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The Path of Life

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* * * * *

CHRISTMAS NIGHT

* * * * *

III

CHRISTMAS NIGHT

Over there, high up among the pines, stood the house where he lived alone
with the trees and the birds; and there, every morning, he saw the sun
rise and, in the evening, sink away again. And for how many years!

In summer, the white clouds floated high over his head; the blackbirds
sang in the wood around his door; and before him, in a blue vista, lay
the whole world.

When his harvest was gathered and the days drew in, when the sky closed
up, when the dry pines shook and rocked in the sad wind and the crows
dropped like black flakes and came cawing over the fields, he closed his
windows and sat down in the dark to brood.

He must go down yonder now, to the village below.

He fetched his Christmas star from the loft, restuck the gold flowers and
paper strips and fastened them in the cleft of the long wand. Then he put
on his greatcoat, drew the hood over his head and went.

From behind the black clouds came a light, a dull copper glow, without
rays, high up where the stars were; it set golden edges to the hem of the
clouds; the heaven remained black. There appeared a little streak of
glowing copper, which grew and grew, became a sickle, a half-disk and at
last a great, round, giant gold moon, which rose and rose. It went up
like a huge round orange behind the heaven and, more and more swiftly,
shot up into the sky, growing smaller and smaller, till it became just a
common moon, the laughing moon among the stars.

He alone had seen it.

Now he took his star on his shoulder, pulled his hood deep over his head
and wandered down the little path, all over the snow, to where the lights
were burning. It was lonely, lifeless, that white plain under that
burnished sky; and he was all alone, the black fellow on the snow. And he
saw the world so big, so monotonously bleak; a flat, white wilderness,
with here and there a straight, thin poplar and a row of black, lean,
knotty willows.

He went down towards the lights.

The village lay still. The street was black with people. Great crowds of
womenfolk, tucked and muffled in black hooded cloaks, tramped as in a
dream along the houses, over the squeaking snow. They shuffled from door
to door, stuck out their bony hands and asked plaintively for their
God's-penny. They disappeared at the end of the street and went trudging
into the endless moonlight.

Children went with lights and stars and stood gathered in groups, their
black faces glowing in the shine of their lanterns; they made a huge din
with their tooting-horns[2] and rumble-pot[3] and sang of

The Babe born in the straw

and

The shepherds they come here.
They're bringing wood and fire
And this and that and t'other:
Now bring us a pot of beer.

[2] A cow's horn fitted with a mouthpiece.

[3] An iron pot with a bladder stretched across the top, beaten with
sticks, like a drum.

Mad Wanne went alone; she kept on lurching across the street with her
long legs, which stuck out far from under her skirt, and held her arms
wide open under her hooded cloak, like a demon bat. She snuffled
something about:

'Twas hailing, 'twas snowing and 'twas bad weather
And over the roofs the wind it flew.
Saint Joseph said to Mary Maid:
"Mary, what shall we do?"

Top[4] Dras, Wulf and Grendel, three fellows, tall as trees, were also
loafing round. They were the three Kings: Top had turned his big jacket
and blackened his face; Grendel wore a white sheet over his back and blew
the horn; and Wulf had a mitre on and carried a great star with a lantern
on a stick. So they dragged along the street, singing at every door:

Three Kings with a star
Came travelling from afar,
Over mountains, hills and dale,
To go and look
In every nook,
To go and look for the Lord of All.

[4] Beggar.

Their rough voices droned and three great shadows walked far ahead of
them on the white street-snow. All those people came and went and twisted
and turned and came and went again. Each sang his own little song and
fretted his whining prayer. Above all this rose the dull toot of the
baker's horn, as he kept on shouting:

"Hot bread! Hot bread!"

High hung the moon and blinked the stars; and fine white shafts fell
through the air, upon everything around, like silver pollen.

"Maarten of the mountain!" whispered the children behind the window.
"Maarten the Freezyman!"[5]

[5] A legendary figure of a snow-covered bogie, who comes down to the
villages at Christmas-time and runs away with the children.

And they crept back into the kitchen, beside the fire.

And the black man stood outside the door, tugging at the string of his
twirling star, and sang through his nose:

Come, star, come, star, you must not so still stand!
You must go with me to Bethlehem Land,
To Bethlehem, that comely city,
Where Mary sits with her Babe on her knee....

Along the country-roads, the farmhouses stood snowed in, with black
window-shutters, which showed dark against the walls and shut in the
light, and stumpy chimneys, with thick smoke curling from them. Indoors,
there was no seeing clearly: the lamp hung from the ceiling in a ring of
steam and smoke and everything lay black and tumbled. In the hearth, the
yule-log lay blazing. The farmer's wife baked waffles and threw them in
batches on the straw-covered floor.

In one corner, under the light and wound from head to foot in
tobacco-smoke, were the farm-hands, playing cards. They sat wrapped up in
their game, bending over their little table, very quiet. Now and then
came a half-oath and the thud of a fist on the table and then again
peaceful shuffling and stacking and playing of their cards.

The Freezyman sat in the midst of the children, who listened open-mouthed
to his tale of _The Mighty Hunter_.

His star stood in the corner.

Later, the big table was drawn out and supper served. All gathered round
and sat down and ate. First came potatoes and pork, red kale and pigs'
chaps, then stewed apples and sausages ... and waffles, waffles, waffles.
They drank beer out of little glass mugs. The table was cleared, coffee
poured out, spirits fetched from the cupboard and gin burnt with sugar.
Then the chairs were pushed close, right round the hearth, and Maarten
stood up, took his star, smoothed his long beard and, keeping time by
tugging the string of his star, droned out:

On Christmas night
Is Jesus born
To fight our fight
Against the night
Of Satan and his devil-spawn.
And a manger is His cot
And all humble is His lot;
_So, mortal, make you humble, too,
To serve Him Who thus served you_.

Three wise men and each a king
Come to make Him offering;
Gold, frankincense and myrrh they bring.
Angels sweet
Kiss His feet,
As they sing:
"Hail, Lord and King!"
Telling all mankind the story
Of His wonder and His glory;
_So, mortal, make you humble, too,
To serve Him Who thus served you_.

All else was still. The men sat drinking their hot gin, the children
listened with their heads on one side and the farmer's wife, with her
hands folded over her great lap, sat crying.

The door opened and the Kings stood in the middle of the floor. They were
white with snow and their faces blue with cold; the ice hung from
Grendel's moustache. They looked hard under their hats at the table, the
hearth and the little glasses and at Maarten, who was still standing up.
Wulf made his star turn, Top banged his rumble-pot to time and they sang:

Three Kings came out of the East;
'Twas to comfort Mary....

When the song was ended, each got two little glasses; then they could go.

Grendel cursed aloud.

"That damned hill-devil swallows it all up," muttered Wulf.

And they went off through the snow.

The others sang and played and played cards for ever so long and 'twas
late when Maarten took his star and, with a "Good-night till next year,"
pulled the door behind him.

It was still light outside, but the sky hung full of snow; above, a grey
fleece and, lower, a swirl of great white flakes, which fell down slowly
swarming one on top of the other.

He plunged deep into it.... It was still so far to go; and his house and
his pines, he had left them all so far behind.

He was so old, so lone; it was so cold; and all the roads were white ...
all sky and snow. In the hollow lay the village: a little group of
sleeping houses round the white church-steeple; and behind it lay his
mountain, but it was like a cloud, a shapeless monster, very far away.

Above his head, stars, stars in long rows. He stood still and looked up
and found one which he saw every evening, a pale, dead star, like an old
acquaintance, which would lead him--for the last time, perhaps--back to
his mountain, back home.

And he trudged on.

There was a light in the three narrow pointed windows of the chapel and
the bell tinkled within. He went to rest a bit against the wall. What a
noise and what a bustle all the evening ... and the gin! And those rough
chaps had looked at him so brutally. In there, it was still; those
windows gleamed so brightly; and, after the sound of the bell, there came
so softly a woman's voice:

"_Venite adoremus_...."

Then all was silence, the lights went out. And he fared on.

The village lay behind him and the road began to climb. There, on the
right, stood "The Jolly Hangman." Now he knows his way and 'tis no longer
far from home. From out of the ditch comes something creeping, a black
shape that runs across the plain, chattering like a magpie: Mad Wanne,
with her thin legs and her cloak wide open. She ran as fast as she could
run and vanished behind the inn.

He had started; he became so frightened, so uneasy, that he hastened his
steps and longed to be at home.

There was still a light in "The Jolly Hangman" and a noise of drunken
men. He passed, but then turned back again ... to sing his last song,
according to old custom. They opened the door and asked him in. He saw
Grendel sitting there and tried to get away. Then the three of them
rushed out and called after him. When they saw that he went on, they
broke into a run:

"Stop, you brute!... Here, you with your star!... Oh, you damned singer
of songs!" they howled and ran and caught him and threw him down.

Grendel dug his knee into his chest and held his arms stretched wide
against the ground. Wulf and Dras gripped whole handfuls of snow and
crammed it into his mouth and went on until all his face was thickly
covered and he lay powerless. Then they planted his star beside him in
the snow and began to turn and sing to the echo:

_A, a, a_--glory be to Him on high to-day!
_E, e, e_--upon earth peace there shall be!
_I, i, i_--come and see with your own eye!
_O, o, o_--His little bed of straw below!

Like a flash, Mad Wanne shot past, yelling and shrieking. Wulf flung his
stick against her legs. She waved her arms under her cloak and vanished
in the dark.

The three men sat down by the ditch and laughed full-throated. Then they
started for the village. Long it rang:

Three Kings came out of the East;
'Twas to comfort Mary ...

Great white flakes fell from the starry sky, wriggled and swarmed, one on
top of the other.

* * * * *

LOAFING

* * * * *

IV

LOAFING

He went, ever on the move, with the slow, shuffling step of wandering
beggars who are nowhere at home.

They had discharged him, some time ago, and now he was walking alone like
a wild man. For whole days he had dragged himself through the moorland,
from farm to farm, looking for his bread like the dogs. Now he came to a
wide lane of lime-trees and before him lay the town, asleep. He went into
it. The streets lay dead, the doors were shut, the windows closed: all
the people were resting; and he loafed. It was dreary, to walk alone like
that, all over the country-side, and with such a body: a giant with huge
legs and arms, which were doomed to do nothing, and that belly, that
craving belly, which he carried about with him wherever he went.

And nobody wanted him: 'twas as though they were afraid of his strong
limbs and his stubborn head--because his glowing eyes could not entreat
meekly enough--and his blackguardly togs....

Morning came; the working-folk were early astir. Lean men and pale women,
carrying their kettles and food-satchels in their hands, beat the
slippery pavements with their wooden shoes. Doors and windows flew open;
life began; every one walked with a busy air, knew where he was going;
and they vanished here and there, through a big gate or behind a narrow
door that shut with a bang. Carts with green stuff, waggons with sand and
coal drove this way and that. Fellows with milk and bread went round; and
it grew to a din of calls and cries, each shouting his loudest.

And he loafed. Nobody looked at him, noticed him or wanted him. In the
middle of the forenoon, a young lady had stared at him for a long time
and said to her mother:

"What a huge fellow!"

He had heard her and it did him good. He looked round, but mother and
daughter were gone, behind a corner, and stood gazing into a shop full of
bows and ribbons.

It began to whirl terribly in his belly; and his stomach hurt him so; and
his legs were tired.

The streets and houses and all those strange people annoyed him. He
wanted to get away, far away, and to see men like himself: workers
without work, who were hungry!

He looked for the narrow alleys and the poor quarter.

Out of a side-street a draycart came jogging along. Half a score of
labourers lay tugging in the shoulder-strap or leant with all the force
of their bodies against the cart, which rolled on toilsomely. 'Twas a
load of flax, packed tightly in great square bales standing one against
the other, the whole cart full. The dray caught its right wheel in the
grating of an open gutter and remained stock-still, leaning aslant, as
though planted there. The workmen racked and wrung to get the wheel out,
but it was no good. Then they stood there, staring at one another, at
their wits' end and throwing glances into the eyes of that big fellow who
had come to look on. Without saying or speaking, he caught a spoke in
either hand, pressed with his mighty shoulder against the inside of the
wheel, bent and wrung and in a turn brought the cart on the level. Then
he went behind among the other workmen to go and help them shove. They
looked at him queerly, as if to say that they no longer needed his help
and had rather done without him. The cart rolled on, another street or
two, and then through the open gate of the warehouse. The labourers
looked into one another's eyes uneasily, moved about, pulled the bales
off the cart and dragged them a little farther along the wall. Then they
tailed off, one by one, through a small inner door; and he stood there
alone, like a fool. A bit later, he heard them laugh and whisper under
their breaths. When he was tired of waiting, he went up the street again.

Nobody, nobody, nobody wanted him!

He ground his teeth and clenched his fists. In the street through which
he had to go, on the spaces outside the hotels sat ladies and gentlemen
toying with strange foods and sipping their wine out of long goblets.
They chattered gaily and tasted and pecked with dainty lips and turned-up
noses. The waiters ran here, there, like slaves. Those coaxing smells
stung like adders and roused evil thoughts in his brain. His stomach
fretted awfully and his empty head turned.

He hurried away.

In a street with windowless house-fronts, a street without people in it,
he felt better. He let his body lean against the iron post of a gas-lamp,
stuck his hands in his trouser-pockets and stood there looking at the
paving-stones. Now he was damned if he would take another step, he would
rather croak here like a beast; then they would have to take him up and
know that he existed.

The boys coming from school mocked him; they danced in a ring, with him,
the big fellow, in the middle. They hung paper flags on his back and
sang:

Hat, hat,
Ugly old hat!
It serves as a slop-pail and as a hat!

He did not stir.

Yon came a milk-maid driving up in a cart drawn by dogs. He got a gnawing
in his arms, a spout of blood shot to his head and he suddenly felt as if
something was going to happen. Just as she drove past, he put his great
hand on the edge of the little cart, with one pull took a copper can from
its straw, put it to his mouth and drank; then he sent the can clattering
through the window of the first-best house, till the panes rattled again.
Looking round--as if bewildered and set going, roused by what he had
done--he caught sight of the frightened little dairy-maid. A mocking grin
played on his cruel face; he flung his rough arm round her little body
and lifted the girl out of the cart right up to his face in a fierce hug.

The boys had fled shrieking. He felt two pairs of hands pulling at his
sleeves from below. He loosed the girl and saw two policemen who held him
fast and ordered him to go with them. They held him by the arm on either
side and stepped hurriedly to keep pace with his great strides. They
looked in dismay at that huge fellow, with his wicked eyes, and then at
each other, as if to ask what they should do.

They came to a narrow little street, with nobody in it, and stopped at a
public-house:

"Could you do with a dram, mate?" they asked him.

He looked bewildered, astounded. They all three went inside; and each of
them drank a big glass of gin.

The policemen whispered something together; the elder wiped the drink
from his moustache and then said, very severely:

"And now, clear out; hurry up! And mind your manners, will you, next
time!"

He was outside once more, loafing on, along the houses.

* * * * *

SPRING

* * * * *

V

SPRING

Mother stood like a clucking hen among her red-cheeked youngsters. She
was holding a loaf against her fat stomach and, with a curved
pruning-knife, was cutting off good thick slices which the youngsters
snatched away one by one and stuffed into their pockets. Horieneke
fetched her basket of knitting and her school-books. She first pulled
Fonske's stocking up once more, buttoned Sarelke's breeches and wiped
Lowietje's nose; and, with an admonishing "Straight to school, do you
hear, boys?" from mother, the whole band rushed out of the door, through
the little flower-garden and up the broad unmetalled road, straight
towards the great golden sun which was rising yonder, far behind the
pollard alders, in a mighty fire of rays. It was cool outside; the sky
was bright blue streaked with glowing shafts aslant the hazy-white clouds
deep, deep in the heavens. Over the level fields, ever so far, lay a
stain of pale green and brown; and the slender stalks of the wheat stood
like needles, quivering in their glittering moisture. The trees were
still nearly bare; and their trunks and tops stood tall and black against
the clear sky; but, when you saw them together, in rows or little
clusters, there was a soft yellow-green colour over them, spotted with
gleaming buds ready to burst. A soft wind, just warm enough to thaw the
frost, worked its way into and through everything and made it all shake
and swarm till it was twisted full of restless, growing life. That wind
curled through the youngsters' tangled hair and coloured their round
cheeks cherry-red. They ran and romped through the dry sand, stamping
till it flew above their heads. They were mad with enjoyment.

Trientje stood in the doorway, in her little shirt, with her stomach
sticking out, watching her brothers as they disappeared; and, when she
saw them no longer, she thrust her fists into her sockets, opened her
mouth wide and started a-crying, until mother's hands lifted her up by
the arms and mother's thick lips gave her a hearty kiss.

Horieneke came walking step by step under the lime-trees, along the
narrow grass-path beside the sand, keeping her eyes fixed on the play of
her knitting-needles. When she reached the bridge that crossed the brook,
she looked round after her brothers. They had run down the slope and were
now trotting wildly one after the other through the rich brown grass,
pulling up all the white and yellow flowers, one by one, till their arms
were crammed with them. Horieneke took out her catechism, laid it open on
the low rail and sat there cheerfully waiting. Sarelke had crept through
the water-flags until he was close to the brook and, through the clear,
gleaming blue water, watched a little fish frisking about. In a moment,
his wooden shoes and his stockings were off and one leg was in the water,
trying it: it was cold; and he felt a shiver right down his back. Ripples
played on the smooth blue and widened out to the bank. The little fish
was gone, but so was the cold; and he saw more fish, farther away: quick
now, the other leg in the water! He pulled his breeches up high and there
he stood, with the water well above his knees, peering out for fish. The
water was clear as glass; and he saw swarms of them playing, darting
swiftly up and down, to and fro like arrows: they shot past in shoals
that held together like long snakes, in among the moss and the reeds and
between the stones, winding through slits and crannies. He shouted aloud
for joy. Bertje and Wartje and the others all had their stockings off and
stood in the water bending down to look, making funnels of their hands in
the water, where it rustled in little streams between two grass-sods
through which the fish had to pass. Whenever they felt one wriggling in
their hands they yelled and screamed and sprang out of the brook to put
it into their wooden shoes, which stood on the bank, scooped full of
water. There they loitered examining those beasties from close by: those
fish were theirs now; and they would let them swim about in the big tub
at home and give them a bit of their bread and butter every day, so that
they might grow into great big pike. And now back to the runnel for more.

"Boys, I'll tell mother!" cried Horieneke.

But they did not hear and just kept on as before. Fonske had not been
able to catch one yet and his fat legs were turning blue with the cold.
In front of him stood Bertje, stooping and peering into the water, with
his hands ready to grasp; and Fonske saw such a lovely little runnel from
his neck to halfway down his back, all bare skin. He carefully scooped
his hands full of water and let it trickle gently inside Bertje's shirt.
The boy growled; and Fonske, screaming with laughter, skipped out of the
brook. Now came a romping and stamping in the water, a dashing and
splashing with their hands till it turned to a rain of gleaming drops
that fell on their heads and wetted their clothes through and through.
And a bawling! And a plashing with their bare legs till the spray spouted
high over the bank.

"The constable!" cried Horieneke.

The sport was over. Like lightning they all sprang out of the brook,
caught up their wooden shoes with the little fish in them and ran as hard
as they could through the grass to the bridge. There only did they
venture to look round. Hurriedly they turned down their breeches, dried
their shiny cheeks and dripping hair with one another's handkerchiefs and
then marched all together through the sun and wind to school.

In the village square they wandered about among the other boys, silently
showed their catch, hid their shoes in the hawthorn-hedge behind the
churchyard and stayed playing until schoolmaster's bell rang.

Boys and girls, each on their own side, disappeared through the gate; and
the street was now silent as the grave. After a while, there came through
the open window of the school first a sort of buzzing and humming and
then a repetition in chorus, a rhythmical spelling aloud: b-u-t, but;
t-e-r, ter: butter; B-a, Ba; b-e-l, bel: Babel; ever on and more and more
noisily. In between it all, the sparrows chattered and chirped and
fluttered safely in the powdery sand of the playground.

The sun was now high in the sky and the light glittered on the young
leaves, full of the glad life of youth and gleaming with gold.

Horieneke, with a few more children, was in another school. They sat, the
boys on one side and the girls on the other, on long benches and were
wrapped up in studying their communion-book and listening to an old nun,
who explained it to them in drawling, snuffling tones. After that, they
had to say their lesson, one by one; and this all went so quietly, so
modestly, so easily, 'twas as if they had the open book before them.
Half-way through the morning, they went two and two through the village
to the church, where the priest was waiting to hear their catechism. This
also went quietly; and the questions and answers sounded hollow in that
empty church.

Horieneke sat at the head of the girls; she had caught up almost half of
them because she always knew her lessons so well and listened so
attentively. She was allowed to lead the prayers and was the first
examined; then she sat looking at the priest and listening to what came
from his lips. He always gave her a kind smile and held her up to the
others as an example of good conduct. After the catechism, they had leave
to go and play in the convent-garden. In the afternoon, there were new
lessons to be learnt and new explanations; and then quietly home.

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