Scarcely had Prince Unexpected heard this cooing of the pigeon, when he regained his lost recollection, bounced from the table, rushed to the door, and behind the door the princess, Bony’s daughter, took him by the hand; they went together down the corridor, and before them stood a horse saddled and bridled.
Why delay? Prince Unexpected and the princess, Bony’s daughter, sprang on the horse, started on the road, and at last arrived happily in the realm of Prince Unexpected’s father. The king and the queen received them with joy and merriment, and did not wait long before they prepared them a magnificent wedding, the like of which eye never saw and ear never heard of.
THE GREEDY COBBLER
(Welsh Folk Tale—Ethics, teaching contentment)
Once upon a time a Welsh cobbler carrying a hazel wand was walking over London Bridge, and as he sauntered along he met an Englishman.
“Ah,” the latter exclaimed, pointing to the wand the man of Cambria used as a cane, “where did you get it?”
“Where did I get it?” the Welshman repeated, amazed that any one should ask such a question. “Off of a hazel bush, to be sure.”
But the stranger stared in big-eyed wonder and shook his head.
“There is only one hazel bush of that kind in all the world,” he declared, “and under it a vast treasure is hidden. Lead me to the spot, and I will share it with you.”
The Welshman smiled pleasantly, for he began to have visions of a luxurious, idle life. He hated to work, and was always grumbling because he had to hammer away at shoe lasts to make his living.
To be sure he would lead the Englishman to the spot, and once he had some gold in his possession, he’d do nothing but feast and ride in a coach and dance at the fair. So he said quite wearily, lest the stranger think he seemed too eager and change his mind, “It is a long way from here, in the Vale of Neath in my native Wales, and by my faith I have no desire to walk that distance.”
But the Englishman coaxed, which was just what the Welshman wanted him to do. So they turned away from London Bridge and journeyed northward across mountains and valleys, until they came to Cambria.
After several days they came to Craig-i-Ddinas, in the lovely Vale of Neath. The Welshman led the way to the hazel bush, beside which he had often played when a boy, and the Englishman said, “In due time we will begin work.”
When darkness was heavy enough to cover all trace of what they did, they dug up the bush, and the Englishman, who happened to be a wizard, pointed to a broad stone under the roots and said, “Below is the treasure. Do as I bid and you shall be rich.”
And the Welshman began to feel very important, thinking how people would honor him when he lived in a great house and wore a velvet coat.
Then the cock crowed for dawn, and they knew they must hurry away before any of the peasants saw them. The Welshman did not wish his village cousins to know he was there, for they would question why he had come; so they found a vacant tinker’s hut in which to rest until darkness made it safe for them to go to work again.
But the cobbler was too excited to sleep. The sight of the broad, flat stone at the root of the hazel bush brought back to his mind a story he had often heard, one that the village grandmothers used to tell when he was a boy. Again and again he thought of it, the story of the treasure of King Arthur.
Historians state that when the ruler of Camelot was killed in the battle of Mount Badon, he was buried at Glastonbury, but the Welsh country folk say that is not true. They declare Merlin carried him straight to the lovely Vale of Neath, where he sleeps on his arms, with his Round Table Knights beside him and all the wealth of his realm piled at his feet. There he and his warriors will rest until the ringing of a warning bell, when the Black and Golden Eagles go to war. Then they will rise up and destroy every enemy of Cambria, when Britain will be governed with justice and peace will reign as long as the world endures. Could it be that the broad stone at the foot of the hazel tree covered the entrance to Arthur’s cave? This the Welshman pondered until it was almost dark and time to go to work again.
Cautiously they left the hut and approached the spot, peering in every direction lest some one see and question them. Sturdily they pulled and tugged at the rock, and slowly, steadily moved it, until they found an opening like a door. Then the Englishman said in a low tone, “Behold King Arthur’s cave! Follow me and obey.”
The Welshman followed, and a wonderful sight met his eyes. Thousands of warriors slept in a circle on their arms, and in the midst of them, more splendid looking than any other, lay the King of Camelot, the mighty Arthur himself. His crown of gold was by his side, a pile of gold lay at his feet, and beyond the circle of his followers were a thousand steeds, all saddled and bridled as if ready for battle. Sometimes they champed as if eager for the war cry, sometimes they drooped their heads wearily.
Noticing a bell suspended just above the treasure heap, the cobbler pointed to it.
“Do not touch it,” the Englishman warned. “But if by accident you do, and the warriors waken and ask if it is day, say, ‘No, sleep thou on.’ Otherwise a terrible fate will overtake you.”
They helped themselves to the gold and left the cave, and each man went his way. The Welshman, having all the treasure he could carry, was no longer a poor cobbler who must spend his time bending over shoe lasts. He was richer than the mayor and could feast and ride in a coach, dance at the fair, and live like the lords of the land.
But riches made that cobbler greedy. He had far more gold than he needed, and the finest house in seven counties, but still he wanted more. He kept thinking of the gold piled high in Arthur’s cave; so one day he journeyed back to the Vale of Neath and waited for nightfall.
Then, creeping to the place of the hazel bush, he moved the rock and went into the cave.
Ah, it was a goodly sight, those thousand warriors slumbering there beside the treasure heap and a thousand saddled chargers beyond! He would take all the gold he could carry, and very soon he would come back for more. But in his greed to increase his wealth he bumped against the bell, which clanged loudly. The warriors started up, asking if it was day, but the man was so dazzled by the pile of shining treasure that he did not have the answer ready. They leaped to their feet, called him a robber, beat him, and drove him from the cave.
Then what a change! He went limping homeward, to discover that all his wealth had disappeared and where his great house had stood was a miserable hut. He was as poor as ever, and unless he could get more gold out of the cave must go back to cobbling and never again ride in a coach. But try as he would, he could not find the place where the hazel bush had grown. Many a journey he made into the Vale of Neath, but never did he catch a glimpse of the broad, flat stone. He had to spend his days bending over shoe lasts instead of riding in a coach, and was a cripple as long as he lived.
THE STORY OF A SALMON
By David Starr Jordan
(Science)
In the realm of the Northwest Wind, on the boundary line between the dark fir forests and the sunny plains, there stands a mountain—a great white cone two miles and a half in perpendicular height. On its lower mile the dense fir woods cover it with never changing green; on its next half mile a lighter green of grass and bushes gives place in winter to white; and on its uppermost mile the snows of the great ice age still linger in unspotted purity. The people of Washington Territory say that their mountain is the great “King-pin of the Universe,” which shows that even in its own country Mount Tacoma is not without honor.
Flowing down from the southwest slope of Mount Tacoma is a cold, clear river, fed by the melting snows of the mountain. Madly it hastens down over white cascades and beds of shining sands, through birch woods and belts of dark firs, to mingle its waters at last with those of the great Columbia. This river is the Cowlitz; and on its bottom, not many years ago, there lay half buried in the sand a number of little orange-colored globules, each about as large as a pea. These were not much in themselves, but great in their possibilities. In the waters above them little suckers and chubs and prickly sculpins strained their mouths to draw these globules from the sand, and vicious-looking crawfishes picked them up with their blundering hands and examined them with their telescopic eyes. But one, at least, of the globules escaped their curiosity, else this story would not be worth telling. The sun shone down on it through the clear water, and the ripples of the Cowlitz said over it their incantations, and in it at last awoke a living being. It was a fish,—a curious little fellow, not half an inch long, with great, staring eyes, which made almost half his length, and with a body so transparent that he could not cast a shadow. He was a little salmon, a very little salmon; but the water was good, and there were flies and worms and little living creatures in abundance for him to eat, and he soon became a larger salmon. Then there were many more little salmon with him, some larger and some smaller, and they all had a merry time. Those who had been born soonest and had grown largest used to chase the others around and bite heads and swallow them whole; for, said they, “even young salmon are good eating.” “Heads I win, tails you lose,” was their motto. Thus, what was once two small salmon became united into a single larger one, and the process of “addition, division, and silence” still went on.
By and by, when all the salmon were too large to be swallowed, they began to grow restless. They saw that the water rushing by seemed to be in a great hurry to get somewhere, and it was somehow suggested that its hurry was caused by something good to eat at the other end of its course. Then they all started down the stream, salmon fashion,—which fashion is to get into the current, head upstream, and thus to drift backward as the river sweeps along.
At last they came to where the Cowlitz and the Columbia join, and they were almost lost for a time; for they could find no shores, and the bottom and the top of the water were so far apart. Here they saw other and far larger salmon in the deepest part of the current, turning neither to the right nor to the left, but swimming right on upstream just as rapidly as they could. And these great salmon would not stop for them, and would not lie and float with the current. They had no time to talk, even in the simple sign language by which fishes express their ideas, and no time to eat. They had important work before them, and the time was short. So they went on up the river, keeping their great purposes to themselves; and our little salmon and his friends from the Cowlitz drifted down the stream.
By and by the water began to change. It grew denser, and no longer flowed rapidly along; and twice a day it used to turn about and flow the other way. Then the shores disappeared, and the water began to have a different and peculiar flavor,—a flavor which seemed to the salmon much richer and more inspiring than the glacier water of their native Cowlitz. There were many curious things to see—crabs with hard shells and savage faces, but so good when crushed and swallowed! Then there were luscious squid swimming about; and, to a salmon, squid are like ripe peaches and cream. There were great companies of delicate sardines and herring, green and silvery, and it was such fun to chase and capture them! Those who eat sardines packed in oil by greasy fingers, and herrings dried in the smoke, can have little idea how satisfying it is to have a meal of them, plump and sleek and silvery, fresh from the sea.
Thus the salmon chased the herrings about, and had a merry time. Then they were chased in turn by great sea lions,—swimming monsters with huge half-human faces, long thin whiskers, and blundering ways. The sea lions like to bite out the throat of a salmon, with its precious stomach full of luscious sardines, and then to leave the rest of the fish to shift for itself. And the seals and the herrings scattered the salmon about, till at last the hero of our story found himself quite alone, with none of his own kind near him. But that did not trouble him much, and he went on his own way, getting his dinner when he was hungry, which was all the time, and then eating a little between meals for his stomach’s sake.
So it went on for three long years; and at the end of this time our little fish had grown to be a great, fine salmon of twenty-two pounds’ weight, shining like a new tin pan, and with rows of the loveliest round black spots on his head and back and tail. One day, as he was swimming about, idly chasing a big sculpin with a head so thorny that he never was swallowed by anybody, all of a sudden the salmon noticed a change in the water around him.
Spring had come again, and the south-lying snowdrifts on the Cascade Mountains once more felt that the “earth was wheeling sunwards.” The cold snow waters ran down from the mountains and into the Columbia River, and made a freshet on the river. The high water went far out into the sea, and out in the sea our salmon felt it on his gills. He remembered how the cold water used to feel in the Cowlitz when he was a little fish. In a blundering, fishy fashion he thought about it; he wondered whether the little eddy looked as it used to look and whether caddis worms and young mosquitoes were really as sweet and tender as he used to think they were. Then he thought some other things; but as the salmon’s mind is located in the optic lobes of his brain, and ours is in a different place, we cannot be quite certain what his thoughts really were.
What our salmon did, we know. He did what every grown salmon in the ocean does when he feels the glacier water once more upon his gills. He became a changed being. He spurned the blandishment of soft-shelled crabs. The pleasures of the table and of the chase, heretofore his only delights, lost their charms for him. He turned his course straight toward the direction whence the cold water came, and for the rest of his life never tasted a mouthful of food. He moved on toward the river mouth, at first playfully, as though he were not really certain whether he meant anything after all. Afterward, when he struck the full current of the Columbia, he plunged straight forward with an unflinching determination that had in it something of the heroic. When he had passed the rough water at the bar, he was not alone. His old neighbors of the Cowlitz, and many more from the Clackamas and the Spokane and Des Chutes and Kootanie,—a great army of salmon,—were with him. In front were thousands pressing on, and behind them were thousands more, all moved by a common impulse which urged them up the Columbia.
They were all swimming bravely along where the current was deepest, when suddenly the foremost felt something tickling like a cobweb about their noses and under their chins. They changed their course a little to brush it off and it touched their fins as well. Then they tried to slip down with the current, and thus leave it behind. But, no! the thing, whatever it was, although its touch was soft, refused to let go, and held them like a fetter. The more they struggled, the tighter became its grasp, and the whole foremost rank of the salmon felt it together; for it was a great gill net, a quarter of a mile long, stretched squarely across the mouth of the river.
By and by men came in boats, and hauled up the gill net and the helpless salmon that had become entangled in it. They threw the fishes into a pile in the bottom of the boat, and the others saw them no more. We that live outside the water know better what befalls them, and we can tell the story which the salmon could not.
All along the banks of the Columbia River, from its mouth to nearly thirty miles away, there is a succession of large buildings, looking like great barns or warehouses, built on piles in the river, high enough to be out of the reach of floods. There are thirty of these buildings, and they are called “canneries.” Each cannery has about forty boats, and with each boat are two men and a long gill net. These nets fill the whole river as with a nest of cobwebs from April to July, and to each cannery nearly a thousand great salmon are brought every day. These salmon are thrown in a pile on the floor; and Wing Hop, the big Chinaman, takes them one after another on the table, and with a great knife dexterously cuts off the head, the tail, and the fins; then with a sudden thrust he removes the intestines and the eggs. The body goes into a tank of water; and the head is dropped into a box on a flatboat, and goes down the river to be made into salmon oil. Next the body is brought to another table; and Quong Sang, with a machine like a feed cutter, cuts it into pieces each just as long as a one-pound can. Then Ah Sam, with a butcher knife, cuts these pieces into strips just as wide as the can. Next Wan Lee, the “China boy,” brings down a hundred cans from the loft where the tinners are making them, and into each can puts a spoonful of salt. It takes just six salmon to fill a hundred cans. Then twenty Chinamen put the pieces of meat into the cans, fitting in little strips to make them exactly full. Ten more solder up the cans, and ten more put the cans into boiling water till the meat is thoroughly cooked, and five more punch a little hole in the head of each can to let out the air. Then they solder them up again, and little girls paste on them bright-colored labels showing merry little cupids riding the happy salmon up to the cannery door, with Mount Tacoma and Cape Disappointment in the background; and a legend underneath says that this is “Booth’s” or “Badollet’s Best,” or “Hume’s,” or “Clark’s,” or “Kinney’s Superfine Salt Water Salmon.” Then the cans are placed in cases, forty-eight in a case, and five hundred thousand cases are put up every year. Great ships come to Astoria, and are loaded with them; and they carry them away to London and San Francisco and Liverpool and New York and Sydney and Valparaiso; and the man at the corner grocery sells them at twenty cents a can.
All this time our salmon is going up the river, eluding one net as by a miracle, and soon having need of more miracles to escape the rest; passing by Astoria on a fortunate day,—which was Sunday, the day on which no man may fish if he expects to sell what he catches,—till finally he came to where nets were few, and, at last, to where they ceased altogether. But there he found that scarcely any of his companions were with him; for the nets cease when there are no more salmon to be caught in them. So he went on, day and night, where the water was deepest, stopping not to feed or loiter on the way, till at last he came to a wild gorge, where the great river became an angry torrent, rushing wildly over a huge staircase of rocks. But our hero did not falter; and summoning all his forces, he plunged into the Cascades. The current caught him and dashed him against the rocks. A whole row of silvery scales came off and glistened in the water like sparks of fire, and a place on his side became black and red, which for a salmon is the same as being black and blue for other people. His comrades tried to go up with him; and one lost his eye, one his tail, and one had his lower jaw pushed back into his head like the joint of a telescope. Again he tried to surmount the Cascades; and at last he succeeded, and an Indian on the rocks above was waiting to receive him. But the Indian with his spear was less skillful than he was wont to be, and our hero escaped, losing only a part of one of his fins; and with him came one other, and henceforth these two pursued their journey together.
Now a gradual change took place in the looks of our salmon. In the sea he was plump and round and silvery, with delicate teeth in a symmetrical mouth. Now his silvery color disappeared, his skin grew slimy, and the scales sank into it: his back grew black, and his sides turned red,—not a healthy red, but a sort of hectic flush. He grew poor; and his back, formerly as straight as need be, now developed an unpleasant hump at the shoulders. His eyes—like those of all enthusiasts who forsake eating and sleeping for some loftier aim—became dark and sunken. His symmetrical jaws grew longer and longer, and projected from his mouth, giving him a savage and wolfish appearance, quite at variance with his real disposition. For all the desires and ambitions of his nature had become centered into one. We may not know what this one was, but we know that it was a strong one; for it had led him on and on,—past the nets and horrors of Astoria; past the dangerous Cascades, past the spears of Indians; through the terrible flume of the Dalles, where the mighty river is compressed between huge rocks into a channel narrower than a village street; on past the meadows of Umatilla and the wheat fields of Walla Walla; on to where the great Snake River and the Columbia join; on up the Snake River and its eastern branch, till at last he reached the foot of the Bitter Root Mountains in the Territory of Idaho, nearly a thousand miles from the ocean which he had left in April. With him still was the other salmon which had come with him through the Cascades, handsomer and smaller than he, and, like him, growing poor and ragged and tired.
At last, one October afternoon, our finny travelers came together to a little clear brook, with a bottom of fine gravel, over which the water was but a few inches deep. Our fish painfully worked his way to it; for his tail was all frayed out, his muscles were sore, and his skin covered with unsightly blotches. But his sunken eyes saw a ripple in the stream, and under it a bed of little pebbles and sand. So there in the sand he scooped out with his tail a smooth round place, and his companion came and filled it with orange-colored eggs. Then our salmon came back again; and softly covering the eggs, the work of their lives was done, and, in the old salmon fashion, they drifted tail foremost down the stream.
They drifted on together for a night and a day, but they never came to the sea. For the salmon has but one life to live, and it ascends the river but once. The rest lies with its children. And when the April sunshine fell on the globules in the gravel, these were awakened into life. With the early autumn rains, the little fishes were large enough to begin their wanderings. They dropped down the current in the old salmon fashion. And thus they came into the great river and drifted away to the sea.
THE PIGEONS OF VENICE
(History)
In one of the upland valleys of Italy, shut away from the rest of the world by the high, white peaks men call the Dolomites, there lived, about five hundred years ago, a little boy named Leonardo. He dwelt in a tiny hut with his black-eyed peasant mother, fed the pigeons and milked the goats each day, and in the evening, the pleasant summer evening that spread rainbow-colored draperies over the Dolomite peaks, he lay in the shadows under the plum tree, thinking about his brother Vittorio, who was a soldier down in the great city of Venice.
“I wish brother would come home,” he said to his mother one morning as they ate their breakfast of macaroni and mountain bread, “because he always tells such wonderful things about the city. Some day I mean to go there and be a soldier, too.”
His dark eyes gleamed as he spoke, and he sat very straight in his heavy oaken chair, as of course a soldier ought to do.
Everybody knows that wishes do not always come true, but sometimes they do, and when that happens the whole world seems brighter and lovelier than it seemed before. The next afternoon, as Leonardo was turning the goats into their inclosure, he gave a shout so joyous that even Armando the weaver, in his shop at the other end of the village, heard and ran to see what it meant. He soon found out, for he saw Leonardo hurrying toward a man who was moving along the highway. Vittorio, the soldier brother, was coming home, coming back to the mountain village with many a tale of the splendid city beside the Adriatic, and perhaps with a goody that would taste very sweet after the coarse fare of weeks and months.
Far into the night the brothers sat and talked together, talked of palaces and gliding gondolas, of great lords and ladies, of soldiers moving in splendid uniforms about the Piazza of St. Mark. They talked of Carnival time too, of the merry pranks the people played on each other, of the procession on the water and the presents given to the Doge.
“And sometimes,” Vittorio exclaimed proudly, “they are very splendid. Sometimes they are of gold and silver, and of silk stuffs brought from the Indies.”
Leonardo sat silent for a minute. He knew little of present giving, for in the mountains where he lived there was no money to spend on such things. But always when he made his mother a garland of flowers on her birthday, she seemed so happy about it that he thought it must be very lovely to bestow gifts. So he said softly, “I should like to send a present to the Doge. It would seem like doing something for Venice. But I have nothing to give.”
“Wait until you are a man and can be a soldier,” the big brother answered. “Then you will be doing much.”
The next morning he was up at daybreak. Vittorio had only two days’ leave, which meant that he must start back at noon, and his mother had promised that Leonardo might go with him to the edge of the village if he finished his tasks in time. So he milked the goats before there was a bit of stirring about the hut, and led the geese from their pen to crop the green grass on the hillside. Then he cut some grass and threw it to the old horse that was their most prized possession, and by the time his brother came from the hut he called to him, “I have only to feed the pigeons yet.”
Vittorio smiled and stood watching as the boy whistled to the birds.
The gentle creatures flew up at Leonardo’s call, and as he scattered crumbs to them, he thought again of the great carnival at Venice and the gifts that would be made to the Doge. He wished that he too might join that throng of givers, but he possessed nothing but his pigeons, and a bird would seem a very poor present to offer a ruler. But he happened to think that the schoolmaster had once told him that it is not the cost or the beauty of an offering that makes it precious, but the good will of the giver, and that a beggar’s portion may be a lovelier gift than that of a prince. The schoolmaster was very wise. He could both read and write, which only a few could do in that day, so anything that he said must be true; and the memory of the words brought an idea to Leonardo that made the boy’s eyes dance.
“Vittorio,” he exclaimed suddenly, “I have thought of something.”
Vittorio wondered what excited his brother so.
“Well?” he asked as he walked near.
“Will you take a pair of pigeons back to the city with you?”
“A pair of pigeons,” the soldier repeated. “Why?”
“I want to send a present to the Doge, and I have nothing else,” he answered. “But the birds are so gentle I am sure he will like them. They are fine carriers, too.”
Vittorio smiled. Being in the army of the Doge, he was pleased that his brother showed such loyalty to the master he served. It meant that he would probably grow up to be a good soldier, and in those days nothing was considered finer than that. So he answered pleasantly: “Of course I will, Leonardo, if you are sure you can give up your pets. I will ask my captain, who knows the Doge well, to take them to him and say that they are the gift of a mountain boy.”
Leonardo’s eyes sparkled with delight. It seemed a glorious thing that he too might give with the rich and great; so he selected the handsomest pair in the covey, birds of a soft gray, with shadings of blue and purple along their delicate wings, and he and Vittorio made a rude cage in which to carry them to the city.
Then they walked together to the edge of the village, and Leonardo watched his brother go along the road that wound down to the low country. He waved good-by until Vittorio passed from sight, then went back to the hut, happy in the thought that he was doing something for Venice.
Many months passed. It was September when Vittorio went away, and now the blossom time had come and hills were bright with touches of summer. All through that long period Leonardo wondered much about the pigeons, but no word came from his brother; for letters went only by courier in those days, and poor folk could not pay for the carrying. But he was sure the birds had reached the Doge, for Vittorio had promised and a soldier never broke his word.
Then one day in the autumn, when the brightness on the mountains had faded to bronze and gray, and squirrels were stocking their houses as nuts dropped in the woods, Vittorio came back. He looked older and graver than the year before, and some worrying thing seemed on his mind.
“It is just to say good-by,” he said, as the gray-haired mother stroked his hands and Leonardo looked at him with loving eyes. “The war has begun, and we soldiers of Venice must sail away to Candia for the fighting.”
Leonardo’s eyes grew wide, and tears came into them as he exclaimed, “If only I were old enough to go with you and help serve our glorious city of St. Mark!”
The big man laid his hand lovingly on the dark head.
“Never mind, brother,” he said. “You have already done much. I gave your birds to my captain, who took them to the Doge, and the Doge is proud of them because they are splendid carriers. So Dandolo, our general, will take them along with the army to bring back news of the war. And now good-by. When the fighting is over, I will come again.”
He mounted his horse and rode away, and two pairs of dewy eyes looked after him as he went.
The days that followed seemed very long to the two who waited in the highlands. They knew that the army had gone, and that away on the eastern island perhaps the fighting had begun. But what of the fate of the Venetian hosts, and what of the son and brother who had sailed under the standard of the Lion? As to that they could only hope and wonder.
Slowly, slowly dragged the days, but no word came back.
One morning, while Leonardo and his mother prayed and waited in the mountain cabin, down in Venice in the splendid Palace of the Doges, the Council of Ten sat and pondered. They talked much about the absent army, wondering if victory or defeat had been its share, and while they wondered there came a fluttering of soft gray wings.
“Pigeons!” some one called. “See, they are carriers!”
The dignified assemblage broke up in excitement, for they knew the tiny birds were messengers, and the men hurried to read the missives fastened to their crimson feet.
“They come from Dandolo,” said one of the nobles, “bringing news of the war.”
“From Candia!” another exclaimed. “It cannot be that they have flown so far!”
But it was true, for upon reading they learned that the Venetian army had been victorious and the soldiers would soon sail home in triumph. The tiny birds had flown all the long leagues across the sea to carry the glad news to the waiting people.
Up in the hut in the Italian highlands Leonardo and his mother still watched and wondered, when one evening a few days later Armando, the village weaver, came by on his way home from the city. He was greatly excited and called to them as he stopped at the door.
“Rejoice,” he said, “for the war is over!”
“How do you know?” the mother asked. “Are the soldiers back?”
“No. But the pigeons brought the word, and every one is glad.”
“Pigeons!” exclaimed Leonardo. “My pigeons! Then after all I did something for Venice.”
And he spoke the truth. So much did the message mean to the anxious people, that the lawmakers said they would always keep the birds, they and their young and their children’s young. And although hundreds of years have passed since then, still the gray-winged creatures fly about St. Mark’s Square, and the people love and feed them. For they know they are descended from the pair sent to the Doge by a mountain boy, Leonardo’s pigeons, that long ago flew across the wide seas, bringing word of the victory of the Venetian hosts.
THE COMING OF THE WONDER TREE
Retold from an Arabian Legend
(Geography—Nature Study)
Abi Ben Ahmed was a chief of Araby, and there was no sweeter child in the land than his little daughter Zuleika. She was fair to look upon, with eyes slender as an almond and soft as a gazelle’s, and the goodness of her heart was known to every one in the tribe. Lowly slave and mighty sheik alike loved her, and when she was with her father he forgot all his trouble.
One evening when the sun was dropping low over the desert, Zuleika sat in front of the tent waiting for a chance to have her supper. Her father was eating just then, for by the laws of Arabian politeness women and children must wait for meals until their lords and masters have finished. She was hungry, yet she did not mind the delay, because she knew nothing else, and when you think all the world does things as you do, your way does not seem hard. So she watched the color flame across the western sky, hummed snatches of song, and made pictures in the sand with her fingers.
Suddenly, away to the south, a yellow cloud seemed to rise out of the desert. It moved nearer, and as Zuleika watched it her dark eyes began to sparkle. She knew what it meant and it made her glad.
“Father,” she called, “some one is riding this way.”
Abi Ben Ahmed left his supper and came from the tent to see. The Arab is fond of his food and very loth to leave it, but when strangers almost never come by it is worth going without a meal to see them.
“Yes,” he agreed, as his piercing eyes scanned the southern horizon, “some one is traveling across the desert.”
Zuleika danced with delight. Only once or twice since she could remember had any one come to the camp, for it was in the very heart of El Nedjed, and there was little traveling in those far-off days. Long before, when she was a tiny girl, a traveler had come that way, and while he lingered at camp, told of the blue Persian Gulf beyond the Oman shore, and of the music of its plashing waves. No word has such a magical sound to the Arab as “water,” and to hear of lakes and rivers of it is like some exquisite fairy tale.
“It is a desert of water more beautiful than the land,” he said in the soft, sweet tongue of the East. “Houris dwell there, and often when the moon is shining they come out and sport upon the sands.”
The tale fascinated her at the time, and had always stayed in her memory. That is why she was happy to see a stranger approaching. She thought he might tell her of the lovely realm beyond.
As the cloud rolled nearer they saw a rider on a milk-white steed. Abi Ben Ahmed called to his men to come and welcome the stranger, for an Arab who lets even one slave stay away when a guest arrives, is lacking in courtesy. So they advanced, stalwart, dark-skinned men, whose turbaned heads were bowed almost to the ground as they gave the low salaam of the East, while the chief spoke words of welcome to his camp.
Very swarthy was the rider, and of proud demeanor that proclaimed him a person of much consequence, and as he returned Ben Abi’s salute he spoke with dignity befitting his bearing.
“I bring greeting from the sheik Ben Nedi,” he announced. “He rides this way tomorrow.”
The chief replied, “Mighty is Ben Nedi, and a man of high esteem among his people. He shall have welcome and all that Arab hospitality can offer.”
Then, leading the way, Ben Ahmed took the stranger to the tent, where camel’s milk and dried goat’s flesh were set before him.
Zuleika, on the sand without, could hear their words, but the joyous light was no longer in her eyes. Her face was drawn in wrinkles, and her lip quivered as if she were about to cry. She knew that the man expected on the morrow was not only a powerful chieftain, but a teacher and prophet as well, and that according to the Arab custom every person in camp, even to the lowliest slave, would lay gifts before him. For it is believed by the desert people that to do so brings a blessing. But Zuleika, although she was a chieftain’s daughter, had nothing to offer, for the wealth of Arab rulers is in their flocks and lands, and the poorest child of the West has more treasures than had this little princess of the desert.
“If I had my baby camel I could give that,” she thought as she listened to the murmurs in the women’s tent and knew that all was excitement there over the coming of the stranger.
But the camel she had loved and petted had died a few weeks before, and she had nothing else.
“Do not grieve,” her mother said when she saw tears in the big almond eyes and asked the reason they were there. “The law of giving does not apply to children, and the sheik Ben Nedi, who is as wise as he is powerful, knows that sometimes empty hands give most of all. The blessing comes of having the great desire, not through the treasure that is offered.”
But Zuleika did grieve, and the world seemed very dark. And after she went to bed she thought about it until she grew so restless she could not lie quietly. So she crept outside and sat on the ground.
It was midnight, and Abi Ben Ahmed and the stranger slept in the tent. The slaves, both men and women, were sleeping too, and nothing broke the stillness of the desert night save an occasional breeze that shifted the loose sand, or a stirring among the animals just beyond. She sat there for a minute, then stole out across the waste. Past the camel keep she went, hurrying through the silver of the moonlight until she came to a rock that rose out of the desert like a grizzled head facing westward. It was her favorite spot, for her mother had told her that a lovely houri (fairy) once made her haunt there, and she hoped she might come back and do wonderful things for her as she was said to have done in the long ago. So she climbed up and looked across the desert.
Away to the west, glowing more brightly than any other in the sky, was the star that according to Arab teaching shines always over Mecca, the city of the Prophet. The sight of it made her grieve more than ever over the thought of her empty hands, and she began to cry.
Then, with a sound of wonderful music, a white creature rose out of the sands. Her beauty was more radiant than any of which Zuleika had ever dreamed, and jewels of many colors glistened in her hair. Her smile was wonderfully sweet, and the girl knew it must be the good fairy returned to her old haunt.
“Why do you weep?” she asked.
Zuleika answered with a low salaam, “The prophet comes tomorrow, and I have nothing to offer him because the baby camel I would have given is dead.”
“But you have a gift more precious than the others,” the fairy spoke.
The little girl was amazed.
“I!” she exclaimed. “Why, I have nothing!”
“Ah, but you have,” came the low reply. “The desire in the heart. That is the only thing worth giving, and that you have. But you shall have still another. Come here in the morning at sunrise, and you will find it on the sands.”
The radiant creature glided away in the light, that dimmed as she went, and in a moment Zuleika could see only the desert and her father’s camp beyond the rock.
Creeping down, she went back to the tent to bed. But the beauty of the shining creature was in her eyes and brain, and she could not sleep. Eagerly she waited for the coming of morning, and as soon as she heard a stirring beyond the tents, and knew that Hassan, the camel keeper, was looking after the animals, she bounded out of bed and down to the place of rock. Her mother saw her go, but thought nothing about it, for it was the time of gray dawn when every Arab looks in prayer toward Mecca, and she was probably going to the fairy rock for her devotions. But Zuleika thought of something besides her prayers.
When she came to the spot she stared around, wondering if it could be the place she had visited in the night. Then only a glittering waste stretched far as the eye could reach. Now there was a tree, straight and branchless almost to the crown, where from beneath wide-spreading leaves hung bunches of pulpy fruit. Nothing like it had been seen on the desert before.
Wild with delight, she rushed back to camp and told of the wonder.
“A tree on the desert!” her father exclaimed. “It cannot be.”
Nor could she make him believe so strange a thing had happened until she led him to the spot. But there it stood, with head held high like an Arab sheik, and when he tasted of the fruit he found it good.
In the late afternoon of the following day the caravan of the sheik Ben Nedi came to the camp of Abi Ben Ahmed. The women within the tents received him with singing, and the men with low salaams. Then the gifts were brought: the finest camels of the herd, turban cloth enough for all the men of his train, and silk, a portion of her mother’s marriage dower worth the price of many camels. It had been brought by ship across the sea and by caravan over the desert, and was rainbow-hued and fine, such as is woven only in the Vale of Cashmere. The great man received them with gratitude, and spoke words of praise for the tribe of Ben Ahmed. “Surely nothing more splendid can be set before a sheik,” he said.
But the chief smiled and answered, “Not so, O mighty prophet! Zuleika’s gift, the finest of all, is yonder on the desert.”
Then he led the way to the place of rock and pointed to the wonder tree that had sprung up in the night. Ben Nedi found the fruit cooling and sweet, and as he listened to the story, he stood with dewy eyes.
“The gift of a child’s tears!” he exclaimed. “Yes, that is most precious of all. The Arab will bless the day it came to be.”
And the prophecy was fulfilled. It still grows in the depths of the desert, the wonder tree of the East that men call the date palm, and the Arab blesses it whenever he rides that way. He knows that for a thousand years and more it has been the salvation of the solitary wanderer across the wastes, and that as long as it lifts its stately head above the sands he will have food from its fruit, clothing from its fiber, and shelter from the noonday heat.
THE GIFT OF THE GNOMES
The Swiss Legend of the Alp Horn
(Geography—Ethics)
In the days of long ago a chamois hunter, caught in a storm on the mountains, took refuge in a deserted hut. The floor was so wet and cold that to stay there was almost as bad as being out in the rain and hail, and so he climbed into the loft and lay down on a pile of straw.
Just how long he slept he did not know, but after a while he was awakened by the tinkle of bells and the lowing of many cattle. That seemed very strange, for it was almost winter, and Swiss herdsmen drive their flocks to the valley early in the autumn. Yet as he looked out through the tiny window he saw herds on every alp, herds hundreds strong, cropping luxuriant grass that grew out of the snow.
Then he heard a noise below in the hut, and peeping down through a knot hole, saw three strange-looking little men. They were warming themselves beside a fire that blazed on the hearth, and by their long green cloaks and red caps he knew that they were gnomes of the Alps.
They were bustling about and seemed to be making cheese. One of them stirred the milk in a big silver kettle, one scurried in and out of the hut bringing fresh milk to add to that which was already cooking, and one fed the fire with moss and dry branches, which piled up out of the earth.
After a while one of the gnomes poured something into the kettle, the second one brought out three golden bowls, and the third blew a blast on a horn that was seven times as large as himself.
Then the hunter heard the sound of cattle lowing nearer and nearer, as if they were drawn by the music of the horn, and a moment later a voice called out, “Come down from the loft, Moni, and taste of the good things in the bowls.”
This amazed him, for he was sure they had not seen him, and how could they know his name? But he crept down from his straw pile, as he was bid, and into the room.
“Choose whichever you please,” the little man said, “and besides the drink in the bowl you will receive a gift that goes with the liquid of your choice.”
The golden bowls stood side by side on the floor, and each one contained a different-colored liquid. One was red, like the wine of Geneva, one yellow as the honey of Zurich, and the third was white like goat’s milk. Moni looked from one to the other, deciding which to take. He was hungry from his long tramp over the crags in the storm and needed milk far more than honey or wine, so he chose that bowl and drank greedily.
Then the little gnomes began to dance.
“Ah,” the cheese maker shouted, “you have won the Alp horn!”
“Yes,” another exclaimed, “and it is a precious gift. You can make other horns like it, and teach the people how to call their herds, which will not stray away and be lost as happens now. Thus the herdsmen will become very prosperous.”
“But remember, if you wish to be happy, you must give up chamois hunting, and never again kill a harmless wild creature.”
The gnomes disappeared, and with them went the cattle, the kettle, and the shining bowls. But the horn lay where the little man had dropped it, and as the hunter looked at it he found it was pure silver. Catching it up, he ran down the mountain side to the hut where his sweetheart lived. He told her the story and showed her the Alp horn, and she was very happy; for she never had wanted him to be a chamois hunter, as the life was full of danger, and she loved the poor little animals that he killed. Now he would tend flocks as she did, and they would be happy in the life of herding.
At first the hunter thought he could not change his ways, for he loved to roam over the mountains and bound from crag to crag in pursuit of the fleet-footed creatures, but the promise of the gnomes and the pleas of Heidi persuaded him, and he gathered a herd and tended it all summer.
He made an Alp horn like the one he had received in the hut and gave it to the maiden, and sometimes as they tended their cattle on different sides of the valley, they would call across to each other, and they were happy and contented—until, one evening, he forgot the warning of the gnomes and shot a chamois.
Then he raised his horn to call good night to his sweetheart. But she did not answer. He blew blast after blast, but only the echoes came back, instead of the sound of the voice he knew and loved. Darkness fell and stars flashed like diamonds above the snowy Jungfrau, and still he called and sought her, but found no trace. The next morning, as he moved with his herd, a boy told him of a strange happening.
“Last night at sunset time I was watching my goats,” he said, “and saw a girl standing on the mountain side above her cattle. She smiled as the wine color of the Alpine glow crept down toward Chamounix, and throwing back her head, sang one of our herd songs. Suddenly she disappeared, but she could not have fallen, and just then an arrow whizzed through the air and fell on the spot where she had been standing.”
He took the arrow out of his peasant blouse and showed it to the hunter, who recognized it as his own, the one he had shot at the chamois.
Then Moni remembered the words of the gnomes, and knew that because he had forgotten their warning he had lost Heidi. He burned his arrows and sorrowfully went back to herding, never again to shoot a wild creature of the hills. By day he followed the cattle, and by night made Alp horns, always thinking of his sweetheart. But he never saw her again. Some of the herdsmen say that she fled in grief because he broke his word to her, and some declare that the gnomes carried her away to an ice palace in a crevasse. But nobody knows. They know only that from that time forth he tended flocks and made Alp horns, until every herdsman in the mountains had one, and because they could keep the cattle from straying and getting lost, they became more prosperous than they had ever dreamed of being.
Since then every peak and valley in Switzerland has resounded to the notes of the Alp horn. Throughout the summer time they are heard around the lakes of Zug and Geneva, and the cattle follow them as the children of Hamelin town followed the music of the piper. They echo along the Jungfrau as the shepherds behind Interlaken call their flocks together, and their weird sweet blasts mingle with the songs of herd girls as they yodel to each other across the ravines. Travelers from every land smile at the sound of them, for one of the charms of going to Switzerland is in hearing the Alp horns; but very few of these strangers know that the mountain people say the reason the sound is so magical to the cattle is because in the beginning the horn came from the gnomes.
THE DUTY THAT WASN’T PAID
(Biography—Music—Ethics)
More than a hundred years ago a man and his two children were journeying from their home in Salzburg to Vienna. They traveled by the Danube boat, and Marianne, the sister, stood by the rail tossing pebbles into the water and watching the turbulent river swallow them up. Her dress was worn almost threadbare, but her face was so sweet and her eyes were so large and bright that she looked pretty for all her shabbiness.
Just behind her on the deck her father and brother were talking. “If we make some money in the city you’ll buy sister a new dress, won’t you, Father?” little Wolfgang asked.
Marianne whirled and started toward him. She knew that was sure to make her father sad, and she called, “Don’t coax, Wolfgang. My dress will do very well until we can afford to buy another, and a new one will seem all the nicer because of my having worn this one so long.”
Her brother turned his big, earnest eyes upon her, and answered, “But, Marianne, I know you want one. I heard you wish for it by the evening star, and last night you put it in your prayer.”
Father Mozart turned from them with a sad look on his face, and walked up and down the deck, wishing very much he could do what Wolfgang asked. But he was just a poor orchestra conductor with an income so small he had to stretch it hard to provide food and shelter for his family. Marianne must wear the shabby frock until better times began, which he hoped would be soon. They were to give some concerts in the Austrian capital, and maybe in that rich, music-loving city would earn enough to make them more comfortable than they had been before. But until then they must not spend a penny save what was needed for food and shelter, because the customs fee on the harp they carried must be paid, and that would reduce their little fund to a very small amount.
Wolfgang, too, thought about it as the boat crept in and out between the hills, and wondered much if there was no way in which Marianne might have the dress before they played in Vienna. His old teacher in Salzburg had often told him that there is a way out of every difficulty if one is clever enough to think of it, and there must be out of this. But although he tried and tried he could not find one. His own suit was bright and new, for his birthday was just past and it had been his uncle’s gift. But Marianne was a very shabby little girl, and he knew she was unhappy even though she was brave and sweet about it.
They were gliding past the ruins of the castle that once, men said, had been the prison of Richard the First, England’s Lion-Hearted King, when his enemies took him captive on his return from the holy wars. Wolfgang thought of the many brave things that soldier ruler had done during the Crusades, for often in the twilight time at Salzburg, as they waited for the father to come from his work, the mother told his tale, and of how the faithful servant Blondel found him at last by singing a song he knew the master loved.
“He was very brave and wise, too,” the boy thought as he looked at the crumbling pile. “He would have found a way for Marianne to have a new dress if she had been his sister.”
Was it the prayer being answered, or just the fulfillment of the wish made by the evening star? For while he thought, an idea came into his head. It was a good idea, it seemed to him, so good that it made him smile. If it worked out, and he believed it would, Marianne might have the dress she wanted so much, because then his father would have more money to spend.
Just to the south they could see the great spire of St. Stephens, a tall, gray finger against the sky, which told that Vienna was not far away. As it grew nearer and nearer, looming up bigger and plainer before them, Wolfgang thought more and more of his idea, until when they reached the mooring his eyes were dancing and his cheeks were aflame. His father believed the thought of seeing the great capital had excited him, but that was not it at all. He had a secret plan and could hardly wait until he knew whether or not it would work out.
The journey was ended and the people were going ashore. “Please loosen the cover, Father,” he said as Leopold Mozart carried the harp toward the customs gate.
“Ah, you are proud of it!” the man answered with a smile.
Wolfgang did not reply, thinking what a poor guesser his father was. He watched him as he set the instrument down and undid the wrapping, bringing the polished frame and glistening strings into full view. Then he went over and took his place beside the harp as the customs officer drew near, and Marianne came and stood beside him. She had forgotten all about her shabby dress in her eagerness to find out how much duty they would have to pay.
“What have you to declare?” the man asked.
“Only a harp,” Leopold Mozart answered, as he laid his hand on their one treasure.
“It is a beautiful instrument and valuable,” the official said as he looked at it, and named as the price of the duty an amount so big as to cut their little hoard almost in half.
Father Mozart’s face grew very serious, and the merriment went out of Marianne’s eyes. But Wolfgang did not worry at all. He still had that idea in his mind, and believed it would work out.
Leopold Mozart reached into his pocket for the little sack containing his savings, but it was not necessary to open it, for just as he was about to do so Wolfgang started to play. The customs officer turned with a start and listened, and the people gathered there forgot all about duty charges as they crowded around the little musician. His tiny hands swept the strings as if his fingers had some magic power, and the melody they made was sweeter than any ever heard on that old wharf. For five minutes, ten, he kept at it, and there was not a whisper or a murmur, only a sort of breathless surprise that one so young could play so wonderfully.
“What!” one exclaimed as he finished, “a lad of his age to perform like that!”
“Yes,” the father answered with a smile, “he does well at the harp.”
“Amazing,” the officer murmured, “’tis amazing! I’ve heard many a good harpist in my day, but never anything sweeter than that. Play some more, boy,” he said.
Wolfgang smiled. The idea was working out, and he was very glad. Already he had visions of a happy sister in a handsome new gown, and turning again to the instrument, he played even more beautifully than before, for the gladness that crept into his heart was creeping also into the music.
For some minutes he picked the strings, while the people listened as if held in a spell, until the father said, “We must go now, for it is getting late, and we have yet to find lodgings in the city.” And he handed the money to the officer.
But the man shook his head. “No,” he said, and his eyes were very tender as he spoke. “A boy who can give as much pleasure as that deserves something. Keep the money and buy a present for him.”
As Wolfgang heard the words he gave a bound. “Father,” he exclaimed, with sparkling eyes, “buy the dress for Marianne. You can do it now, since you have saved the customs money.”
The officer looked at him in amazement. “He is a wonderful lad, truly,” he exclaimed, “and as kind as he is wonderful!”
“Yes,” came the low reply. “He has wanted nothing so much as a new dress for his sister, and now he is happy because he thinks she will get it.”
And she did get it, too, a beautiful one of soft, bright red, all trimmed with shining buttons. Wolfgang danced with delight when he saw it, and there was no happier child in all that great capital.
They gave many concerts there, some before the royal family; and Maria Theresa, the empress, became greatly attached to both brother and sister, gave them handsome clothes and beautiful gifts, and forgot all about affairs of state while Wolfgang played. She called him the “little sorcerer,” and agreed with the customs officer that he was a wonderful child.
Then, after some weeks, they went back to the home in Salzburg, where the boy kept on at his music, doing such marvelous things that his fame traveled far. He grew to be the great master, Mozart, at whose glorious music the world still wonders, and he was a generous and sweet-souled man, just as he was a big-hearted and thoughtful child. Many lovely acts are told of him, but none that shows his kindness and tenderness in a more delightful way than when as a boy on the Vienna wharf he charmed the customs officer and all others who heard, and Marianne had the dress for which she had wished by the evening star with the duty money that wasn’t paid.
WILHELMINA’S WOODEN SHOES
(Biography—Art Teaching)
It was summer time, and a boy named Rembrandt van Rijn was lying on top of the ramparts that walled in the city of Leyden, his eyes fixed on the yellow highroad that stretched away toward The Hague. It was good to be there in the shadow of the mill sails, for the trees beyond were beautifully green, and he loved to watch the market folk coming and going, loved to see strangers journeying from far away and to dream of the time when he, too, would fare forth to see the world. Instead of being a miller like his father and living always beside the Leyden ramparts, he would go to Amsterdam, where ships sailed in from the Indies, and perhaps he would board one of those wonderful craft and journey over leagues of ocean to distant realms of the East. The thought brought a smile to his face and a deeper blue to his eyes, and he whistled a strain from an old Dutch song of rejoicing.
Suddenly he started up in surprise, for a familiar figure was coming along the Rhine road. It looked like his Uncle Peter, but that seemed impossible, for it was Saturday morning, and his uncle was an industrious merchant who was never known to leave his shop on business days. Then as the man hurried through the great gate that opened into the city, Rembrandt saw that it was his Uncle Peter; and his surprise changed to alarm, for he believed his uncle’s coming would mean trouble for him.
The day before, in the Latin school, he had drawn pictures on his cousin Wilhelmina’s wooden shoes and had been caught. She was quite willing to have them decorated, and laughed merrily at sight of the ducks and chickens and spotted pigs marching from heel to toe; but Mynheer Speelburg, the teacher, had a very different idea. He considered that it was defacing property, and wasting one’s time as well. Although Wilhelmina declared it was all her fault, Rembrandt was severely scolded, and the master sent a note home to his uncle. Now the uncle was probably coming to tell the boy’s father about it, and the thought sent all the brightness out of the day.
The merchant did not notice Rembrandt until he had passed the ramparts and a cawing crow caused him to turn and see the boy on top of the wall. Then he looked up and smiled, which did not seem like anger, and yet—what else could have taken him from the shop on Saturday morning?
“I’ve come to have a talk with your mother,” he said as he stopped a moment.
Rembrandt climbed down to go with him, hoping that something besides the shoes had brought him, but the man shook his head.
“No, stay where you are,” he said. “I want to see your mother alone.”
Again the uneasy feeling surged over the lad. After all, it must be those wooden shoes, and he felt very uncomfortable; and a little later, when both mother and uncle came from the house and hurried to the mill, he wished very much that he never had seen pigs and fowls—most of all that he had not drawn them on his cousin’s shoes. Then his father called to him, and although he wanted to creep away and hide, he went on the run.
“Here’s the young rascal,” the uncle said as the boy went in at the broad, low door. Rembrandt noticed that he held one of Wilhelmina’s shoes, and his heart sank. But a moment later he was as much amazed as he had been alarmed, for his mother spoke pleasantly and asked, “Would you really like to be a painter?”
“A painter?” he answered quickly. “More than anything else in the world.”
Then his father smiled, too, which seemed strange indeed, for he had declared that his son never should become an artist. Often Rembrandt had dreamed of being one, and when he spoke to his mother about it the idea seemed to please her. But the sturdy Dutch miller shook his head and announced that his boy must become a syndic, one of the wise lawgivers of Holland, or else a miller like himself. So, instead of being allowed to spend his days drawing the pictures that were constantly running through his fancy, Rembrandt had been sent to the Latin school to do sums and conjugations. It seemed impossible that the miller could have changed his mind; but he had changed it, for he said, “Very well. We will see about it.”
Then, while the mill sails whirred above them, and the voices of passing market folk came in through the open window, the merchant uncle told what seemed to Rembrandt a wonderful story.
“This morning, as I was opening the shop,” he began, “Speelburg, the schoolmaster, came to talk about the pictures on Wilhelmina’s shoes. He urged me not to be too hard on the lad because he had thought much about it during the night and had come to believe that perhaps Rembrandt cannot help drawing. He is a wise man, this Speelburg, and told me much of how the young masters Giotto, Cimabue, and Raphael had made pictures on stones, sand, and anything that would hold a drawing, and that their parents could no more prevent it than they could keep water from running downhill. He thinks our Rembrandt may be like them, and so he offered to tend the shop for me if I would come and ask you, his father, to let him study with Master Swannenburg.”
Those words were music to Rembrandt’s ears, for Swannenburg was the master painter of Leyden.
An hour later, miller and merchant went through the old White Gate into the city, and Rembrandt trudged along beside them, carrying a roll of paper. As they hurried along the highway his eyes gleamed, for it seemed to him like a dream come true, and the stern Dutch schoolmaster began to appear in the guise of a fairy godfather. He did not see the market folk they passed on the way, did not hear the murmur of the Rhine sweeping seaward just beyond them, for the thought that he might become a painter had crowded out all other things.
Very soon they reached the workshop of the artist, and knew what the great man thought of the sketches, for as he looked them over he murmured, “H’m, h’m! Pretty good! The old woman’s head is too small for her body, and a pig never had legs as crooked as that; but he will learn, and if he is willing to work I’ll gladly take him as a pupil.”
So Rembrandt went into the studio of the painter, for his father had come to believe that he was intended for neither a syndic nor a miller. He was so eager to learn that he worked with all his might, and his progress amazed his teacher, who, although he knew he had talent, had not dreamed he could advance so rapidly. Before two years were gone his pictures were better than those of Swannenburg himself, who said sadly one day, “I am no longer the master painter of Leyden.”
But that artist had a great, good heart, and he was so glad to see the boy’s progress that he helped him all he could.
Now it happened, about the time the work of the miller’s son was causing Leyden folk to open their eyes, that Jan Lievens, who was a successful painter in Amsterdam, came home to visit his parents, who were neighbors of Rembrandt’s family. He was greatly excited over the work of his young friend and exclaimed, “You must go back to Amsterdam with me, for the best masters of Holland are there, and you must study with them.”
The idea seemed good to the miller, who was very proud of the progress of his son; so to Amsterdam young Rembrandt went, where he progressed as amazingly as he had done in the studio of Swannenburg. The great harbor city fascinated him, and he loved to roam along its splendid streets watching the people hurrying to and fro or idling in groups on the corners, laughing and chatting in their merry Dutch way; loved to go to the docks where ships came in from the Indies, and to see the sunrise and sunset painting marvelous-hued pictures on the waves of the wild North Sea. Then he would go back to the studio and work, picturing the men and women he saw on his rambles, the mill by the old White Gate, and the market folk he used to watch from the Leyden ramparts. His paintings delighted the great of Amsterdam just as the pigs and chickens he drew on Wilhelmina’s shoes had delighted the boys and girls in the Latin school, and he became rich and famous. He lived in a palace fine enough for a prince, and could have bought whole cargoes of those ships that sailed in from the Indies; and his wealth seemed all the more glorious because he had earned it with the labor of his hand and brain. He married a great and gracious lady, and as his children drove through the streets in their fine carriage the people would say, “See, the son and daughter of Rembrandt van Rijn, the wonderful painter.”
But all his good fortune and all the honors heaped upon him did not make him selfish and overbearing. He never forgot or ceased to love his native Leyden. He lived in the harbor city because it fascinated him and was a better place for an artist than his childhood town, but he never tired of going back to the old home or lost interest in the pigs and cows and the market folk on the Rhine road. Sometimes on these visits he would lie on the ramparts just as he had done when a boy, and strangers journeying to and from The Hague had no idea that the grave-eyed man dreaming there in the shadow of the mill sails was the famous painter of Amsterdam.