The Ravens and the Angels Part 3

The other boys, observing the choir-master's love for him, grew jealous, and called him sometimes "the master's little angel," and sometimes "the little beggar of the hermitage," or "Dwarf Hans's darling."

He was too brave and manly a little fellow to tell his mother all these little annoyances. He would not for the world have spoiled her joy in her little "Chrysostom," her golden-mouthed laddie. But once they followed him to her door, and she heard them herself. The rude words smote her to the heart, but she only said,--

"Thou art not ashamed of the hermit's house, nor of being old Hans's darling?"

"I hope, never!" said the child with a little hesitation. "G.o.d sent him to us, and I love him. But it _would_ be nice if dear Hans sometimes washed his face!"

Magdalis smiled, and hit on a plan for bringing this about. With some difficulty she persuaded the old man to take his dinner every Sunday and holiday with them, and she always set an ewer of water--and a towel, relic of her old burgher life--by him, before the meal.

"We were a kind of Pharisees in our home," she said, "and except we washed our hands, never ate bread."

Hans growled a little, but he took the hint, for her sake and the boy's, and gradually found the practice so pleasant on its own account, that the was.h.i.+ng of his hands and face became a daily process.

On his patron saint's day (St. John, February 8), Mother Magdalis went a step further, and presented him with a clean suit of clothes, very humble but neat and sound, of her own making out of old h.o.a.rds. Not for holidays only, she said, but that he might change his clothes every day, after work, as her Berthold used.

"Dainty burgher ways," Hans called them, but he submitted, and Gottlieb was greatly comforted, and thought his old friend a long way advanced in his transformation into an angel.

So, between the sweetness of the boy's temper and of the dear mother's love which folded him close, the bitter was turned into sweet within him.

But Ursula, who heard the mocking of the boys with indignation, was not so wise in her consolations.

"Wicked, envious little devils!" said she. "Never thou heed them, my lamb! They would be glad enough, any of them, to be the master's angel, or Dwarf Hans's darling, for that matter, if they could. It is nothing but mean envy and spite, my little prince, my little wonder; never thou heed them!"

And then the enemy crept unperceived into the child's heart.

Was he indeed a little prince and a wonder, on his platform of gifts and goodness? And were all those naughty boys far below him, in another sphere, hating him as the little devils in the mystery-plays seemed to hate and torment the saints?

Had the "raven" been sent to him, after all, as to the prophet of old, not only because he was hungry and pitied by G.o.d, but because he was good and a favourite of G.o.d?

It seemed clear he was something quite out of the common. He seemed the favourite of every one, except those few envious, wicked boys.

The great ladies of the city entreated for him to come and sing at their feasts. And all their guests stopped in the midst of their eager talk to listen to him, and they gave him sweetmeats and praised him to the skies; and they offered him wine from their silver flagons, and when he refused it, as his mother had desired him, they praised him more than ever; and once the host himself, the burgomaster, emptied the silver flagon of the wine he had refused, and told him to take it home to his mother and tell her she had a child whose dutifulness was worth more than all the silver in the city.

But when he told his mother this, instead of looking delighted, as he expected, she looked grave, and almost severe, and said,--

"You only did your duty, my boy. It would have been a sin and a shame to have done otherwise. And, of course, you would not for the world."

"Certainly I would not, mother," he said.

But he felt a little chilled. Did his mother think it was always so easy for boys to do their duty? and that every one did it?

Other people seemed to think it a very uncommon and n.o.ble thing to do one's duty. And what, indeed, could the blessed saints do more?

So the slow poison of praise crept into the boy's heart. And while he thought his life was being filled with light, unknown to him the shadows were deepening,--the one shadow which eclipses the sun, the terrible shadow of self.

For he could not but be conscious how, even in the cathedral, a kind of hush and silence fell around when he began to sing.

And instead of the blessed presence of G.o.d filling the holy place, and his singing in it, as of old, like a happy little bird in the suns.h.i.+ne, his own sweet voice seemed to fill the place, rising and falling like a tide up and down the aisles, leaping to the vaulted roof like a fountain of joy, and dropping into the hearts of the mult.i.tude like dew from heaven.

And as he went out, in his little white robe, with the choir, he felt the eyes of the people on him, and he heard a murmur of praise, and now and then words such as "That is little Gottlieb, the son of the widow Magdalis. She may well be proud of him. He has the voice and the face of an angel."

And then, in contrast, outside in the street, from the other boys, "See how puffed up the little prince is! He cannot look at any one lower than the bishop or the burgomaster!"

So, between the chorus of praise and the other chorus of mockery, it was no wonder that poor Gottlieb felt like a being far removed from the common herd. And, necessarily, any one of the flock of Christ who feels that, cannot be happy, because if we are far away from the common flock, we cannot be near the Good Shepherd, who always keeps close to the feeblest, and seeks those that go astray.

V.

It was not long before the watchful eye of the mother observed a little change creeping over the boy--a little more impatience with Lenichen, a little more variableness of temper; sometimes he would dance exultingly home as if he were scarcely treading the common earth, sometimes he would return with a depression which made the simple work and pleasures of the home seem dull and wearisome.

So it went on until the joyful Easter-tide was drawing near. On Palm Sunday there was to be a procession of the children.

As the mother was smoothing out the golden locks which fell like sunbeams on the white vestments, she said, "It is a bright day for thee and me, my son. I shall feel as if we were all in the dear old Jerusalem itself, and my darling had gathered his palms on Olivet itself, and the very eyes of the blessed Lord Himself were on thee, and His ears listening to thee crying out thy Hosannas, and His dear voice speaking of thee and through thee, 'Suffer the little children to come unto me.'"

But Gottlieb looked grave and rather troubled.

"So few seem thinking just of _His_ listening," he said doubtfully.

"There are the choir-master and the Dean and Chapter, and the other choristers, and the Cistercians, and the mothers of the other choristers, who wish them to sing best."

She took his hand. "So there were in that old Jerusalem," she said. "The Pharisees, who wanted to stop the children's singing; and even the dear disciples, who often thought they might be troublesome to the Master.

But the little ones sang for Him; and He knew, and was pleased. And that is all we have to think of now."

He kissed her, and went away with a lightened brow.

Many of the neighbours came in that afternoon to congratulate Magdalis on her boy--his face, his voice, his gentle ways.

"And then he sings with such feeling," said one. "One sees it is in his heart."

But in the evening Gottlieb came home very sad and desponding. For some time he said nothing, and then, with a brave effort to restrain his tears, he murmured,--

"Oh, mother! I am afraid it will soon be over. I heard one of the priests say he thought they had a new chorister at the Cistercians whose voice is as good as mine. So that the archd.u.c.h.ess may not like our choir best, after all."

The mother said nothing for a moment, and then she said,--

"_Whose_ praise and love will the boy at the Cistercian convent sing, Gottlieb, if he has such a lovely voice?"

"G.o.d's!--the dear Heavenly Father and the Saviour!" he said reverently.

"And you, my own? Will another little voice on earth prevent His hearing you? Do the thousands of thousands always singing to Him above prevent His hearing you? And what would the world do if the only voice worth listening to were thine? It cannot be heard beyond one church, or one street. And the good Lord has ten thousand churches, and cities full of people who want to hear."

"But thou, mother! Thou and Lenichen, and the bread!"

"It was the raven that brought the bread," she said smiling; "and thou art not even a raven,--only a little child to pick up the bread the raven brought."

He sat silent a few minutes, and then the terrible cloud of self and pride dropped off from his heart like a death-shroud, and he threw himself into her arms.

"Oh, mother, I see it all!" he said. "I am free again. I have only to sing to the blessed Lord of all, quite sure He listens, to Him alone, and to all else as just a little one of the all He loves."