Yet not unhappily.Clement it may be remembered, was fond of children, and true monastic life fosters this sentiment.The innocent distress on the cherubic face, the tears that ran so smoothly from those transparent violets, his eyes, and his pretty, dismal cry for his only friend, his mother, went through the hermit's heart.He employed all his gentleness and all his art to soothe him; and as the little soul was wonderfully intelligent for his age, presently succeeded so far that he ceased to cry out, and wonder took the place of fear; while, in silence, broken only in little gulps, he scanned, with great tearful eyes, this strange figure that looked so wild, but spoke so kindly, and wore armour, yet did not kill little boys, but coaxed them.Clement was equally perplexed to know how this little human flower came to lie sparkling and blooming in his gloomy cave.But he remembered he had left the door wide open, and he was driven to conclude that, owing to this negligence, some unfortunate creature of high or low degree had seized this opportunity to get rid of her child for ever.[1].At this his bowels yearned so over the poor deserted cherub, that the tears of pure tenderness stood in his eyes, and still, beneath the crime of the mother, he saw the divine goodness, which had so directed her heartlessness as to comfort His servant's breaking heart.
"Now bless thee, bless thee, bless thee, sweet innocent, I would not change thee for e'en a cherub in heaven.""At's pooty," replied the infant, ignoring contemptuously, after the manner of infants, all remarks that did not interest him.
"What is pretty here, my love, besides thee?""Ookum-gars,[2] said the boy, pointing to the hermit's breastplate.
"Quot liberi, tot sententiunculae!" Hector's child screamed at his father's glittering casque and nodding crest; and here was a mediaeval babe charmed with a polished cuirass, and his griefs assuaged.
"There are prettier things here than that," said Clement, "there are little birds; lovest thou birds?""Nay.Ay.En um ittle, ery ittle? Not ike torks.Hate torks um bigger an baby."He then confided, in very broken language, that the storks with their great flapping wings.scared him, and were a great trouble and worry to him, darkening his existence more or less.
"Ay, but my birds are very little, and good, and oh, so pretty!""Den I ikes 'm," said the child authoritatively, "I ont my mammy.""Alas, sweet dove! I doubt I shall have to fill her place as best I may.Hast thou no daddy as well as mammy, sweet one?"Now not only was this conversation from first to last, the relative ages, situations, and all circumstances of the parties considered, as strange a one as ever took place between two mortal creatures, but at or within a second or two of the hermit's last question, to turn the strange into the marvellous, came an unseen witness, to whom every word that passed carried ten times the force it did to either of the speakers.
Since, therefore, it is with her eyes you must now see, and hear with her ears, I go back a step for her.
Margaret, when she ran past Gerard, was almost mad.She was in that state of mind in which affectionate mothers have been known to kill their children, sometimes along with themselves, sometimes alone, which last is certainly maniacal, She ran to Reicht Heynes pale and trembling, and clasped her round the neck, "Oh, Reicht!
oh, Reicht!" and could say no more.
Reicht kissed her, and began to whimper; and would you believe it, the great mastiff uttered one long whine: even his glimmer of sense taught him grief was afoot.
"Oh, Reicht!" moaned the despised beauty, as soon as she could utter a word for choking, "see how he has served me!" and she showed her hands, that were bleeding with falling on the stony ground."He threw me down, he was so eager to fly from me, He took me for a devil; he said I came to tempt him.Am I the woman to tempt a man? you know me, Reicht.""Nay, in sooth, sweet Mistress Margaret, the last i' the world.""And he would not look at my child.I'll fling myself and him into the Rotter this night.""Oh, fie! fie! eh, my sweet woman, speak not so.Is any man that breathes worth your child's life?""My child! where is he? Why, Reicht, I have left him behind.Oh, shame! is it possible I can love him to that degree as to forget my child? Ah! I am rightly served for it."And she sat down, and faithful Reicht beside her, and they sobbed in one another's arms.
After a while Margaret left off sobbing.and said doggedly, "let us go home.""Ay, but the bairn?"
"Oh! he is well where he is.My heart is turned against my very child, He cares nought for him; wouldn't see him, nor hear speak of him; and I took him there so proud, and made his hair so nice, I did, and put his new frock and cowl on him.Nay, turn about:
it's his child as well as mine; let him keep it awhile: mayhap that will learn him to think more of its mother and his own.""High words off an empty stomach," said Reicht.
"Time will show.Come you home."
They departed, and Time did show quicker than he levels abbeys, for at the second step Margaret stopped, and could neither go one way nor the other, but stood stock still.
"Reicht," said she piteously, "what else have I on earth? Icannot."
"Whoever said you could? Think you I paid attention? Words are woman's breath.Come back for him without more ado; 'tis time we were in our beds, much more he."Reicht led the way, and Margaret followed readily enough in that direction; but as they drew near the cell, she stopped again.
"Reicht, go you and ask him, will he give me back my boy; for Icould not bear the sight of him"
