke. The panting Steffen had almost climbed the mountain; only the last hill remained to be conquered, then it was downhill to his home, so he hurried to climb the summit, but the mountain was steep and the load was heavy. He had to rest more than once, propping the gnarled stick under the basket to reduce its oppressive weight and wiping the sweat that stood in large drops on his forehead. With a final effort, he finally reached the top of the mountain, and a beautiful straight path led to its slope. In the middle of the path lay a sawed-off spruce tree, and the remains of the trunk lay next to it, straight as a die and upright, leveled at the top like a tabletop. All around it grew green tunkagrass, swallowwort, and lady's mantle. This sight was so comforting to the weary porter that he immediately set down the heavy basket on the log and stretched out on the soft grass in the shade opposite. Here he calculated how much pure profit his goods would bring him this time, and after careful calculation, he found that if he did not spend a penny at home and let his wife's industrious hands provide for food and clothing, he would have just enough to buy a donkey at the market in Schmiedeberg and load it up. The thought of how he would burden the gray horse with the load in the future and walk leisurely alongside it was so refreshing to him at a time when his shoulders were sore from carrying it that he continued to dwell on it, as is very natural with happy ideals. “Once I have the donkey,” he thought, “it will soon become a horse, and once I have the black horse in my stable, I will also find a field where its oats will grow. One field will easily become two, two will become four, and in time a farmstead and finally a farm, and then Ilse will also have a new skirt.” He had almost finished his plans when Rübezahl whirled his whirlwind around the wooden stick and suddenly knocked over the glass basket, shattering the fragile items into a thousand pieces. It was like a thunderclap in Steffen's heart! At the same time, he heard loud laughter in the distance, unless it was an illusion and the echo was merely repeating the sound of the shattered glass. He took it for malicious joy, and because the excessive gust of wind seemed unnatural to him, even though he saw clearly that the log and the tree had disappeared, he easily guessed who the culprit was. “Oh!” he lamented, “Rübezahl, you malicious spirit, what have I done to you that you take my piece of bread, my hard-earned sweat and blood! Oh, I am a beaten man for life!” At this, he flew into a kind of rage, hurling every conceivable insult at the mountain spirit to provoke him to anger. “Scoundrel!” he cried, “come and strangle me, now that you have taken everything I have in the world.” In fact, at that moment, his life was no more valuable to him than a broken glass; Rübezahl, however, was nowhere to be seen or heard. Impoverished Steffen had to decide, if he did not want to carry the empty basket home, to gather up the fragments so that he could at least dip a few pointed glasses at the glassworks to start a new business. Profound as a sailor whose ship had been swallowed up by the voracious ocean with all hands, he walked down the mountain, wrestling with a thousand melancholy thoughts, yet occasionally speculating on how he could repair the damage and revive his trade. Then he remembered the goats his wife kept in the barn; but she loved them almost like her children, and he knew that, for the best, they could not be taken away from her. So he devised a plan not to let anyone at home notice his loss, not to return to his dwelling during the day, but to sneak into the house at midnight, drive the goats to the market in Schmiedeberg, and then use the money he got for them to buy new merchandise; but on his return, he would quarrel with his wife and act gruffly, as if she had been careless and allowed the animals to be stolen in his absence. With this well-thought-out plan, the unfortunate shard collector crept into a bush near the village and waited eagerly for midnight to steal from himself. At the stroke of midnight, he set off on his thieving spree, climbed over the low farmyard gate, opened it from the inside, and crept with a pounding heart to the goat shed; he was still shy and afraid of his wife catching him in the act of wrongdoing. Contrary to custom, the pen was unlocked, which surprised him, though he was glad, for he found in this negligence a semblance of justification for his noble deed. But in the pen he found everything desolate and deserted; there was nothing that had life and breath, neither goat nor kid. In his initial shock, he thought that another thief, more skilled at stealing than he was, had already beaten him to it, for misfortune rarely comes alone. Dismayed, he sank down on the straw and, since even his last attempt to get his business back on track had failed, he gave himself over to a dull sadness. Since the busy Ilse had returned from the pastor's house, she had cheerfully and diligently prepared everything to welcome her husband with a good meal, to which she had also invited the pastor, who promised to bring a jug of wine to accompany the merry feast and to tell the cheerful Steffen about his wife's rich inheritance and under what conditions he should enjoy and share in it. Towards evening, she looked out of the window eagerly to see if Steffen was coming, ran out of impatience to the edge of the village, looked with her black eyes towards the highway, was distressed that he was taking so long, and as night fell, anxious worries and premonitions followed her into the bedroom, without her thinking about supper. For a long time, sleep did not come to her tear-filled eyes, until she fell into a restless, weary slumber towards morning. Poor Steffen was no less tormented by vexation and boredom in the goat shed; he was so depressed and subdued that he did not dare to knock on the door. Finally, he came out, knocked timidly, and called in a wistful voice, “Dear wife, wake up and open the door to your husband!” As soon as Ilse heard his voice, she jumped nimbly off the bed like a lively deer, ran to the door, and embraced her husband joyfully; but he responded to these affectionate caresses coldly and frostily, set down his basket, and threw himself sullenly onto the stove bench. When the cheerful woman saw this pitiful sight, it touched her heart. “What's wrong, dear husband?” she said, dismayed. “What's the matter?” He only answered with moans and sighs, but she soon asked him the cause of his grief, and because his heart was too full, he could no longer hide his misfortune from his beloved wife. When she heard that Rübezahl had played the prank, she easily guessed the spirit's benevolent intention and could not help laughing, which Steffen, in his courageous state of mind, would have punished severely. Now he did not punish the apparent carelessness any further and only asked anxiously about the goats.This amused the woman even more, as she realized that the steward had already been snooping around everywhere. “What do you care about my livestock?” she said, “you haven’t even asked about the children yet; the livestock is safe out in the pasture. Don’t let Rübezahl’s malice get to you and don’t worry, who knows where he or someone else will give us rich compensation for it.” “You can wait a long time for that,” said the hopeless man. “Well,” replied the woman, “unexpected things often happen. Be of good cheer, Steffen! Even if you no longer have any glasses and I no longer have any goats, we still have four healthy children and four healthy arms to feed them and ourselves. That is our entire wealth.” “Oh, may God have mercy!” cried the distressed man, “if the goats are gone, just carry the four little rascals into the water, I can't feed them.” “Well, I can,” said Ilse. At these words, the friendly pastor entered, carrying having already eavesdropped on the entire conversation outside the door, he spoke up, lectured Steffen on the text that greed is the root of all evil, and after he had sufficiently impressed upon him the law, he now also proclaimed to him the gospel of his wife's rich inheritance, pulled out the Italian letter, and interpreted it for him, saying that he, the pastor of Kirsdorf, had been appointed executor of the will and had already received the inheritance of his deceased brother-in-law into safe hands. Steffen stood there like a mute statue, unable to do anything but bow occasionally when the pastor reverently touched his cap at the mention of the illustrious Republic of Venice. Once he had regained his composure, he fell lovingly into the arms of his beloved wife and made the second declaration of love in his life, as warm as the first, and although it may have stemmed from different motives this time, Ilse accepted it graciously. From then on, Steffen became the most accommodating and agreeable husband, a loving father to his children, and a diligent, orderly host, for idleness was not his thing. The honest pastor gradually converted the gold into hard cash and used it to buy a large farm, where Steffen and Ilse lived out their lives. He lent out the surplus at interest and managed his ward's capital as conscientiously as the church treasury, accepting no other reward than a chasuble, which Ilse had made so magnificent that no archbishop would have been ashamed to wear it. The tender, loyal mother continued to enjoy great happiness with her children in her old age, and Rübezahl's protégé grew into a brave man, serving in the emperor's army for a long time under Wallenstein in the Thirty Years' War and becoming a famous war hero.