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THE NUeRNBERG STOVE
EIGHTH EDITION
FOR WHAT HE SAW WAS NOTHING LESS THAN ALL THEBRIC-A-BRAC IN MOTION _Page 64_]
THE NUeRNBERG STOVE
BY LOUISA DE LA RAME (OUIDA)
_ILLUSTRATED IN COLOR BY_
MARIA L. KIRK
PHILADELPHIA AND LONDON J. B. LIPPINCOTT COMPANY
COPYRIGHT, 1909, BY J. B. LIPPINCOTT COMPANY COPYRIGHT, 1916, BY J. B. LIPPINCOTT COMPANY
PRINTED BY J. B. LIPPINCOTT COMPANY AT THE WASHINGTON SQUARE PRESS PHILADELPHIA. U. S. A.
ILLUSTRATIONS
PAGE
FOR WHAT HE SAW WAS NOTHING LESS THAN ALL THE BRIC-A-BRACIN MOTION _Frontispiece_
HE WENT ON THROUGH THE STREETS, PAST THE STONE MAN-AT-ARMSOF THE GUARD-HOUSE 9
"IT IS A SIN, IT IS A THEFT, IT IS AN INFAMY," HE SAID 34
AUGUST OPENED THE WINDOW, CRAMMED THE SNOW INTO HIS MOUTHAGAIN AND AGAIN 55
THE NUeRNBERG STOVE
I
August lived in a little town called Hall. Hall is a favoritename for several towns in Austria and in Germany; but this oneespecial little Hall, in the Upper Innthal, is one of the mostcharming Old-World places that I know, and August for his partdid not know any other. It has the green meadows and the greatmountains all about it, and the gray-green glacier-fed waterrushes by it. It has paved streets and enchanting little shopsthat have all latticed panes and iron gratings to them; it has avery grand old Gothic church, that has the noblest blendings oflight and shadow, and marble tombs of dead knights, and a look ofinfinite strength and repose as a church should have. Then thereis the Muntze Tower, black and white, rising out of greenery andlooking down on a long wooden bridge and the broad rapid river;and there is an old schloss which has been made into a guard-house,with battlements and frescos and heraldic devices in gold andcolors, and a man-at-arms carved in stone standing life-size inhis niche and bearing his date 1530. A little farther on, butclose at hand, is a cloister with beautiful marble columns andtombs, and a colossal wood-carved Calvary, and beside that asmall and very rich chapel: indeed, so full is the little town ofthe undisturbed past, that to walk in it is like opening a missalof the Middle Ages, all emblazoned and illuminated with saintsand warriors, and it is so clean, and so still, and so noble, byreason of its monuments and its historic color, that I marvelmuch no one has ever cared to sing its praises. The old piousheroic life of an age at once more restful and more brave thanours still leaves its spirit there, and then there is the girdleof the mountains all around, and that alone means strength,peace, majesty.
In this little town a few years ago August Strehla lived with hispeople in the stone-paved irregular square where the grand churchstands.
He was a small boy of nine years at that time,--a chubby-facedlittle man with rosy cheeks, big hazel eyes, and clusters ofcurls the brown of ripe nuts. His mother was dead, his father waspoor, and there were many mouths at home to feed. In this countrythe winters are long and very cold, the whole land lies wrappedin snow for many months, and this night that he was trottinghome, with a jug of beer in his numb red hands, was terriblycold and dreary. The good burghers of Hall had shut their doubleshutters, and the few lamps there were flickered dully behindtheir quaint, old-fashioned iron casings. The mountains indeedwere beautiful, all snow-white under the stars that are so big infrost. Hardly any one was astir; a few good souls wending homefrom vespers, a tired post-boy who blew a shrill blast from histasselled horn as he pulled up his sledge before a hostelry, andlittle August hugging his jug of beer to his ragged sheepskincoat, were all who were abroad, for the snow fell heavily and thegood folks of Hall go early to their beds. He could not run, orhe would have spilled the beer; he was half frozen and a littlefrightened, but he kept up his courage by saying over and overagain to himself, "I shall soon be at home with dear Hirschvogel."
HE WENT ON THROUGH THE STREETS, PAST THE STONEMAN-AT-ARMS OF THE GUARD-HOUSE]
He went on through the streets, past the stone man-at-arms of theguard-house, and so into the place where the great church was,and where near it stood his father, Karl Strehla's house, with asculptured Bethlehem over the door-way, and the Pilgrimage of theThree Kings painted on its wall. He had been sent on a longerrand outside the gates in the afternoon, over the frozenfields and the broad white snow, and had been belated, and hadthought he had heard the wolves behind him at every step, and hadreached the town in a great state of terror, thankful with allhis little panting heart to see the oil-lamp burning under thefirst house-shrine. But he had not forgotten to call for thebeer, and he carried it carefully now, though his hands were sonumb that he was afraid they would let the jug down every moment.
The snow outlined with white every gable and cornice of thebeautiful old wooden houses; the moonlight shone on the gildedsigns, the lambs, the grapes, the eagles, and all the quaintdevices that hung before the doors; covered lamps burned beforethe Nativities and Crucifixions painted on the walls or let intothe wood-work; here and there, where a shutter had not beenclosed, a ruddy fire-light lit up a homely interior, with thenoisy band of children clustering round the house-mother and abig brown loaf, or some gossips spinning and listening to thecobbler's or the barber's story of a neighbor, while theoil-wicks glimmered, and the hearth-logs blazed, and thechestnuts sputtered in their iron roasting-pot. Little August sawall these things, as he saw everything with his two big brighteyes that had such curious lights and shadows in them; but hewent heedfully on his way for the sake of the beer which a singleslip of the foot would make him spill. At his knock and call thesolid oak door, four centuries old if one, flew open, and the boydarted in with his beer, and shouted, with all the force ofmirthful lungs, "Oh, dear Hirschvogel, but for the thought of youI should have died!"
It was a large barren room into which he rushed with so muchpleasure, and the bricks were bare and uneven. It had awalnut-wood press, handsome and very old, a broad deal table, andseveral wooden stools for all its furniture; but at the top ofthe chamber, sending out warmth and color together as the lampshed its rays upon it, was a tower of porcelain, burnished withall the hues of a king's peacock and a queen's jewels, andsurmounted with armed figures, and shields, and flowers ofheraldry, and a great golden crown upon the highest summit ofall.