Marie Grubbe by Jens Peter Jacobsen (parable of the sower read online txt) 📕
He was a large-boned, long-limbed man with a stoop in his broad shoulders. His hair was rough as a crow's nest, grayish and tangled, but his face was of a deep yet clear pink, seemingly out of keeping with his coarse, rugged features and bushy eyebrows.
Erik Grubbe invited him to a seat and asked about his haymaking. The conversation dwelt on the chief labors of the farm at that season and died away in a sigh over the poor harvest of last year. Meanwhile the pastor was casting sidelong glances at the mug and finally said: "Your honor is always temperate--keeping to the natural drinks. No doubt they are the healthiest. New milk is a blessed gift of heaven, good both for a weak stomach and a sore chest."
"Indeed the gifts of God are all good, whether they come from the udder or the tap. But you must taste a keg of genuine mum that we brought home from Viborg the other day. She's both good and German, though I can't see that the customs have put their mark on her."
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At the sign of the Golden Grove they turned and rode through the woods
toward Overdrup, then walked their horses through the underbrush down
to the bright surface of the lake. Tall beeches leaned to mirror their
green vault in the clear water. Succulent marsh grass and pale pink
feather-foil made a wide motley border where the slope, brown with
autumn leaves, met the water. High in the shelter of the foliage in a
ray of light that pierced the cool shadow, mosquitoes whirled in a
noiseless swarm. A red butterfly gleamed there for a second, then flew
out into the sunlight over the lake. Steel-blue dragonflies made
bright streaks through the air, and the darting pike drew swift wavy
lines over the surface of the water. Hens were cackling in the
farmyard beyond the brushwood, and from the other side of the lake
came a note of wood doves cooing under the domes of the beech trees in
Dyrehaven.
They slackened their speed and rode out into the water to let their
horses dabble their dusty hoofs and quench their thirst. Marie had
stopped a little farther out than Ulrik Frederik and sat with reins
hanging in order to let her mare lower its head freely. She was
tearing the leaves from a long branch in her hand and sent them
fluttering down over the water, which was beginning to stir in soft
ripples.
“I think we may get a thunderstorm,” she said, her eyes following the
course of a light wind that went whirling over the lake raising round,
dark, roughened spots on the surface.
“Perhaps we had better turn back,” suggested Ulrik Frederik.
“Not for gold!” she answered and suddenly drove her mare to the shore.
They walked their horses round the lake to the road and entered the
tall woods.
“I would I knew,” said Marie, when she felt the cool air of the forest
fan her cheeks and drew in its freshness in long, deep breaths. “I
would I knew—” She got no further but stopped and looked up into the
green vault with shining eyes.
“What wouldst thou know, dear heart?”
“I’m thinking there’s something in the forest air that makes sensible
folks mad. Many’s the time I have been walking in Bigum woods when I
would keep on running and running till I got into the very thickest of
it. I’d be wild with glee and sing at the top of my voice and walk and
pick flowers and throw them away again and call to the birds when they
flew up—and then, on the sudden, a strange fright would come over me,
and I would feel, oh! so wretched and so small! Whenever a branch
broke, I’d start, and the sound of my own voice gave me more fright
than anything else. Hast thou never felt it?”
Before Ulrik Frederik could answer her song rang out:
“Right merrily in the woods I go
Where elm and apple grow,
And I pluck me there sweet roses two
And deck my silken shoe.
Oh, the dance,
Oh, the dance,
Oh, tra-la-la!
Oh, the red, red berries on the dogrose bush!”
and as she sang, the whip flew down over her horse, she laughed,
hallooed, and galloped at top speed along a narrow forest path where
the branches swept her shoulders. Her eyes sparkled; her cheeks
burned; she did not heed Ulrik Frederik calling after her. The whip
whizzed through the air again, and off she went with reins slack! Her
fluttering habit was flecked with foam. The soft earth flew up around
her horse. She laughed and cut the tall ferns with her whip.
Suddenly the light seemed to be lifted from leaf and branch and to
flee from the rain-heavy darkness. The rustling of the bushes had
ceased, and the hoofbeats were silent as she rode across a stretch of
forest glade. On either side the trees stood like a dark encircling
wall. Ragged gray clouds were scudding over the black, lowering
heavens. Before her rolled the murky blue waters of the Sound, and
beyond rose banks of fog. She drew rein, and her tired mount stopped
willingly. Ulrik Frederik galloped past, swung back in a wide circle,
and halted at her side.
At that moment a shower fell like a gray, heavy, wet curtain drawn
slantwise over the Sound. An icy wind flattened the grass, whizzed in
their ears, and made a noise like foaming waves in the distant
treetops. Large flat hail stones rattled down over them in white
sheets, settled like bead strings in the folds of her dress, fell in a
spray from the horses’ manes, and skipped and rolled in the grass as
though swarming out of the earth.
They sought shelter under the trees, rode down to the beach, and
presently halted before the low door of the Bide-a-Wee Tavern. A
stableboy took the horses, and the tall, bareheaded innkeeper showed
them into his parlor, where, he said, there was another guest before
them. It proved to be Hop-o’-my-Thumb, who rose at their entrance,
offering to give up the room to their highnesses, but Ulrik Frederik
graciously bade him remain.
“Stay here, my man,” he said, “and entertain us in this confounded
weather. I must tell you, my dear”—turning to Marie—“that this
insignificant mannikin is the renowned comedian and merry-andrew of
alehouses, Daniel Knopf, well learned in all the liberal arts such as
dicing, fencing, drinking, shrovetide sports, and such matters,
otherwise in fair repute as an honorable merchant in the good city of
Copenhagen.”
Daniel scarcely heard this eulogy. He was absorbed in looking at Marie
Grubbe and formulating some graceful words of felicitation, but when
Ulrik Frederik roused him with a sounding blow on his broad back, his
face flushed with resentment and embarrassment. He turned to him
angrily but mastered himself and said with his coldest smile, “We’re
scarce tipsy enough, Colonel.”
Ulrik Frederik laughed and poked his side crying, “Oh, you sacred
knave! Would you put me to confusion, you plaguy devil, and make me
out a wretched braggart who lacks parchments to prove his boasting?
Fie, fie, out upon you! Is that just? Have I not a score of times
praised your wit before this noble lady till she has time and again
expressed the greatest longing to see and hear your far-famed
drolleries? You might at least give us the blind Cornelius Fowler and
his whistling birds or play the trick—you know—with the sick cock
and the clucking hens!”
Marie now added her persuasions, saying that Colonel Gyldenlove was
quite right, she had often wondered what pastime, what fine and
particular sport, could keep young gentlemen in filthy alehouses for
half days and whole nights together, and she begged that Daniel would
oblige them without further urging.
Daniel bowed with perfect grace and replied that his poor pranks were
rather of a kind to give fuddled young sparks added occasion for
roaring and bawling than to amuse a dainty and highborn young maiden.
Nevertheless, he would put on his best speed to do her pleasure, for
none should ever say it of him that any command from her fair ladyship
had failed of instant obedience and execution.
“Look ‘ee!” he began, throwing himself down by the table and sticking
out his elbows. “Now I’m a whole assembly of your betrothed’s
honorable companions and especial good friends.”
He took a handful of silver dollars from his pocket and laid them on
the table, pulled his hair down over his eyes, and dropped his lower
lip stupidly.
“Devil melt me!” he drawled, rattling the coins like dice. “I’m not
the eldest son of the honorable Erik Kaase for nothing! What! you’d
doubt my word, you muckworm? I flung ten, hell consume me, ten with a
jingle! Can’t you see, you dog? I’m asking if you can’t see?—you
blind lamprey, you! Or d’ ye want me to rip your guts with my stinger
and give your liver and lungs a chance to see too? Shall I—huh? You
ass!”
Daniel jumped up and pulled a long face.
“You’d challenge me, would you?” he said hoarsely with a strong North
Skaane accent, “you stinkard, you! D’ you know whom you’re
challenging? So take me king o’ hell, I’ll strike your—Nay, nay,”
he dropped into his natural voice, “that’s perhaps too strong a jest
to begin with. Try another!”
He sat down, folded his hands on the edge of his knees as though to
make room for his stomach, puffed himself up fat and heavy jowled,
then whistled firmly and thoughtfully but in an altogether too slow
tempo the ballad of Roselil and Sir Peter. Then he stopped, rolled his
eyes amorously, and called in fond tones:
“Cockatoo—cockadoodle-doo!” He began to whistle again, but had some
difficulty in combining it with an ingratiating smile. “Little
sugar-top!” he called, “little honey-dew, come to me, little chuck!
P’st! Will it lap wine, little kitty? Lap nice sweet wine from little
cruse?”
Again he changed his voice, leaned forward in his chair, winked with
one eye, and crooked his ringers to comb an imaginary beard.
“Now stay here,” he said coaxingly, “stay here, fair Karen; I’ll never
forsake you, and you must never forsake me,”—his voice grew
weepy,—“we’ll never part, my dear, dear heart, never in the world!
Silver and gold and honor and glory and precious noble blood—begone!
I curse you! Begone! I say. You’re a hundred heavens high above them,
the thing of beauty you are! Though they’ve scutcheons and
emblems—would that make ‘em any better? You’ve got an emblem too—the
red mark on your white shoulder that Master Anders burned with his hot
iron, that’s your coat-of-arms! I spit on my scutcheon to kiss that
mark—that’s all I think of scutcheons—that’s all! For there isn’t in
all the land of Sjaelland a highborn lady as lovely as you are—is
there, huh? No, there isn’t—not a bit of one!”
“That’s—that’s a lie!” he cried in a new voice, jumped up, and shook
his fist over the table. “My Mistress Ide, you blockhead, she’s got a
shape—as a man may say—she’s got limbs—as a man may say—limbs. I
tell you, you slub-berdegulleon!”
At this point Daniel was about to let himself fall into the chair
again, but at that moment Ulrik Frederik pulled it away, and he rolled
on the floor. Ulrik Frederik laughed uproariously, but Marie ran to him
with hands outstretched as though to help him up. The little man, half
rising on his knees, caught her hand and gazed at her with an
expression so full of gratitude and devotion that it haunted her for a
long time. Presently they rode home, and none of them thought that
this chance meeting in the Bide-a-Wee Tavern would lead to anything
further.
The States-General that convened in Copenhagen in the late autumn
brought to town many of the nobility, all anxious to guard their
ancient rights against encroachment but none the less eager for a
little frolic after the busy summer. Nor were they averse to flaunting
their wealth and magnificence in the faces of the townspeople, who had
grown somewhat loud-voiced since the war, and to reminding them that
the line between gentlemen of the realm and the unfree mob was still
firm and immutable in spite of the privileges conferred by royalty, in
spite of citizen valor and the glamor of victory, in spite of the
teeming ducats in the strong boxes of the hucksters.
The streets were bright with throngs of noblemen and their ladies,
bedizened lackeys, and richly caparisoned horses in silver-mounted
harness. There was feasting and open house in the homes of the
nobility. Far into the night the violin sounded from well-lit halls,
telling the
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