GUSTAV FREN5SEN.
 
 THE LIBRARY 
 
 OF 
 
 THE UNIVERSITY 
 
 OF CALIFORNIA 
 
 LOS ANGELES 
 
 GIFT OF 
 PROF. VICTOR A. OSWALD
 
 HOLYLAND
 
 HOLYLAND 
 
 Exclusive Authorized 'Translation of 
 "HiWgenlei" 
 
 BY GUSTAV FRENSSEN 
 
 Author of " Jorn Uhl " 
 
 STranulatrt from tfje ffictman 
 
 BY 
 MARY AGNES HAMILTON 
 
 BOSTON 
 THE PAGE COMPANY 
 
 PUBLISHERS
 
 ENGLISH VERSION 
 
 Copyright, Sept. 13, rgo6 
 BY DANA ESTES & COMPANY 
 
 Entered at Stationers' Hall 
 
 All rights reserved 
 
 GERMAN VERSION 
 Published, Nov. 6, 1905 
 
 Privilege of copyright in the United States 
 reserved under the act approved March 3, 1905 
 
 BY G. GROTE'SCHE VERLAGSBUCHHANDLUNG 
 
 COLONIAL PRESS 
 
 Eltctretyped and Printed by C. H. Sitnonds & Co. 
 Boston, U.S. A,
 
 TT 
 
 
 691341
 
 CHIEF CHARACTERS 
 
 Tjark Dusenschon Left-handed descendant of a prince's son, 
 brought up by his grandmother, 
 
 Stiena Dusenschon. 
 
 Kai Jans Eldest son of 
 
 Thomas Jans A navvy, formerly on the lightship. 
 
 Pe Ontjes Lau Son of the harbourmaster; marries 
 
 Anna Boje Eldest daughter of 
 
 William Boje Teacher, and 
 
 Hella His wife. 
 
 Pete and Hett Anna's brothers. 
 
 Heinke Her sister (eight years younger). 
 
 Kassen Wedderkopp An old civil servant living in Hilligenlei; 
 formerly a journalist. 
 
 Heine Wulk Editor of the newspaper. 
 Daniel Peters Mayor of the town. 
 
 Peter Volquardsen A young teacher at the grammar school ; mar- 
 ries Heinke.
 
 HOLYLAND 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 HALF asleep and dissatisfied, many people merely drag 
 themselves through life; they never really live; they are a 
 burden to those about them. Who cares for their story? 
 
 There are others whose childish eyes are full of wonder, 
 who dimly feel, as boys, that great things are reserved for 
 them, and go out into life with unclouded spirits. It would 
 be worth while to tell their story. Never mind; it does not 
 come to much, after all. What do these people make of their 
 lives? They devote themselves to the pursuit of wealth and 
 outward honour and such illusions; they run, they stumble, 
 they fail to find what they seek, and so stumble into their 
 graves. It is a weariness to write their story; one's hair grows 
 grey in the telling. Not that we expect the superhuman 
 that people should set out to find a kingly crown no ; let 
 them only, while pursuing their illusions, have some hope of 
 finding in the next field a troop of angels instead of a herd 
 of asses: some vague idea that there, under the oak tree at the 
 next turn of the road, the Eternal may be standing with the 
 thousand riddles of the world in His sacred hands, ready to 
 tell them the answer to some. We do ask this; without this 
 a man is incomplete. 
 
 And so, my troubled, courageous soul, tell the story of one 
 who sought for holiness full of unrest, full of hope. 
 
 With the coming of the dusk the storm cast itself more 
 fiercely upon the sea, striking with its strength the grey waste 
 of desolate waters far and wide. From Iceland to the Scotch 
 
 ii
 
 12 HOLYLAND 
 
 coast, and from there right over to Norway, the grey, foam- 
 ing waves came heavily on a hundred miles across, with end- 
 less roar and rush, on to the Holstein coast. There in the 
 dread darkness at the entrance of the bay lay the squat red 
 lightship swinging heavily backwards and forwards on its 
 chain, swaying its radiant lamp. Over the blackness of the 
 angry ocean its light flickered restlessly. The wind tore and 
 whistled in the rigging. Howling and swelling storm and 
 sea rushed past the lightship, roared into the wide, grey bay, 
 forced their way up the narrow harbour into the little town 
 called Hilligenlei. Then indeed the storm, as if exulting in 
 its freedom from the sea, which had hung at its heels all the 
 way from Iceland, dashed itself, wild and surging, against 
 the first obstacle it met, a long, low, thatched roof standing 
 high upon the beach at the top of the harbour stream. It 
 dashed against the roof and struck the five chimneys with 
 might and main; it leapt round the house and tore at the five 
 doors and at the windows. 
 
 In the furthest room sat Rieke Thomson, the midwife, in 
 her comfortable armchair: feet on the foot-warmer, hands 
 resting on her portly body, coffee-pot ready on the table, she 
 was waiting peacefully. She sat there looking down the street, 
 only turning her big head from time to time to look through 
 a little square window that she herself had had made at the 
 side, across the bay to see whether there were any sign from 
 Friestadt. It was the time-honoured duty of the Friestadt 
 schoolmaster, who lived on the dyke opposite, to put a white 
 cloth on the dark, thatched roof in the day-time and a light 
 in the school-room window at night that could be seen from 
 Hilligenlei whenever a woman was in labour. This stormy 
 evening, however, it was only the force of habit that made 
 her turn her heavy head. As far as any news she had heard, 
 there could be no message from Friestadt. It was across to 
 the house of Harbourmaster Lau that she looked. His wife's 
 time must come to-night, she thought. But the harbour- 
 master's door remained tight shut. 
 
 Then she began to be sorry for herself, a lonely, neglected 
 female, although in the course of the day she had had seven 
 visitors. Six old women had come to gossip. One young 
 one wanted to know from the cards when she should be a 
 mother again. Tired of being alone, she bent indolently to
 
 HOLYLAND 13 
 
 pick up the wooden shoe that lay by the fireside, and threw 
 it, with a slow swing of her arm, against the door. In came 
 old Hule Beiderwand, who lived in the next room. In spite 
 of his sixty years, he carried himself as upright as in his youth, 
 when he was mounted orderly between Kiel and Gottorp; 
 but his straight bearing was not only due to the proud build 
 of his body; far more to the lovely light that shone within 
 his soul. 
 
 Round about the bay of Hilligenlei, at the foot and under 
 the shade of the great sea dyke, clustered many little houses, 
 in which dwelt labourers, fishermen, and small farmers. 
 These people, living extraordinarily lonely lives in their dark, 
 low-roofed rooms, far away from the church, had from long 
 time past brooded over a peculiar faith. They called them- 
 selves " Holyland men," and lived in the belief that the little 
 town of Hilligenlei and the country round the bay would be 
 one day a real Hilligenlei, i. e,, Holyland. They looked for 
 the Kingdom of God in the bay. The secret leader, and, in- 
 deed, the last of the faithful for the faith was dying out 
 was Hule Beiderwand. In his life he had watched many 
 nights by sick-beds, and thus acquired the habit of standing 
 by the window and looking out into the night. Now, with 
 his slow, stiff gait, he went to the little window that looked 
 out over the bay. Lost in thought, he gazed out into the dark- 
 ness and listened to the song of the storm. 
 
 " It's too bad," said Rieke, " that I have got to sit here 
 like this, a lonely old woman like me. And if a man does 
 come he stands there mum like a stock!" 
 
 ; ' There is a light," said the old man. 
 
 "What?" she cried, starting up in her chair, and look- 
 ing out. There in the distance the clear light shone calm 
 and distinct. "In Friestadt! What is it, Hule?" 
 
 " I think I know," said the old man. " A fortnight ago 
 Lisa Dusenschon was here in the dusk, like this." 
 
 Rieke, with her hands on her knees, looked at Hule out 
 of her big, round eyes. " Lisa Dusenschon? That's Stiena's 
 daughter, who lives near us in the long house? in service 
 with the Reimars in Friestadt?" 
 
 "If you know no other woman in Friestadt for whom the 
 light has been set out, ' it is Lisa. She asked for her mother : 
 she was away; then for you, and you weren't there either;
 
 I 4 HOLYLAND 
 
 then she went away again. Now that I see the light I imag- 
 ine that she had something important to 'say." 
 
 " Well," said Rieke, pressing her hands against the arms 
 of her chair as if to get up, " then I must go to Friestadt in 
 all this weather! " 
 
 She had not yet risen, when the storm seized the outer 
 door and dashed it against the wall. There on the threshold 
 stood Lisa, strong and broad, her ruddy fair hair hanging 
 wet about her ears, deathly exhaustion on her white face, 
 horror in her deep-set eyes. 
 
 "The farmer has turned me out; my mother is not at 
 home." 
 
 Rieke hobbled out of the chair and took hold of her, led 
 her up three steps to the inner room, and laid her down on 
 the bed. 
 
 " Well, I never," she said. " Never in my life have I 
 had such a fright ! " 
 
 " Rieke, I lay down in the mud fifty times. I doubled 
 up like a worm. I wanted to take hold, but I couldn't." 
 She breathed deep. " Oh, now it is easier. Hasn't mother 
 come yet ? " 
 
 "She will be here directly. Hark! that's the door. Yes, 
 here she is." Stiena Dusenschon was dressed in the attire 
 she always donned for visiting. On her head was the dingy- 
 black state bonnet, round her thin 'shoulders the old-fash- 
 ioned black mantle with bead fringe that the clergyman's 
 wife had given her. Her long bonnet strings hanging down 
 in front trembled, and the bead fringe jumped up and down 
 in her excitement. She passed her hands over her head again 
 and again in a troubled manner. " Oh, my child, my child," 
 she cried, "why have you done this?" 
 
 " Woman," said Rieke, " do not for any sake get into a 
 state. Were you any better in your young days? Why has 
 she done it? Either because some one got the better of her 
 or because her own nature drove her to it. That's why." 
 
 Stiena had sat down at the edge of the bed gasping for 
 breath. " My child, my child, who is the father? Only 
 tell your old mother who the father is." 
 
 " Stop your questions," said Rieke. " Go and fetch little 
 Tina Rauh to help us and make some coffee. We shall need 
 half the night for this."
 
 HOLYLAND 15 
 
 Stiena was a trifle offended. However, she got up from 
 the bed, and, going out, returned with the little Rauh girl, 
 one of the family living in the harbour street, all of whom 
 have curly fair hair and somewhat wandering wits. Then 
 she went straight to her daughter's bed. She lay groaning 
 heavily, her distorted face against the coverlet. " Oh, my 
 child, tell me; is it some rich farmer's son? or a strange 
 gentleman? or, oh! is it a nobleman?" 
 
 "A nobleman, indeed!" said Rieke, shaking her great, 
 round head. " Be glad if it's a good, honest fellow who 
 will acknowledge mother and child. Come, we'll have a 
 cosy cup of coffee. It's not a dream, is it now, that you're 
 to be a grandmother to-day? Come, sit down." 
 
 Just as Tina lifted up the can to pour out, Lisa gave a 
 loud cry from the inner room. The girl put the can noisily 
 down on the table, and was on the point of running away. 
 
 "Oh, dear. I must run home to mother!" 
 
 Rieke, however, took hold of her by the neck. " You 
 stay here at the table, and mind you don't stir. Come, 
 Stiena," and they went in to help the moaning woman. 
 
 The little girl sat huddled up at the table as if she were 
 fastened there. When Lisa cried out she drove both hands 
 into her tousled hair; when the cry was louder she held her 
 ears. When it got quieter within she cautiously straightened 
 out her neck and laughed. So she stayed for two long hours, 
 till a soft, distant weeping came, as if from far away, from 
 the inner room. Then she bowed her head on the table and 
 wept miserably. 
 
 " Well, that really breaks one's back," said Rieke, coming 
 down into the room. " Come, let's have our coffee." She 
 sat down heavily in the big armchair and looked at Tina. 
 " You go now and sit up there and listen if Lisa is asleep 
 or calls out or anything, and don't stir from there. Come 
 now, Stiena, sit down and make yourself cosy." 
 
 " Who can the father be ? " said Stiena, smiling at her 
 happy thoughts, and turning about on her chair as if to the 
 strains of a slow waltz. " Assuredly a farmer's son, most 
 assuredly ; and, better still and, Rieke, think of its being 
 a boy. That makes me so awfully happy. The Dusen- 
 schons have been girls for a hundred years back, but now 
 it's a boy I "
 
 16 HOLYLAND 
 
 " You really might tell me," said Rieke Thomson, filling 
 her cup, " the true story of your Dusenschons; but mind 
 you don't exaggerate; in my old age I don't want any lies 
 told me. Drink your coffee." 
 
 Stiena drank, and, putting down her cup, swayed for awhile 
 to the joyous music within her, with a sweet, thoughtful 
 smile, her bonnet strings swaying and the bead fringe wav- 
 ing this way and that. " Ah," she said, " that is a story, in- 
 deed. Look here. It began a hundred years ago or more. 
 Then my great grandfather was mayor here in Hilligenlei 
 and called von Dusenschon. He lived quite ' alone with his 
 six daughters. He did not allow the young men of the town 
 to come near them, for he hoped ' that noblemen and officers 
 would come and fetch them away one after the other, for 
 they were all very beautiful. He did not trouble over their 
 growing older and older till the two eldest were really 
 withered. He was a hard man, and it never entered his 
 head that every created thing will have its rights. Well, one 
 fine day he heard that the king's son was passing through 
 Hilligenlei incognito, with only a few companions, and wanted 
 to spend the night at his house, he being mayor. So he in- 
 formed his daughters. 
 
 Little Tina craned her neck to see mother and child. In 
 doing so she moved the door, which gave a short, sharp 
 creak. Rieke Thomson looked up. " Does Lisa want any- 
 thing?" 
 
 " No," said the little girl ; " she looks as red as an apple 
 on a tree." 
 
 " We're just coming," said Stiena, nodding lovingly to- 
 wards the bedroom. " One more cup, please, Rieke." 
 
 '' There you are, Stiena. Go on with your story." 
 
 " When the mayor's three elder daughters were going to 
 bed that night the eldest said that the visit was a great 
 honour, the second that they must put out the damask table 
 linen, and the third that she should put on her blue silk 
 gown. But the three younger sisters reflected on the mean- 
 ing of love. As a matter of fact, they did that every evening, 
 but more so this evening than usual. The eldest combed her 
 hair and drew up her full figure in front of the mirror and 
 thought, ' He is eight-and-twenty and handsome. How stupid 
 that a king's son may only woo a king's daughter.' The
 
 HOLYLAND 17 
 
 second sat on the edge of her bed in her wide, white night- 
 gown, and bent down her head till she could see the whole 
 of her beautiful body from neck to knee, and thought, should 
 she be wrinkled and spotty and shrunk like her eldest sister 
 in ten years' time? She shuddered at the thought, and hardly 
 knew what to think of the world. So she lay down and slept. 
 The third, the youngest of all, was Susie, and she was one- 
 and-twenty. She lay full length on her back, her two hands 
 in her thick, golden-brown hair, in bitter trouble. In the 
 summer she had gone over a great deal to the old clergy- 
 man's wife, who lived near the churchyard. There she had 
 lain on the grass in the garden under a hazel bush with the 
 son, a student, while he whistled like a chaffinch and told 
 her how the hazel blossomed and made a wedding-feast, and 
 he kissed her and went away. Since then she had silently 
 fought a fierce fight against God and man, thinking, with 
 bitter resentment in her heart, ' The Holy Trinity and the 
 world are wronging me hideously.' And this evening her 
 misery was acute, for her father had privately said to her, 
 ' I want the prince to remember our house with particular 
 pleasure so that by his help I may get promotion to the cap- 
 ital and a better post. I know he likes beautiful, clever 
 women. You are the cleverest and the most beautiful. To- 
 morrow evening you shall sit by him.' Therefore, as she lay 
 full length in bed she resolved, ' If he chooses he shall tell me 
 all the things I don't know and want to know.' " 
 
 Tina craned her neck to see the mother and child. In 
 doing so she moved the door, and it gave a short, sharp 
 creak. 
 
 Rieke looked up. " Does Lisa want anything? " 
 " No," said the girl, " but she's as white as chalk." 
 " We're just coming," said Stiena, nodding her head lov- 
 ingly towards the bedroom. " I'll get to the end quickly. 
 One more cup, please, Rieke." 
 
 Rieke poured it out. Hule Beiderwand came in again 
 and took up his usual position at the window without saying 
 anything. " Drink it off and go on with your story." 
 
 " The next day the prince came, and in the evening he 
 sat next to Susie and found her charming. As sure as she 
 laughed at what he said he bowed and looked quite serious. 
 As sure as she was quiet and serious he laughed and gave her
 
 18 HOLYLAND 
 
 more wine. When they got up he gave her his hand and 
 whispered a few words. Her sisters thought it some compli- 
 ment, but he had said a bad word to her. When all in the 
 house were gone to bed she slipped secretly out of her room 
 and downstairs. The next morning the eldest sister found 
 her sitting in the arbour, her hands pressed together on her 
 lap, staring at the ground in front of her. The prince rode 
 away. She waited for a letter or a message, but none came. 
 Then she advised her two younger sisters to rebel against 
 their father and marry some simple tradesman. She went 
 secretly to Hamburg, where she lived with simple folk, and 
 made a hard living by sewing, and gave birth to a girl. For 
 eight or nine years she lived with these people, some say 
 quietly and alone, happy with her little girl; others say vis- 
 ited from time to time by officers. Anyhow, she died young. 
 The ten-year-old girl was sent first to Hilligenlei, but by 
 that time the mayor was dead. They sent her to the five 
 sisters, but they had entered a superior cloister, where they 
 made crochet table-covers. Their sister's child horrified them. 
 Comforted by the parson, they despatched her back to Hilli- 
 genlei. She grew up there among simple folk, and developed 
 uncommon intelligence. Sometimes she was proud and re- 
 served, then suddenly feverishly gay. When she was twenty 
 she went the same way as her mother. Her daughter, my 
 mother, bore me out of wedlock, and I was not married my- 
 self." 
 
 The little girl, heavy with sleep, stirred now that the story 
 was at an end. The door gave a sharp creak. Rieke moved 
 her clumsy body. " Does Lisa want anything? " 
 
 " No. She is lying quite still, as yellow as wax." 
 
 Then Rieke, supporting her hands on the arms of her chair, 
 got slowly on to her legs and went thoughtfully up into 
 the bedroom, holding on to the sides of the door. 
 
 Stiena remained at the table nodding her head and smil- 
 ing sweetly, listening to some joyous music. The bead fringe 
 rattled gently, and the strings swayed elegantly. So she 
 sat, dreaming, " It's a nobleman ; I'm sure of it." 
 
 Hule stood by the window gazing out into the stormy 
 night. After a while Rieke came down the stairs with the 
 child in her arms, and sat down again, breathing hard, in
 
 HOLYLAND 19 
 
 her big chair by the table, saying, in a choked voice, " Lisa 
 is dead." 
 
 Stiena uttered a piercing yell, calling God and men to wit- 
 ness. 
 
 Hule had turned away from the window and gone up into 
 the bedroom. Coming down again stiffly after a short ab- 
 sence he said, shaking his head, " What a misfortune." 
 
 Rieke pushed back her cup sharply. " Be quiet," she said ; 
 " I don't want to hear another word." 
 
 But the old man was not to be baulked. " What a mass 
 of sin have we here. The king's son and the mayor and 
 all those who have committed outrage, the farmer who drove 
 her away, and you two, who paid no heed to her! This town 
 is called Hilligenlei, Holyland, but never have I seen a man 
 here free of sin and sorrow." 
 
 Rieke struck the table sharply, and said, in a breaking 
 voice, " I won't hear it. Christ our Lord redeemed us with 
 His blood. That I have learnt, and that I stand by." 
 
 "What then?" said the old man. " Is there a single man 
 in Hilligenlei or along the dyke who is redeemed, who is 
 holy? Think of all the lazy, thoughtless, stupid people in 
 the town. But, I say unto you, one day a brave man will 
 come who will rise up like a judge in Israel and bow the 
 whole land beneath his sword until it is holy in deed as in 
 name." 
 
 At this moment Tina shot in at the door, and, throwing 
 a postcard on the table, was off again. " The postman 
 brought it to us because you weren't at home, Stiena." 
 
 Stiena snatched up the card, wiping the tears from her eyes 
 to read the address. " To Stiena Dusenschon in Hilligenlei." 
 When she turned it over it was painted with bright flowers. 
 In the little fore space were the words, " You have no idea 
 of it " at that time a slang phrase. 
 
 " Oh, look here," she said, wiping away her tears, " look! 
 this is from him. What a pretty card. I have no idea 
 no idea of what ? that he is a rich man no. I have no 
 idea. Rieke, he's a nobleman. He'll come in his carriage 
 and fetch away the child, and me too." 
 
 Rieke took the card and looked at it and said, " It's a 
 pretty card, and the writing is good, but it would be better 
 if there were a name on it."
 
 20 HOLYLAND 
 
 " Who or what his father is does not matter in the least," 
 said the old man. " What does matter is that he should 
 help to make this land, this Hilligenlei, more holy, that's it." 
 
 " Always at that," said Rieke, crossly. " I say, with a 
 father who writes a postcard like that, and a Dusenschon 
 for his mother, he will be something, that's certain. Come, 
 Stiena, let's consult the cards. Good heavens, what one has 
 to go through in this life! They're on the top shelf." 
 
 " Oh, yes," said Stiena, getting up so quickly that the bon- 
 net strings swayed and the bead fringe rose in waves. " Con- 
 sult the cards. Lord, how I wonder!" 
 
 Next morning Rieke was once more sitting in her big 
 armchair by the hearth with her foot-warmer smoking a 
 little, and she looked eagerly across to the harbourmaster's 
 house, expecting her summons to come at last. So she 
 waited for four days, visited meantime by some twenty 
 women, old and young, who drank coffee with her. She 
 complained of her loneliness, and began to be secretly angry 
 with the child. On the morning of the fifth day, when she 
 had just taken up her usual position on the throne, Har- 
 bourmaster Lau came across the street, burst open a window 
 with his great paw so that the fastening jumped off, and said, 
 in his calm, comfortable way, " The boy arrived last night." 
 
 She threw herself stiffly up and regarded him sharply out 
 of her round eyes. "Why didn't you send for me?" 
 
 "Well," said Lau, "the boy said it wasn't necessary; he 
 could help himself. There are the fifteen pence," and he 
 counted the midwife's fee on to the window-sill. 
 
 " That boy will be a good-for-nothing weathercock, I can 
 tell you that." 
 
 The big harbourmaster laughed in his fair beard and went 
 off. Then Rieke remembered that fifteen pence were owing 
 her from Stiena. She waited till Stiena came one day to 
 drink a cup of coffee with 'her, and then said, "The fifteen 
 pence, please." 
 
 Stiena swayed a little as if to some wonderful, festal music, 
 and said, with an acid sweetness, " I told you such a lovely 
 story while Lisa was dying. You don't get any money from 
 me. Look, I've got a new fringe made, and I've bought 
 new bonnet strings for myself." 
 
 From this time little Dusenschon was in Rieke's bad books,
 
 HOLYLAND 21 
 
 although the cards had foretold him good wealth and 
 honour. She told all her visitors he would come to nothing. 
 
 So the two children, the little Dusenschon and the little 
 Lau, grew up together and became friends. When they filled 
 the street with their noise Rieke Thomson would rise in 
 her big chair, and sometimes even get up heavily, open the 
 window, and shout to the little Lau boy, " You weather- 
 cock! " and to little Tjark Dusenschon, "You haven't even 
 paid your midwife's fee! " What could two little boys do? 
 What use was it for the harbourmaster to call to his boy 
 with his big, comfortable laugh, " Don't let yourself be put 
 upon, my boy! " or for Stiena to come to the door with flying 
 bonnet strings and cry out in a sweet voice, " Tj-ark, Tj-a- 
 a-rk, my sweet boy, come quickly to your granny." 
 
 Next door to the harbourmaster, and on the other side 
 from the long house, lived a smith called John Frederick 
 Buhmann. In Hilligenlei they called him Jeff for short. 
 He was a very big man with wild, uncombed hair and a 
 face black all over except for the yellow whites of his eyes 
 and his yellow teeth. His great, tall frame looked as if it 
 were falling to pieces, only held together by the big, stiff 
 apron of blackish-brown leather. He looked all right from 
 the front, but from behind quite dreadful, for the apron 
 did not meet, and he was, so to speak, without sidepieces, 
 nothing but a mass of loose, shabby trouser, and a thin strap 
 of worn-out leather hanging down from the apron. Everyone 
 knows what an elephant looks like from behind. 
 
 All the little street children were frightened of him, for as 
 they passed he used to crawl out of the smithy half-doubled 
 up, bellowing fearfully, and shake his great, black fist at 
 them. Really, he was not a bad fellow, but a fool, and a 
 childish fool at that, and lazy. 
 
 One day, when the two children were about six years old, 
 he enticed them into 'the smithy and became their friend and 
 protector against the fat woman. Many were the hours they 
 spent with him outside on the bench by the wall in sum- 
 mer, on the anvil by the hearth, often quite cold, in winter. 
 One day Tjark brought the postcard which had come to his 
 grandmother on the day of his birth. A long consultation 
 ensued. For hours the big smith rumpled his wild hair with 
 his big, sooty hands and pondered, holding the card up
 
 22 HOLYLAND 
 
 against the sunlight, to discover hidden writing or secret 
 signs. Then suddenly he would look up from the writing 
 to fix his wild, soot-circled eyes on Tj ark's face, searching 
 for a likeness to any well-known man in Hilligenlei. Then, 
 shaking his head, he would say, " You have no. idea of it, no 
 idea " 
 
 Little Tjark sat opposite him, gazing at him with big, 
 sparkling eyes till the profound brooding of the big, wild 
 smith went so to his heart that he burst into tears, where- 
 upon little Lau scolded and beat him, and thus Tjark grew 
 good at crying and Lau good at his fists. 
 
 But Hule Beiderwand, the old orderly on the Kiel and 
 Gottorp road, standing at the window of the long house, 
 looking at the two boys, soon saw that Tjark was not the 
 right one. He was indolent. So for a time he set his hopes 
 on Pe Ontjes Lau. The lad was well built, and carried 
 himself well. He was calm and self-reliant, and showed a 
 gift for ruling. One day, however, Max Wieber, the school- 
 master at the harbour school, told him that it was quite im- 
 possible to get twice two into Lau's head. So Hule gave up 
 this hope too. The man who was to redeem the whole land 
 from sloth and injustice and other imperfection must know 
 his elements. 
 
 So the old man turned away from the window back to the 
 "bedside of his brother. He had taken over the task of look- 
 ing after him from his parents when he was a young farmer 
 fifty years ago. From his youth up he had been lame, and 
 for the last thirty years confined to bed. Hule sat down by 
 his side and read aloud to him from the Bible and the hymn 
 book and Luther. He did not give up hope. He waited 
 for a young couple to come and live in the long house, or 
 perhaps for new life over there in the Friestadt school-house, 
 where a lonely old pair now lived, to send the well-known 
 light across the bay. For he thought to 'himself that up there 
 on the open dyke, face to face with the wide sea, now as light 
 as the sunshine, now as gloomy as fear itself, the child was 
 to be born.
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 WILLIAM BOJE, the new teacher, who came when the old 
 man died over at Friestadt on the dyke, knew nothing of 
 women. Once he had touched the hand of a friend's sister, 
 as if by mistake, just to know what it would feel like. 
 But then he was very young; he was twenty-four now. He 
 had looked forward eagerly to his first post, picturing to 
 himself with delight how, after school was over and he had 
 taken a walk along the dyke, he should read the glorious 
 books he had collected in his student days the story of 
 Odysseus, the soul-stirring dramas of Macbeth and Faust, 
 and Robinson Crusoe. These and a few others seemed to pic- 
 ture forth the whole drama of life as in a mirror. 
 
 By March he 'had not been four months in the big, empty 
 house when he fell in love. How it happened he did not 
 know. It was a time of happy misery. He would stand in 
 front of his bookcase and feel for a book, but though his 
 eyes remained fixed upon the pages, his thoughts were soon 
 far away. Suddenly a thrill of such intense rapture passed 
 through him that he had to put the book 'down, and, plung- 
 ing his hands in his fair hair, cry aloud for sheer happiness. 
 So joyful did the thought of her make him; so deep was his 
 love, though his eyes had never yet beheld her. 
 
 He would often go into the big front room and picture 
 her to himself living with him. There, against the wall, 
 would be the sofa ; there they would sit in the evenings while 
 he kissed her and held her in his arms. Out of the room 
 he went into the passage, and felt in the cupboard. ' There 
 her Sunday dress will hang." Then into the kitchen, where 
 he stood before the fire, to one side, so as not to be in her 
 way, and heard her scolding, saying she could not have any- 
 one watch her while she cooked. Then into the garden, 
 where he called her, 'but she did not answer, looked for her, 
 to find her at last hiding under the gooseberry bushes. When 
 
 23
 
 24 HOLYLAND 
 
 he scolded her for eating the unripe fruit she said she had not 
 eaten any, though the skins on the ground betrayed her. 
 " Oh, what a child you are ; what a funny, darling child ! " 
 In the evening, before going to bed, he went in to the empty 
 middle room, and love's longing pictured her standing by his 
 side. Her stately figure was full of youthful vigour; be- 
 neath the thick, hanging masses of her smooth, fair hair were 
 proud, elusive eyes that looked at him neither sweetly nor 
 kindly, but with a clear, intelligent gaze. Then, with a sud- 
 den movement, she lifted up her arms and put them round 
 his neck, all sweetness, and God's most beautiful creation 
 was revealed to his sight. So clear was her image in his soul, 
 though he knew not who she was. It was a time of happy 
 misery. 
 
 At last a day came when his restlessness seemed to reach 
 its height. All day long he thought of her, and in the eve- 
 ning he seemed to be leaning over her bed and saying, in an 
 affectionate tone he did not recognise as his own, " Darling, 
 the girl shall be Heinke and the boy Pete." 
 
 He grew afraid of his thoughts. " Never mind. Thank 
 Heaven I live in a world where girls are plentiful as black- 
 berries. I will search for my dream-girl and marry her." 
 
 The very next day he heard that there was a dance in 
 Hilligenlei, so when Harbourmaster Lau came over with his 
 boat he went back with him. 
 
 Among the young girls sitting round the hall as he entered 
 was one very like his dream-picture. Tall and stately, with 
 fair hair, as she rose for the dance her fresh young beauty 
 clad her like some royal garment. As she passed by him in 
 its course he saw in her beautiful, deep eyes the mingled 
 pride and shyness of an innocent soul, and he loved her more 
 and more. His soul went out to her, full of joyful love, 
 as he sat, lost in admiration of the beauty of her strong fig- 
 ure and her sweet, open face. 
 
 She happened to stop quite near him, and, turning her 
 eyes shyly to where the men were as she passed on her part- 
 ner's arm, met his, only to turn away with lowered head 
 as a dove before the hawk, thinking, " What a fine, tall man ; 
 and how he stares at me. If he would only dance with me! " 
 
 The dance in the hall was an informal affair, for young 
 Ringerang, the host, was nothing of a manager. There was
 
 HOLYLAND 25 
 
 a perfect rush when the music began, for all the young men 
 swarmed round the favourites. After two unsuccessful at- 
 tempts to reach her William 'had to content himself with 
 looking on. 
 
 She had watched him closely out of the corners of her 
 eyes. Now that she was dancing again confused thoughts 
 passed through her woman's mind. " I'll do it. No, I can't 
 do it. To-day, now, he is here, and I may never see him 
 again in my life. I am going to do it." Her shoe flew off 
 at his feet. " Oh," she cried, with a faint scream, " my shoe 
 is off." She turned to her partner. ' There is no good 
 thinking of dancing any more; the strap is broken." She 
 made him a low curtsey and he, being young and foolish, 
 went away. 
 
 " If you can't dance any more," said William, in a low, 
 choked voice, " come with me." 
 
 She laid her hand on his arm and said, softly, " Let's go 
 outside, not into the refreshment room." 
 
 " I will go on," he said, in a low tone, " come after me." 
 
 Delayed on the way by the crowd, when he came out of 
 doors into the shadow of the lofty chestnut trees he did not 
 immediately see her standing on the little bridge that led over 
 the castle moat into the park. The castle itself is no longer 
 there. 
 
 She laid her arm in his. " My father is here, in Hilli- 
 genlei. He will scold if he sees me! " 
 
 " Never mind that now," said he. 
 
 She laughed softly. "I'm not to talk about that?" 
 
 " No." 
 
 "What about, then?" 
 
 " Whether you like me a little." 
 
 She bent her head and said, hesitatingly, " Do you like me, 
 then?" 
 
 " Dear, I have never kissed anyone, never held anyone in 
 my arms. Love to me is serious." 
 
 Once more she bent her head and cast her eyes upon the 
 ground, saying, shyly, " Yes, to me, too, it is the most serious 
 thing in the world." 
 
 Then he stood still and took hold of her hand. " Only 
 look up, only look at me," he begged. 
 
 But she still kept her head bent, shy of showing a face
 
 26 HOLYLAND 
 
 which she knew confessed in its confusion love's sudden 
 coming. 
 
 The light, penetrating through the moving branches, played 
 upon her hair. He put his hand upon her forehead, bent back 
 her head, imploring, " Come to me," kissed her timidly, 
 kissed her again and again while she stood still with eyes cast 
 down. She nestled to his side, both hands on his arm, as she 
 walked on slowly by his side, her eyes once more upon the 
 ground. 
 
 "Does your father dislike your going to dances?" 
 
 " Yes ; he wants to keep us all at home, to save paying 
 wages. Our farm is heavily mortgaged. My eldest sister has 
 grown cold with age already." 
 
 He was furious. " That mustn't happen to you. You are 
 not to be an old maid, darling." 
 
 " I don't want to, indeed; but who wants me? " 
 
 " It all depends on whom you want ; that's what matters. 
 Do turn your eyes to me for once. Look up; look at me. 
 Ah, don't be afraid. There. Oh! what dear blue eyes they 
 are. Only tell me what he 'must look like, the man you 
 love?" 
 
 For a while she looked at him, without moving, with a 
 kind of friendly curiosity. Then, in shy surrender, she 
 raised her hands as if to put them on his shoulder. The 
 action still incomplete, she murmured, with an exquisite 
 embarrassment, " Something like you." 
 
 " Darling," he answered, stroking her hair. 
 
 As they stood thus, lost in gazing into each other's eyes, 
 a step came under the chestnut trees. A heavy, broad-shoul- 
 dered man, dressed like a workman, passed them, saying, in a 
 raucous voice, " You come home with me." 
 
 Without a word she left Boje and followed her father till 
 they disappeared down the avenue. 
 
 William walked back round the bay to Friestadt, home to 
 his empty house. The next day he thought, " What a confid- 
 ing darling she was with her dear little white face," and on 
 the second pictured to himself her living in his house, her 
 whom now he actually knew. He went through all the rooms 
 seeing her there. On the third day came a letter from her, 
 written in crooked letters how could such a clever girl 
 make such funny little letters, and in such a queer style,
 
 HOLYLAND 27 
 
 too ! " I am to marry my cousin from Krautstiel. He has 
 a little farm at the bottom of the dyke, and father says he 
 does not want a dowry, and if they yoke together they could 
 save two horses at ploughing times. My cousin is still quite 
 young, but his skin is like horn, and does not feel human at all. 
 I suppose I shall marry him though, for what am I to do? 
 I shall get away from father, at any rate. My window is 
 the last on the side facing the dyke, looking west, but what use 
 is that? The whole night long I think of the schoolmaster 
 from Friestadt, and I do so want to know if he still cares for 
 me." 
 
 In the evening, when it was dark, putting on a thick, winter 
 jacket, he went down to the beach, unfastened the crab-fisher- 
 man's boat, and rowed out into the bay. With the ebb tide 
 flowing hard in that direction, he hoped to reach Krautstiel 
 in an hour, returning in the morning with the incoming tide. 
 Getting into the current, and keeping his course by the Hilli- 
 genlei lights, he gripped the oars. His youthful thoughts and 
 the force of the stream impelled him on. When he looked up 
 again after a time that seemed to him much shorter than it 
 really was, instead of the herds of little white, lamb-like clouds, 
 a few single dark cows pastured reflectively on the wide meadow 
 of the sky. On his right the dyke, which had stood up in front 
 of him a clear dark line, had disappeared. This troubled him, 
 and he worked hard at his oars with the idea of getting back 
 to it. 
 
 A bitter wind rose, the direction of which he could not 
 discover. On every side nothing but the grey and black of the 
 waves, growing bigger and bigger as they rolled more quietly 
 past! Above, the sky was growing clearer. The cold was 
 intense. " She shall pay for this, yes, she shall," he said 
 to himself, as, angry and weary, he abandoned all hope of 
 reaching his goal, and resolved to keep himself warm until the 
 morning grey appeared, and avoid being driven too far out to 
 sea by rowing against the stream. Hardly was the idea con- 
 ceived when he became aware of a wonderfully clear light, 
 or a tower, it seemed, in front of him. The tower, too, in the 
 very heart of the raging sea, seemed to sway as its light, fiery 
 red, swung on high as on a mast. Open-eyed and open- 
 mouthed, he made straight for it one, two Good heav- 
 ens! It was the lightship the lightship that stood outside
 
 28 HOLYLAND 
 
 the bay. Was he so far out of his way? He rowed right up 
 to it, fastened his boat to a rope, and climbed on deck. 
 
 Two sailors were leaning over the taffrail. 
 
 " Hallo ! " said one of them. " Where have you sprung 
 from?" 
 
 " I am schoolmaster Boje from Friestadt. I lost my way 
 trying to get to Hilligenlei." 
 
 " That's not true," said the sailor. " You were on your 
 way to Krautstiel to see Hella Anderson!" 
 
 Boje stared with the deep-set, clever eyes sparkling in the 
 sailor's weather-beaten face. " How on earth do you know 
 that?" 
 
 " I am Thomas Jans. My wife wrote to me how Hella 
 danced out of her slipper. She knows her quite well, for she 
 has been in service up there at the farm." 
 
 " What was your wife doing at the dance with you on the 
 lightship?" 
 
 " Well, you see, we've got three children, so she earns a 
 bit. She's a chambermaid up at Ringerang's. Come, you're 
 simply frozen." 
 
 On the companion were the captain and lieutenant. They 
 shook their heads over Boje's story, and, after saying to Jans, 
 " You can take him ashore," troubled no further about him. 
 
 He sat down in the cabin, on the extreme edge of a sea-chest, 
 with the faint warmth of the little stove between his knees, his 
 teeth chattering, and his whole body trembling with cold. 
 " Have you been long on the lightship? " 
 
 ' Three years now," said Thomas. 
 
 " How on earth can you endure it? Three years away from 
 your wife! If it were a thousand miles away, perhaps; but 
 only two it must be the very devil." 
 
 " Yes, it is that; but what's to be done? " said the sailor. 
 
 " How do you mean ? " 
 
 " Well, look here. To begin with, there's very little work 
 going in Hflligenlei ; nothing at all in winter for ten or twelve 
 weeks ; the whole place goes to sleep, as you know. Well 
 well, you see in the first three years we had three girls right 
 off, so I thought, is it to go on like that? " 
 
 " So that's why you went on the lightship? " 
 
 "Just so." 
 
 "And these three years you haven't been near your wife?"
 
 HOLYLAND 29 
 
 " I've been over now and then every six weeks or so; but 
 I kept away from her, do you understand?" 
 
 " You're mad," said Boje, drawing the stove nearer, " quite 
 mad. You're not living at all." 
 
 " Yes," said Thomas, looking at Boje from under his clever, 
 deep-set eyes. " It's bad enough ; my life isn't worth living. 
 But look here. Suppose a boy came. The three girls are all 
 right. They are sure to marry, somehow; but if it were a 
 boy?" 
 
 " A boy? Be glad, man, be glad! " 
 
 " That's all very well, but what is to become of him ? 
 Look here. When I was a kid I always wanted to be learn- 
 ing. I never got enough of reading and learning. The school- 
 master said to my father, ' It's a pity the boy must go to the 
 fields,' but when I was ten I had to go. My learning then was 
 over just when it should have begun absolutely over. Well, 
 seven years ago, just after I came back from the army, I was 
 with Hargen Jansen, in Siiderwisch, you know, and his 
 brother, the parson, came to see him. I had to go about with 
 him all over the place, down to the sea, up to the inland vil- 
 lages, while he tried to find out all his childish haunts; and 
 in these three days, while I drove beside him in the cart, he 
 talked about everything in heaven and earth and learned folks' 
 ideas about it: about religion and the State, Parliament and 
 self-government, trade and industry and agriculture. But he 
 didn't give me any pleasure. When the three days came to 
 an end and I went back to the stables, and was alone again 
 in the evenings in the room beside the horses, I can tell you 
 I have never been so unhappy in my life, for that's how it is 
 and how it will always be. Do you understand ? A big, empty 
 house in one's head, no wall paper, no windows, no furniture, 
 no one living in it at all do you see what I mean ? Well, 
 girls can manage ; they don't demand so much ; but a boy 
 is he to go into that misery? is he to have that hideous, empty 
 house in his head all his life? Do you see? Well, then, you 
 know why I sit here on the lightship." 
 
 " Do you love your wife ? " said Boje. 
 
 " I should think so, the dear little woman." 
 
 Resting his head on both hands, he fell into a brown study. 
 
 Three sailors came into the cabin and sat down. One of 
 them cleaned his pipe while the other two looked on, saying
 
 30 HOLYLAND 
 
 nothing. Thomas raised his head, and, as if speaking his 
 thoughts aloud, said, " Carpenter, have you had a single happy 
 hour in your whole life? " 
 
 "I don't know," said the carpenter. "Quite happy? no, 
 I don't think so perhaps when I was quite a boy." 
 ' Think," said Thomas. 
 
 " Man, you're as curious as a child," said the carpenter, 
 working at his pipe. "Quite happy? I don't know yes 
 six or seven years ago, after the war, I went to London on a 
 merchant steamer. On the way we had a strange experience. 
 There was a passenger on board, a little man, whose face 
 seemed to me a bit Jewish. One evening, when I was off duty, 
 we had got into a regular nor'wester, and he came down to 
 our quarters. Bob Stevens had just opened the Bible, so I 
 suppose it was Sunday. Well, the fellow came, sat down, 
 and, seeing the book, struck it with his hand I can see him 
 now saying, ' That's the best book in the world, but it's 
 to blame for most of the poverty and stupidity there is in it.' 
 Yes, that's what he said, as near as possible." 
 
 Thomas Jans had lifted up his heavy head, and his eyes were 
 fixed on the old carpenter's hairy face. " Go on." 
 
 ' The rich and the parsons,' said the Jew, ' throw sand in 
 our eyes, and they get their sand from the Bible.' Yes, that's 
 what he said, just that." 
 
 Thomas stared at Boje. "Well, schoolmaster?" 
 
 "A socialist," said Boje. " I've heard of them; a socialist. 
 But that doesn't help me to get to Krautstiel." 
 
 " Go on." 
 
 "Well, what else did he say? Everything was to be 
 changed, everything, and soon, too." 
 
 " I don't understand," began Thomas. 
 
 " Think, man ; all equal that's what he said all equal. 
 Now, because one rich man has a big field and a big wood the 
 poor men have to shiver in the streets with their children, or 
 live crowded together in a slum where the sun never shines. 
 Because one rich man has magnificent clothes, travels all over 
 the world, buys his children every book they want, ten poor 
 men and their children are oppressed and ignorant all their 
 lives. All that is to be changed, he said. The day is over when 
 the nobleman's child rode in front and the workman's child 
 crawled behind. Let both sit on the horse and see which can
 
 HOLYLAND 31 
 
 ride, which falls off, do you see? so that the best men can help 
 the people on. See? That's what he said." 
 
 Thomas Jans had got up on to his feet. " So that's what he 
 said," he asked, slowly; " and there are people who believe it? " 
 
 " Yes," he said, " thousands in Hamburg and Berlin ; mem- 
 bers of the Reichstag, too." 
 
 " What was that about the children? " said Jans, staring at 
 him. " Those who have something in their heads are to go up, 
 that's it?" 
 
 " Yes, that's what he said." 
 
 " Then," said Thomas, " that's it all right. Yes, by Heaven, 
 I will I will leave the lightship and risk it. Come on, 
 schoolmaster. I'll take you to Krautstiel and go to Hilligenlei 
 from there." 
 
 The carpenter wiped his mouth and looked at the others. 
 "Risk it, will he? Risk what?" 
 
 They shook their heads. The carpenter went on : " There 
 was once a young fellow on the lightship just like that. He 
 got quieter and quieter, and used to stare across at the Blue- 
 sand buoy stare for hours. Suddenly one evening he said 
 to me, 'Carpenter, isn't that my wife?' He actually thought 
 that the buoy, a great long thing at least fifteen yards high, 
 was his wife ! So I had to bring him on shore ; a young man's 
 no good on a lightship. Jans is gone quite silly. Going to risk 
 it? What on earth's he going to risk? " 
 
 Meantime the other two had got over the side and were 
 rowing hard, thoroughly soaked meantime by a cold rain that 
 had come on hard and wet them through by the time they got 
 into Krautstiel an hour later. Silent and frozen, they walked 
 along the dyke against the biting wind until Jans said, " That's 
 the farm. Do you see? There, under those dark poplars," 
 shouting after him as he turned aside without a word. 
 
 " Hpld hard, or the old fellow won't give up his girl." 
 
 To which Boje replied, without turning round, " Mind your 
 own business, and I'll look after mine." 
 
 Coming down to the thatched roof, before he had had time 
 to distinguish the separate windows, he saw Hella Anderson 
 sitting in the window-ledge. She put her arm round him, 
 then shrank back. " Oh, how wet you are, and frozen with 
 cold. Come quickly inside, you dear, dear thing. You must 
 get into my warm bed ; you're simply perishing with cold."
 
 32 HOLYLAND 
 
 He got in at the window. " My darling," he said, holding 
 her fast in his arms. " Tell me, must you marry your cousin, 
 with his horny skin, to save your father two horses?" 
 
 Clinging fast to him, she nodded. " Darling, don't desert 
 me." 
 
 " Desert you? I desert you? Oh, how beautiful you are! " 
 
 So he came to her for six weeks, and then she had to tell 
 her father. 
 
 When the time came a little boy was born in the long house 
 at Hilligenlei. When Rieke Thomson took him up to wash 
 him she turned to his mother and said, in a frightened voice, 
 " Look in the middle of his breast ; he's got a flaming red 
 mark, as big and round as a four-shilling piece. What on earth 
 is it?" 
 
 Thomas Jans bent over his weary little wife. " Didst hear, 
 Mala?" 
 
 She felt for his hand and said : " All the three years that 
 you were away, especially at night, when I lay in bed and 
 couldn't go to sleep, I used to see the lightship in my mind's 
 eye, and the light was always as big and round as a four- 
 shilling piece." 
 
 About midnight, when Rieke had looked after the infant 
 and put it in its mother's arms, old Hule Beiderwand, who 
 had been watching by his brother's dying bed, knocked at the 
 window to say that the light was shining opposite. So off 
 went Rieke, just as she was, to help Hella with her first child 
 a plump girl with yellow hair like her own that lay all over 
 the pillow. Her husband pressed her hand so hard that she 
 had to beg him to take care, so deeply did he rejoice in the 
 child that his dear, lovely, passionate wife had given him. 
 
 And so the two children grew up. The little Jans boy grew 
 up, in the long house at Hilligenlei, a delicate boy, but not 
 really weak, seldom seeing his parents. His mother worked at 
 Ringerangs', and his father stood by the edge of the sea, dig- 
 ging. When they went away he was still asleep; when they 
 came back he was in bed. Only on Sundays he sat on her lap, 
 or stood between her knees; and soon a time came when he 
 caught hold of his mother's dress and followed her all over the 
 big house to the last door. 
 
 There sat a huge, round woman. Everything about her
 
 HOLYLAND 33 
 
 seemed round, especially her eyes. She drank coffee with 
 brown sugar, and gave him a lump, saying to his mother, " Ex- 
 traordinary eyes that boy has; always wondering. I like the 
 boy, all but those eyes of his. What in the world is there to 
 wonder at? I'll see if the cards have anything to say." 
 
 All that the cards said was that there was not much money, 
 and, as little Mala Jans said proudly, " Happiness did not de- 
 pend on that." 
 
 Sometimes he would put his little hand inside his father's 
 big, hard one and go next door into Hule Beiderwand's room. 
 He gave him a bit of bread and butter and an old Bible story- 
 book with astonishing pictures, and while he sat kneeling on a 
 chair at the window with the book on the ledge talking to the 
 pictures Thomas Jans spoke of his hopes that the new Labour 
 party would make the world holy, and so realize their old faith. 
 
 But the old man had become reserved, and said, obstinately, 
 " No ; a man must live here in the bay, here on the dyke, and 
 make a Hilligenlei, a Holyland, out of this place with the 
 power of his might: that is our faith." 
 
 He called the child in his high, hollow voice and looked 
 at him with his darkened eyes, saying, " No; this is not the 
 one; his eyes are timid; he is afraid," and he almost pushed the 
 boy away.
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 ONE day, when he was seven years old, his mother said 
 she wanted to take him across the bay. In the house he could 
 just see in the distance, on the dyke, there lived a little girl 
 who was just his age. With observant eyes full of a some- 
 what uneasy wonder he followed his mother down to the pier, 
 clutching, as usual, tightly hold of her skirt. 
 
 A fresh breeze came to meet them. On the pier was Pe 
 Ontjes Lau, and he had on a woollen cap and wooden shoes, 
 such as no one else wore in the whole bay. 
 
 One day a smack from Jutland had been driven into Hilli- 
 genlei by a westerly gale, and for three days it lay off the 
 pier. For a whole day Pe Ontjes and the Jutlander had sat 
 opposite to one another without speaking or moving, the Jut- 
 lander in his woollen cap and wooden shoes on the hatchway, 
 Pe Ontjes on land, on top of a post, both with their hands up 
 to the elbows in their trousers pockets. The next day Pe 
 Ontjes began to bargain. They got on quite well with low 
 German and low Danish and their ringers to help them out. 
 With his teeth set hard, Pe Ontjes paid sixteen good pence 
 into the Jutlander's horny yellow hand. Half a year later 
 the woollen cap and the wooden shoes came safely to hand, not 
 nicely wrapped up, by post, but handed from smack to smack 
 from Jutland right across to Hamburg, and so over to Hilli- 
 genlei, with this address, no more, " On the pier at Hilligenlei 
 is a twelve-year-old boy; these are his." 
 
 From that hour he had worn the costume whenever there 
 was a cold wind, putting it on as soon as he came out of school, 
 and on the understanding that there were to be no jeers. 
 
 He was standing now on the bridge, his legs wide apart, 
 munching a big piece of black bread, spread with roast potato. 
 To keep the potato from blowing away he had stuck it to the 
 bread with black syrup. He looked at his shy little neighbour, 
 clinging fast to his mother, up and down with a calm and fath- 
 erly air, and asked, "What are you going to be?" 
 
 34
 
 HOLYLAND 35 
 
 The little fellow looked at him sharply out of his deep blue 
 eyes. "What are you going to be?" 
 
 Pe Ontjes was astonished, and began to feel a certain respect 
 for Kai. " I am going to sea, of course. In four years I shall 
 be done with school, and then I am going to South America." 
 
 " You haven't chosen a very fine day," said the harbour- 
 master to Mala Jans. " The wind is getting round to the 
 north." 
 
 " You must stick close to the Danish coast, father," said he 
 of the woollen cap. ' Then you can get back easily." 
 
 " Yes," said Lau, reflectively, " but then it will be late and 
 cold and dark, not for little boys." 
 
 They embarked and made a good start. Pe Ontjes stood 
 on the bank, looking after them. 
 
 " You treat your boy as if he were thirty," said little Mala, 
 in a captious tone. 
 
 " Yes," said Lau, " as usual, you are right. My father was 
 a day labourer in Eierstadt. In my youth I didn't learn read- 
 ing or writing. Then I went to sea and went all over the 
 world, but all the time I cared for nothing but eating and 
 drinking. I often seemed to hear a smothered voice within 
 me saying, 'Bestir yourself, man; rise a little in the world.' 
 But I only began to wake up when I was about forty. Then 
 I looked about me and learnt a few things, passed the short- 
 distance certificate, and so got the post of harbourmaster here. 
 And I can't get any further. That's why, you see, I'm glad 
 of every question that Pe Ontjes asks, and why I talk as se- 
 riously to him as to someone of my own age. He's naturally 
 rather a sluggard and no hero at his books, just like I used to 
 be, but you'll see that having a really sensible friend will make 
 things easier for him, and he'll get on better than I have." 
 
 When Mala Jans, holding her little boy by the hand, came 
 into the clean hall of the schoolhouse and found no one there 
 she blushed shamefacedly, and was going to slip quietly out of 
 the door when she heard a voice from the inner room, " Is 
 that Mala? Come in here, I can't get up." 
 
 So the two went on tiptoe through the hall and the kitchen, 
 and found Hella Boje on a chair by the window in a loose, 
 open garment with a new-born babe at her breast, the clear 
 sunshine falling on the charming picture. 
 
 Mala clasped her hands. "Oh! I had no idea!"
 
 36 HOLYLAND 
 
 Hella laughed. " I thought you did not know, and I was 
 looking forward to your astonishment. A big girl, isn't she? 
 Number three already ! " 
 
 It was Wednesday afternoon, and in came the teacher fresh 
 from his books. In his beautiful, steel-grey eyes and in his 
 joyful bearing was something of the reflected glory of great 
 and strange times and extraordinary events. He called the 
 little boy to him, and, holding back his head, said to his wife, 
 " What a real old German he looks. Like one of Siegfried's 
 men, one of the peasants, not the noblemen. I wager he will 
 be a dreamer, like his father." As he said this the night on the 
 fireship came into his mind. " Yes, I will risk it," and he 
 laughed. 
 
 " But where are your two eldest? " said Mala. " Not ill, 
 I hope?" 
 
 "They ill! " said Boje, and, getting up, he led the little 
 boy through the kitchen, and, opening the outer door, pointed 
 out two children, a boy and girl, lying in the long grass at the 
 edge of the pond, so that only their fair heads were visible 
 above it. They looked sharply at the newcomer out of their 
 grey eyes. 
 
 ' This is little Kai Jans. Make friends, or you shall be 
 smacked." And with this Boje returned to his books. Kai 
 remained standing at the kitchen door; the other two lay face 
 downwards on the grass, with outstretched necks. 
 
 " There's a scarecrow," said Anna to Pete. 
 
 " Yes, isn't he ? that's a real workman's boy. Look at his 
 boots; not made for him. Mother might have told us." 
 
 " We have no use for you just now," said Anna, " but I 
 shall soon quarrel with Pete, and then I'll play with you ; until 
 then you can stay there and look on." 
 
 Kai was not surprised by this treatment. They seemed so 
 grand, and all their surroundings too. They were engaged in 
 weaving a peaked cap by plaiting rushes. As both were work- 
 ing at the same piece a quarrel soon arose. " You're no good," 
 said Pete; " leave it to me." 
 
 " The cap isn't only for you," said Anna, getting annoyed. 
 
 " It's all one to me," said Pete. " Leave off, or I'll smack 
 you," suiting the action to the word. 
 
 Anna retreated, her eyes on the cap. Anger visibly rose 
 and then died down in the determined little face. As she
 
 HOLYLAND 37 
 
 looked up her eyes fell on Kai, and she said to her brother, 
 " Let's beat him to bits! What else is he good for? " 
 
 But Pete, remembering his father's warning, said, " No, we 
 won't beat him ; we'll frighten him." 
 
 Suddenly jumping up they made a dash upon him like prac- 
 tised highwaymen, and dragged him to the pond. " We're 
 going to duck you in the pond," said Pete; "that's what we 
 do with Hilligenlei boys." 
 
 " Hundreds are there already," said Anna. 
 
 He did not scream, only looked at them curiously. Pete 
 held on to his jacket; Anna, lying full length on the grass, had 
 his ankles fast. 
 
 " Tell us a story, or into the pond you go." 
 
 "About Pe Ontjes Lau?" he said, quickly. 
 
 " We know him, a hateful boy." 
 
 " He's as big again as I am," Kai went on, " and stands on 
 the pier, looking over the water, with a woollen cap on, and 
 he's going to be a captain. Then he'll go far, far away, 
 and " 
 
 " He doesn't know any more," said Pete. 
 
 " And I shall go with him far away. There are lions and 
 elephants, and I shall be a king there. Yes." 
 
 Anna brushed her fair hair back from her forehead and 
 looked at him with more interest. 
 
 The boy got hot and excited, twittering with big, wonder- 
 ing eyes like a young lark who uses its wings for the first time 
 when it has been frightened out of its nest in the furrow by 
 a weasel, and as soon as it sees that it can fly forgets all its 
 fear in the joy of this wonderful new power. 
 
 " There I build a house for myself that reaches up to the 
 sky, all made of gold, and in it there live my father and mother, 
 and Pe Ontjes Lau, and all the other people in the world, and 
 do nothing but laugh and sing and enjoy themselves. Nobody 
 has a cough there. Nobody dies. Will you come too? " 
 
 His clever east-country face was irradiated with kindness. 
 
 The girl pulled his foot so that he fell down, and, picking 
 up the badly plaited rush hat, crammed it on his head. 
 ' There's a crown for you," she said. 
 
 He did not mind. " If you like you may come too," he said, 
 his eyes sparkling with kindness. "Would you like it?" 
 
 " Me, too," said Pete, standing up. He saw that more tre-
 
 38 HOLYLAND 
 
 mendous thoughts were coming to the fair-headed boy with 
 the quick eyes. Looking wildly round like someone suddenly 
 awakened, he jumped up and ran through the kitchen into the 
 sitting-room, the other two after him. 
 
 " We have been quite good," he said at once in a loud 
 voice. 
 
 " He wants to be a king," said Anna. " That's his crown." 
 
 The teacher took his children by the fair hair and said, 
 " And what do you want to be ? " 
 
 " Oh, you know," said she, " we want to be neighbour Mar- 
 tin ; have as many horses and cows as he has." 
 
 "Suppose I haven't any money?" 
 
 " That doesn't matter," said Anna, " if we must be neigh- 
 bour Martin ! " 
 
 "Who says that you must?" said Boje, in an almost irri- 
 tated voice. 
 
 " God says so," they both replied. 
 
 " Get away," he said, angrily. " You always end up with 
 that. You make God the servant of your own wills." 
 
 He turned them both out. As they stood in the doorway 
 the sun fell on the fair, defiant heads, and their hair shone like 
 the wood of a new-cut ash-tree. 
 
 " The children are a great trouble to us, Mala," said Hella. 
 " They are dear, good children, but so impetuous, so quick 
 to anger, full of such ideas! If we were people of consequence 
 and well off they might do great things, but we are poor, even 
 in debt. If they rush out into life, out of such narrow sur- 
 roundings, full of this wild eagerness, they will dash them- 
 selves against fearful obstacles ; they will find the way hard and 
 a cold wind blowing against them; they will make themselves 
 hot with running, and then they will fall. Boje and I were 
 just the same, with our heads full of lofty ideas. What won- 
 derful things I used to see in my little room on the dyke ! Well, 
 the greatest wonder of all came true for us; we saw and be- 
 longed to one another, and so we are quiet and contented. 
 But can such good fortune fall to our children ? " 
 
 Little Mala Jans looked shyly from one to the other and 
 thought, " What have six short years made of the two young 
 things who pressed each other's hands secretly at Ringerang's 
 party, thinking of nothing but possessing one another! " 
 
 She got up and said she must go, or Harbourmaster Lau
 
 HOLYLAND 39 
 
 would be waiting for her, and there was supper to be got ready. 
 She said goodbye, and left the house with her boy. 
 
 When Thomas Jans came home at night with his spade 
 and heard of the trouble they had at the schoolhouse from the 
 masterfulness of the children, his deep-set eyes sparkled as he 
 sat looking thoughtfully at the table, and he said, in joke, 
 "Then we need have no trouble; our boy is as meek as a 
 whipped cur! " 
 
 Mala Jans flew out at that. " You have no eyes and ears 
 then," said she, and went on to tell him, in a shy, trembling 
 voice, of her boy's inner life, and how he had said he wanted 
 to be a king. " He is every bit as proud, only in a different 
 way, as the Boje children. His pride is deep, deep down. His 
 is a different sort of kingdom." 
 
 "What sort?" said Thomas, astonished. "What sort of 
 one? One in the moon, perhaps." 
 
 The next day he picked up courage for the first time to go 
 into the middle of the street and peer into the dark smithy, 
 where conversation reigned for once instead of the clang of 
 the hammer and the roar of the furnace. Pe Ontjes Lau saw 
 him come out, and said, " Come inside." So he went in and 
 looked about him. On the anvil sat Jeff, huge and black in 
 his messy leather apron, with his hammer tucked away com- 
 fortably under his arm. Scheinhold, the journeyman, stood at 
 the bellows. All three were looking at Tjark Dusenschon, 
 who sat on the lathe dangling his legs and moving his bare 
 feet up and down. 
 
 " Why shouldn't I wear the green handkerchief if the mayor 
 gave it to me? " said Tjark. 
 
 " It's not true," said Pe Ontjes. ' The money came from 
 his grandmother. Listen to his 'mayor'; how he says it! 
 Call him Daniel Peters; all Hilligenlei calls him so, silly." 
 
 "The mayor gave it you, did he?" said Jeff, raising his 
 eyebrows. " So, so " his stiff apron made a noise like the 
 falling-in of a mine when he moved "so; then I must re- 
 turn to my old opinion, anyhow." 
 
 "What opinion, sir?" asked Scheinhold, blinking as if some 
 buzzing insect had got inside his eyes. 
 
 " Shut up," said Jeff. " I'm not talking to you. My old 
 opinion is that Tjark Dusenschon is the mayor's natural son,
 
 40 HOLYLAND 
 
 so now you know. If we only had the postcard. It was wrong 
 of you, Pe Ontjes, to throw it into the harbour." 
 
 Pe Ontjes nodded slowly. " Go on, go on. He is half- 
 cracked already. You'll drive him stark mad." 
 
 Tjark was happy at being once more the subject of conver- 
 sation, and he turned about, dangling his wide trousers and 
 turning back his big toes in a way that terrified little Kai 
 Jans. 
 
 " Look at his legs," said Jeff. " Whose legs are like that, 
 as straight as a lance? The mayor's, of course; and who else 
 is so arrogant ? " 
 
 The journeyman, Scheinhold, rubbed his eyes and said, " It 
 may be because of his royal blood." 
 
 Pe Ontjes got up to go. " This drivel is too much for me. 
 What is he ? A child born out of wedlock, whose grandmother 
 is an old idiot, and whom Rieke Thomson scolds daily for 
 never having paid her fifteen pence, that's what he is." 
 
 " Yes," said Jeff, creaking his leather apron. " I grant you 
 the present is dark, but a star of hope is shining." 
 
 " Well," said Pe Ontjes, " are you thinking of paying the fif- 
 teen pence for him ? " 
 
 The master sadly shook his head. " I can't. You know 
 that. I have a wife and children, and debts to pay. But you're 
 right. As long as the midwife's fee isn't paid he cuts a sorry 
 figure. To put it properly, he isn't a citizen." 
 
 " Every day the fat old witch scolds me," said Tjark, look- 
 ing about with his shining brown eyes. " I'm no good while 
 that goes on." 
 
 " You could have paid the fifteen pence yourself long ago 
 if you had wanted to," said Pe Ontjes. " A boy of fifteen can 
 earn fifteen pence, but you must go and buy a green handker- 
 chief, or else a striped blue or red cap off a boy at the gram- 
 mar school, or something stupid of that sort." 
 
 " Suppose I am the mayor's son," said Tjark, his eyes spark- 
 ling. " I can't go about the town like every Tom, Dick, and 
 Harry." 
 
 "Right again," said Jeff. 
 
 Pe Ontjes got up and made for the door once more. " I 
 won't have anything more to do with you," he said ; " you are 
 cracked, all three of you. Come away, Kai," and he went 
 towards his home. After a few steps, however, he came to a
 
 HOLYLAND 41 
 
 standstill, stood for a moment lost in thought, and then, in a 
 decided voice, " Yes, that is the best way. I will clear the 
 business right out, Tjark." 
 
 Tjark leapt out of the smithy, barelegged and speechless. 
 " I cannot go on any longer hearing the endless cursing and 
 complaining about your old fee. It's gone on for years. I 
 mean to make an end of it." 
 
 " I shall be grateful to you for ever," said Tjark. 
 
 " Don't be anything of the sort, silly. Grateful ? Is a man 
 grateful? Grateful is the word you hear in school, but a 
 healthy man isn't grateful." 
 
 He felt in his purse, and then struck across the dyke with 
 the two others to the long house. Then he said to Kai Jans, 
 " Just run in and see if she is in her big chair and if she's got 
 her foot-warmer, and if she's thinking, and if she's got her 
 slippers handy for throwing. Say something and just shove the 
 slippers a bit out of the way, then come back and leave the 
 door open." 
 
 The little fellow went in, came out again, and said, in a 
 low voice, " It's all right." 
 
 Then Pe Ontjes drew a deep breath, rushed into the room, 
 and, raising his clenched fist, almost drove the fifteen pence 
 into the board. " There are the fifteen pence that Tjark 
 Dusenschon owes you, and now let your confounded cursing 
 be at an end." 
 
 The old woman had leant back in horror. Then, appearing 
 on the threshold, " You weathercock," from the distance Tjark 
 cried out in an injured tone, " you are to say no more of that 
 now!" 
 
 "What?" cried the old woman. "Say no more about it? 
 For a vagabond like you other people have to pay your fee 
 for you. Is that Kai Jans with you? H'm, he's beginning 
 early. He'll come to no good. Just come in here, you vaga- 
 bond." 
 
 Pe Ontjes shook his head, and said, dejectedly, " The fifteen 
 pence are thrown away." Then suddenly his anger rose. 
 Drumming on his legs with both fists, he shouted, " Never 
 again will I bother about that wretched Tjark Dusenschon. 
 Where is he gone?" 
 
 Sniffing danger, he had fled to his grandmother's door.
 
 42 HOLYLAND 
 
 Stiena Dusenschon stood there with waving bonnet strings. 
 " Tj-a-ark, Tjark, come to your granny." 
 
 " I will tell you something," said Pe Ontjes to Kai. " In 
 the future I shall only have to do with you." 
 
 The little fellow looked happily up at him. " Yes ; then you 
 must promise to take me with you when you are a captain." 
 
 " You are a funny one," said Pe Ontjes. "And where do 
 you want to go to? " 
 
 "Ah! that you shall see," he said, earnestly. "Do you 
 know, we shall go to oh ! to a glorious country," and in his 
 eagerness he stamped - on the ground. 
 
 " Done, then," said Pe Ontjes, clapping him on the shoulder. 
 He began to be fond of the little fellow, and took him about 
 with him everywhere. And the little fellow grew strong in his 
 company.
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 THE teacher at the harbour school had to be a very conscien- 
 tious man, for the school hours were arranged to fit the tides 
 so that the children of the sailors and fishermen could help 
 their parents ; strong, too, for the boys used to come, some bare- 
 footed, some in clattering slippers, some in heavy boots; they 
 came in leather breeches and shirt-sleeves; their voices were 
 loud and unmodulated ; their skulls were somewhat thick. 
 
 It was a hot summer afternoon. The boys lay, in their 
 shirt-sleeves, lazily spread-eagled on the desks, pretending to 
 be entirely absorbed in the writing-lesson; the girls lifted their 
 books from time to time and fanned themselves. Max Wieber, 
 likewise in his shirt-sleeves, sat stolidly behind his desk, leaning 
 his bullet head, surrounded by fiery-red hair, against the black- 
 board on the wall behind him. It was a constant temptation 
 to think of tea to be enjoyed with his wife when school was 
 over, under the lime tree, but he wrestled with the temptation, 
 conquering it each time with a new text. " Work while it is 
 yet day," he murmured, slightly bending his big head and tak- 
 ing up the red pencil and a new exercise book. 
 
 After a while his wife's face appeared on the green at the 
 end of the passage. " It's so hot," she said. 
 
 " Let not a woman speak in the assembly," he whispered 
 quickly, shaking his mane, and this temptation was over in its 
 turn. 
 
 Then up got Pe Ontjes, first on the boys' side, and said, in 
 his hoarse, manly voice, " We were to get back our exercises 
 to-day." Not that Pe Ontjes was in the least curious to see 
 his own exercise; he merely wanted to put some life into the 
 proceedings. 
 
 Max Wieber had an unconscious inclination to do whatever 
 Pe Ontjes proposed with his calm, self-confident air. He took 
 the great pile of blue exercise books and said, in his droning 
 voice, " The subject was ' The Story of a Drop of Water.' I 
 
 43
 
 44 HOLYLAND 
 
 said that the drop of water was to come in with the tide, and 
 then relate all that it saw in the bay of Helligenlei ; then, evap- 
 orating in the harbour, it was to rise up in mist, to fall down 
 again as a drop of rain, and flow down the street into the sea 
 once more. In your work you were to show, you vagabonds, 
 your understanding of how clouds and rain come to be. Well, 
 here is Kai Jans' exercise Kai Jans there is something very 
 peculiar in that boy. Sometimes he is the cleverest in the school, 
 and sometimes far the stupidest. If you ask him about the 
 moon he knows what sort of men live there and how they get 
 their boots soled ; but stick his nose into a thorn-bush, and he 
 doesn't know what it is. Pe Ontjes, stop laughing in that 
 stupid way." 
 
 Max Wieber picked up his eyeglasses from the desk with 
 two sharp fingers, put them on his nose, and picked up the 
 exercise to read it out. Then Kai Jans got up, in the third 
 row, anxious entreaty in his eyes. 
 
 " What do you want ? " 
 
 He opened his mouth, but sat down without saying any- 
 thing. 
 
 " Well, the raindrop rises from the harbour in mist. ' But 
 now a tremendous west wind rose. It drove the cloud, where 
 the drop was, thousands of miles eastward, and when it was 
 over St. Petersburg it saw the Emperor of Russia driving with 
 his wife in a coach of gold, driving as fast as the cloud, ever 
 eastwards. So they came to Siberia. And there the raindrop 
 saw the Emperor set all the prisoners free. And it fell straight 
 into the well from which the Chinese Emperor has his water 
 drawn. Then his servant-maid came and took the drop" out of 
 the well in her pail, and dipped a cup into the pail, and gave 
 it to the Emperor to drink. And so he drank up the drop. He 
 had been a wicked man, but now he became good, for the drop, 
 which came from the holy bay, was holy.' " 
 
 Most of them sniggered. A few of the girls looked with 
 wondering eyes across to Kai, whose brown hair covered such 
 marvellous things. 
 
 " Stop laughing in that stupid way. Kai Jans is a wonderful 
 boy yes. Generally, he's as shy as a little hare; then, hey, 
 presto! he's a great, wild thing, strikes behind him and in 
 front of him, and has all Paradise at his disposal all Para-
 
 HOLYLAND 45 
 
 disc, indeed ! Next time you'll confine your thoughts to Hilli- 
 genlei, do you hear? " 
 
 He laid the exercise down and took up another. 
 " Well, Kai Jans at least stuck to the drop of water. But 
 Pe Ontjes Lau Pe Ontjes Lau! You imagine Pe Ontjes 
 Lau is head boy in the Hilligenlei harbour school? He's far 
 more than that; he's harbourmaster of Hilligenlei, and, more 
 than that, he's mayor of Hilligenlei. Well, his drop of water 
 comes swimming into the bay with the tide all right. Then he 
 becomes too preposterous. He uses words that I know well 
 enough. You and your father, you vagabond, have done the 
 exercise together. ' Then the drop of water saw that the har- 
 bour stream got narrower and narrower, so that a decent-sized 
 cutter could not possibly come though. Klaus Voss' Joanna 
 was stuck for two tides off the Danish sandbank, and could not 
 stir. It is a fearful piece of stupidity for a town to allow its 
 harbour to be choked ; it's like tying a string round a pig's nose 
 when you want to fatten it; it gets thinner and thinner, till 
 it is like two boards fastened together, and finally dies. Thus 
 you see Hilligenlei getting poorer and stupider every day.' I 
 haven't the least objection to Pe Ontjes Lau having the har- 
 bour stream cut out when he is once mayor, but I shall give 
 him a good spanking for talking as big as if he were mayor 
 when he isn't anything of the sort, yet. Now we will have a 
 short interval." 
 
 With these words Max walked serenely down the middle 
 passage out of the schoolroom, to have a chat with his wife. 
 
 Turning round on his form, Pe Ontjes found the eyes of all 
 the bigger boys upon him. " Children," said he, " let come 
 what may, I am not going to give the old fellow the pleasure 
 of walloping me to-day; I'm off. Tide's low at four. Who's 
 coming? " 
 
 ' That means an awful thrashing," they said. 
 
 ' Who's coming? " said Pe Ontjes. 
 
 1 Me," said Kai Jans. 
 
 'You?" 
 
 ' He read out my exercise; that's why I'm coming." 
 
 Five went with him. There were the Tarns, the fisherman's 
 two boys (one of them died young, as a sailor, in a fearful 
 wreck; the other is now a fisherman on Lake Ontario) ; the 
 shepherd's two boys (both of whom afterwards served on the
 
 46 HOLYLAND 
 
 Russian frontier, and are now dock labourers, as strong as 
 ever, and as ready for any sort of spree), and Kai Jans. Tjark 
 Dusenschon had slunk out, and watched them disappear from 
 behind the shed. 
 
 They made their way through the garden into the street, 
 crossed the dyke, and so ran over the green plain a wide, 
 absolutely level plain covered with beautiful short grass. Not 
 a house or a tree anywhere, only here and there a herd of heavy 
 cattle or a group of splendid colts. Across it the little band of 
 children trotted. In the distance, at thd edge, from time to 
 time a solitary flash from a workman's spade. Overhead the 
 sky, endlessly high, endlessly broad. 
 
 They soon got to the edge of the green plain, and then in 
 they went, over their ankles, up to their knees, in the grey mud. 
 There was a great deal of groaning, complaining, and bragging, 
 and then out they came on to firm ground once more that 
 seemed to extend right to the far, far distant horizon, where 
 a narrow strip of silver lay. 
 
 They talked about everything they saw the bird that flew 
 past, the sail on the horizon, the Danish sandbank, where the 
 treasure ship lay buried that would some day be discovered, 
 for the sand was breaking away. " And then Hilligenlei will 
 be ever so rich." 
 
 " Nonsense," said Pe Ontjes. " It's true there is a Danish 
 ship, but there's no gold in it; nothing but wood." 
 
 When they saw anything in the distance each of them said 
 what he thought it was. They examined everything they found 
 a plank end, a broken chest, a basket that the steward of 
 the liner had cast overboard and there was eager conversa- 
 tion about it all. It seemed endless, the way, but at last they 
 got to the harbour stream. The tide was out, but it was still 
 sixty yards wide, flowing slowly down to the sea in its bed of 
 grey mud. 
 
 The others beean to search in the shelving edge of the sand 
 on the chance that the prow of the treasure ship or its taffrail 
 might be sticking out. Pe Ontjes and Kai were gazing at a 
 short, green strip on the water to the far side of the stream, 
 and the others soon looked over too. 
 
 " Look! " they said; " a little island." 
 
 " Kai Jans discovered it last Sunday," said Pe Ontjes. " He 
 Stuck up a stake and wrote on it, ' This land was discovered by
 
 HOLYLAND 47 
 
 me,' and then his name. The stake is still there, but the bit 
 of wood you wrote on is gone, Kai! " 
 
 At that moment a shout of childish joy came clearly across. 
 All gazed in astonishment. Pe Ontjes began to yell, " Coo-ee, 
 coo-ee." 
 
 Up rose two fair-haired children, about ten years old, both 
 bare-footed, the girl in a sleeveless dress that fluttered in the 
 wind, the boy in his shirt and knickers. 
 
 '* There are Anna and Pete Boje," said Kai. 
 
 " Ha! " cried Pe Ontjes, " what are you doing there? Will 
 you get out of there ? Kai Jans has discovered the island ! " 
 
 Then Pete cried across in his high, clear voice, " I have 
 taken possession ! " 
 
 " Golly! " cried Pe Ontjes, stripping off shirt and trousers, 
 and getting into the water. 
 
 The big Tarns boy stood in his shirt too. " Oh! Pe Ontjes," 
 cried Kai, " don't ; that's the Friestadt side." 
 
 " Come on," cried Pe Ontjes. 
 
 " I can't; the current is too strong." 
 
 Pete Boje stood on the stake, his legs wide apart, trying to 
 persuade his sister to run away; but she stayed beside him. 
 The two big boys swam across, got on land, and rushed upon 
 them. Kai saw Pete picking up mud to throw at the naked 
 assailants, and Tarns, too, picked some up and threw it so 
 as to hit the girl on the ear and hair. The force with which it 
 was thrown made her bend her head. 
 
 Then he shouted across the stream, " Dear Pe Ontjes, come 
 to meet me," and running into the water just as he was, he 
 began to swim. 
 
 Pe Ontjes had turned round as if seized by a heavy hand. 
 It seemed to go right through him, this " dear, wonderful boy." 
 He ran to the water to meet him swimming, as he always did, 
 with eyes wide open, spitting out the salt. In the middle of 
 the stream he turned round and swam across Kai's way to keep 
 off the force of the current. Kai swam on bravely, breathing 
 hard, his eyebrows drawn down and his mouth shut tight, and 
 got safely to land. The big Tarns boy had picked up little 
 Pete, and was shaking him grievously. 
 
 The little fellow looked at him in determined silence as if 
 to say, " I can't defend myself, but I can show you I'm not 
 afraid."
 
 48 HOLYLAND 
 
 " Hold him tight," said Pe Ontjes. 
 
 " How could you hit a little girl?" said Kai, standing in 
 front of the tall Tarns boy with clenched fists and sparkling 
 eyes. " Come, and I'll wash you," he said to her. 
 
 She was as defiant as her brother, though pushed his hand 
 away with angry looks. In spite of her fair hair and her light- 
 gray eyes, she looked scowling enough. 
 
 " I only swam across to help you, and I was nearly 
 drowned." 
 
 " Are you the boy who came the day Heinke was born? " 
 
 "Yes," said he; "do you recognize me?" Dipping his 
 hand in the water, he shyly brushed the mud off her hair and 
 ear. " It's just as well I did come." 
 
 She looked round at her brother. " Tell the big Lau boy 
 not to hurt my brother." 
 
 " I say," cried Pe Ontjes, " come here a minute; they have 
 found a big eel ; it must weigh at least a pound." 
 
 Pete Boje looked with disgust at the eel playing awkwardly 
 in the wet sand. "You can't hold him; he's so slippery." 
 
 "What?" said Pe Ontjes. He made his fingers into a 
 hook, picked the eel up by the neck, and, looking wildly about 
 him for a moment, bit the eel's head off and spat it out. 
 
 Anna Boje gave a loud, shrill scream, shaking herself so that 
 her short, loose dress blew hither and thither. " Little pig," 
 she cried, standing stiff with horror. " Get away, you pig! 
 What a disgusting thing you are." 
 
 He pretended he wanted to eat her next, jumping round 
 her, gnashing his teeth. 
 
 She shrank back, holding her arm before her face, abusing 
 him all the time. " You're the most horrible person in the 
 world, you you eel-eater ! " 
 
 " If you touch her," said Pete, " I'll hit you. I'm littler 
 than you, but you won't find me so easy to deal with, for all 
 that." 
 
 " Come, Pe Ontjes," said Kai, " take your eel, and let's go 
 back again." 
 
 " They're a couple of boobies," said Pe Ontjes, looking at 
 them well-pleased, and turning away. 
 
 So they threw themselves into the water again, Tarns on 
 the left, Kai in the middle, Pe Ontjes to the right, keeping off 
 the current, with the eel stuck in his mouth, shaking his head
 
 HOLYLAND 49 
 
 vigorously, and puffing and blowing with tremendous energy. 
 When they got up on to the bank beside the others and looked 
 about them they saw the two children standing side by side, 
 all alone in the vast empty greyness lit here and there by daz- 
 zling rays of sunshine that fell upon their hair. 
 
 The girl raised her hand threateningly, and her brave little 
 voice rang across in clear defiance, " Eel-eater, eel-eater ! " 
 
 " The girl is as wild as the boy," said Pe Ontjes, hollowing 
 his hand to shout back, " You shall be my wife! Do you like 
 the prospect ? " 
 
 But back came the same scornful word, clear and sharp as 
 the flight of an angry bird. 
 
 Next morning, when Pe Ontjes went down the street to 
 school, his fellow culprits came out from the doorways, or from 
 within the houses, and joined him. All were quiet, and avoided 
 looking at one another. Pe Ontjes himself did not seem in a 
 very elated mood. When they came into the schoolyard he 
 turned round and said, gravely, " Boys, this is our death-ride ! " 
 In school they had read of the ride of Mars la Tour. 
 
 He burst the door open and walked in. 
 
 Max Wieber held fast to the desk, crossed his cane in front 
 of him, and said an inward prayer, as he always did before 
 striking. As a boy he had broken a comrade's arm in his rage. 
 In turn they got a good thrashing. When he came, last of all, 
 to Kai Jans he asked him, " What did you stand up for yester- 
 day? What did you want?" 
 
 Kai said in a low voice, entreaty in his eyes, " I wanted to 
 ask you not to read mine out. I can't bear their laughing at 
 me, and. they do it so often." 
 
 He hesitated a moment, then thrashed him too. 
 
 When it was over he lifted up his cane to threaten the 
 whole street, saying, sternly, " Woe to you if you laugh at 
 Kai Jans. What is it to you if he has all Paradise in himself 
 and the angel Gabriel to boot? Are you going to drive him 
 out of Paradise, you vagabonds? Leave that to God."
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 BY the first of March Pe Ontjes had his whole outfit ready. 
 He did not need a new chest, but took his father's, which had 
 been used as a wood-box for the last sixteen years in that slovenly 
 household. He painted it brown with his own hands, bought 
 a new lock, and packed it as neatly as possible. Keys in pocket, 
 he sat on his form with an expression of great boredom. The 
 day after Palm Sunday he was to go on board the ship Gude 
 Wife at Hamburg. 
 
 One might have thought he would start without a single 
 regret, but no! When he looked to one side there sat Tjark 
 Dusenschon, tall and thin, with restless shoulders and eyes 
 twinkling with friendliness. He was to be confirmed, too, on 
 Palm Sunday, but his things were very far from being ready. 
 He did not even know what he wanted to be. 
 
 True, Pe Ontjes Lau had once said, " I will trouble my 
 head no more about Tjark." But is it ever possible to do that? 
 Hasn't one got to trouble about him? One has to say to him, 
 sooner or later, " Don't laugh in that sugary way, fellow," and 
 " Don't tell lies, anyhow," or another day, " Where did you 
 get that cap and that scarf, pray? " The only alternative to 
 troubling oneself about Tjark was killing him outright. 
 
 There was deep consultation in the smithy. Jeff Buhmann 
 did not know what to say; he was greatly puzzled. " He's 
 no good too lazy," he said. 
 
 Pe Ontjes did not know what to say; he was greatly an- 
 noyed. " He's as lazy as you, and he has another fault besides 
 he's magnificent. He has an absurd idea of himself." 
 
 Scheinhold, the apprentice, did not know what to say, he was 
 vague, and looked about him suspiciously. " We must send 
 him out into the world, just as he is. I expect he'll discover 
 some new trade something between a tight-rope dancer and 
 a blacksmith. If so, lots of people will find work." 
 
 Tjark sat in the midst of them, on the anvil, in a costume 
 
 So
 
 HOLYLAND 51 
 
 that came from various sources, and grey stockings. Round 
 his long neck was a red scarf with long, dangling ends ; on his 
 head a battered old first-form cap; his slippers had fallen off. 
 Dangling his feet and twisting his toes, he regarded them all 
 with eyes twinkling with friendliness. 
 
 Kai Jans, feeling rather young and inexperienced to take part 
 in an affair of such importance, sat sideways on the vice on top 
 of the nailbox, silently attentive to whoever was speaking. 
 
 " At any rate, his grandmother has been to the vicar," said 
 Jeff. 
 
 "Grandmother!" said Pe Ontjes. "Good Lord! Stiena 
 Dusenschon! Of course, I might have known it." He swayed 
 his shoulders and arms solemnly, smiling. " He was to tell her, 
 then, what you were to be? " 
 
 Tjark was not in the least hurt. He looked at his feet, 
 playing hide and seek with his toes. 
 
 " She asked the vicar whether I could not possibly find em- 
 ployment with some nobleman, as an equerry or chamberlain, 
 or something of that sort." 
 
 " Well," said Pe Ontjes, a mixture of scorn, contempt, and 
 uncertainty in his voice, " and what did the vicar say? " 
 
 Tjark lifted up his eyebrows. " He said there was a great 
 deal of competition ! " 
 
 " Madness! " said Pe Ontjes, much relieved. 
 
 " It must be something," said Jeff, " where he can wear 
 grand clothes and have to do with grand people." 
 
 " There mustn't be any dirty work," said Pe Ontjes, with 
 profound scorn. " Oh ! he will be a great success." 
 
 The journeyman, Scheinhold, rubbed his eyes like the skipper 
 of a sailing vessel which has been becalmed for three days. 
 " If I may be allowed to speak, he ought to be clerk to the 
 mayor." 
 
 Then, indeed, Jeff shouted aloud, " To Daniel Peters, his 
 natural father! Truly, the child belongs to his father! Yes, 
 indeed, boys, that's it he is to be clerk to Daniel Peters!" 
 He put his great, sooty hand up to his eyes as if he were look- 
 ing at a landscape bathed in sunshine. " Yes, I can see his life's 
 path stretching out clear before my eyes." 
 
 Pe Ontjes looked at the excited smith with displeasure. " It 
 would be better if you would think of what is to be done now," 
 he said.
 
 52 HOLYLAND 
 
 " He must go and present himself," said Scheinhold. 
 
 " Yes, it's called ' presenting,' but we don't know yet whether 
 he will." 
 
 "Who?" said Pe Ontjes. 
 
 "Tjark? whether he will? As if we should ask him. He 
 will be whatever we decide." 
 
 " But I can't present myself in these clothes," said Tjark, 
 in a complaining voice. " And I have no boots at all. The 
 mayor is a grand person, too! " 
 
 They looked sadly down. Then at last Scheinhold lifted 
 up his grey head. " If I may be allowed to speak, Nissen's 
 old coach is in our shed. Suppose we were to sell some forty 
 lottery tickets, at a shilling each, and raffle it that would 
 give us money for a suit of clothes and boots." 
 
 " Very good," said Jeff, " very good," and he kept on nod- 
 'ding his head without looking up. 
 
 Pe Ontjes was not satisfied. " It's too old," he said. " As 
 long as I can remember, it has stood there in that dark shed. 
 We might go and see, however." 
 
 Jeff and his journeyman exchanged a long look. " What 
 for? The coach is there, and that is all that matters." 
 
 " One can always say there is a coach there," said Schein- 
 hold, without lifting his head. 
 
 " It used to belong to Mr. Nissen. When we went bank- 
 rupt he gave me the coach to settle his debt to me. I didn't 
 care about selling it, however." 
 
 " You couldn't sell it," said Pe Ontjes. " I will see it, or 
 else I'll have nothing to do with the raffle." 
 
 " Forty tickets," said Tjark, hastily, " at a shilling each. 
 That would get me everything, even a couple of stand-up 
 collars." 
 
 " As usual," sighed Jeff, " Tjark is confusing net and gross. 
 I have one suggestion to make about the old lumber about 
 the coach, I mean forty shillings for Tjark and forty for 
 me make eighty. Don't waste time in talking, but get the 
 business through." He laid his huge hand on Pe Ontjes' knee. 
 " Just think," he said, " what is Tjark to be? " 
 
 Having no alternative to suggest, Pe Ontjes calmed down, 
 and they all set to work, making a memorandum of the ticket- 
 holders in an old notebook, and cutting eighty lots out of card- 
 board. Then Scheinhold was despatched to go to all the
 
 HOLYLAND 53 
 
 farmers round about Hilligenlei and say it was a question of 
 getting the grandson of a poor widow started in a decent pro- 
 fession. Any questions asked about the condition of the coach 
 must be answered " with caution." The painful thing was 
 that not one of those present bought a ticket. Kai had no 
 money. Pe Ontjes said he was not gong to sink any capital 
 in such a shady undertaking. Jeff declared that, as owner of 
 the coach, he was doing more than anyone else; nobody could 
 expect him to give cash as well. Nissen, the baker, who hap- 
 pened to pass, and was called in, was willing enough to take 
 a ticket on condition that he only paid if his was^the winning 
 number a proposal that was rejected by three to two. 
 Scheinhold, however, did take a ticket, and paid ready money 
 for it. He then started off. 
 
 For four days, now with, now against, the bitter March 
 wind, he ran round Hilligenlei, came home sober every evening, 
 and by the evening of the fourth day had exactly the eighty 
 shillings in his pocket. Jeff took forty. With the other forty 
 in his pocket, and Tjark in his slippers by his side, Pe Ontjes 
 went to Lammann, the tailor, and ordered a suit of clothes, 
 saying, distinctly, that they were to be for Tjark here, since the 
 tailor had the reputation of making all suits rather after his 
 own figure he being short and bow-legged. 
 
 They had then to consider how to approach the mayor, it be- 
 ing no joke to manage a tall, handsome man like Daniel Peters. 
 
 At last Scheinhold offered to undertake this part of the busi- 
 ness also, if he were given three days to do it in. Pe Ontjes 
 was very eager to get the matter settled off, for when spring 
 came and the warm weather neither Jeff nor Scheinhold could 
 be relied upon for anything. Jeff was irresistibly drawn to 
 fishing-rods and flounder-nets, Scheinhold to the brandy flask 
 and tramping. All winter he would work under Jeff in the 
 Hilligenlei harbour street, gentle with children, helpful and 
 kind in his ways. But when summer came he was one of the 
 thousand wastrels wandering, lazy and drunken, up and down 
 the long, grey, treeless Holstein roads between Hamburg and 
 Kolding. 
 
 For three days Scheinhold, the journeyman, went about as 
 if in a dream, so that Kai and Pe Ontjes began to be afraid, 
 since the weather was growing warm, that his curse was upon 
 him already. They watched him as well as they could. In the
 
 54 HOLYLAND 
 
 interval they used to run down to the smithy to see if he were 
 there. On the third day they found him not. Kai Jans, how- 
 ever, who was especially troubled about him, heard a monot- 
 onous murmur coming from the room behind the bellows 
 where he lived. Jeff came too, and they opened the door 
 softly. There he stood, with his back towards them, bending 
 like a stiff penknife, and saying to the wall, " Most worship- 
 ful and honourable Mr. Mayor, this youth whom you see by 
 my side is the grandson of an honest widow, Stiena Dusen- 
 schon, of high rank on the mother's side, and, to judge from 
 a postcard which Pe Ontjes Lau has unfortunately destroyed, 
 the son of an educated, though unknown, father. It is there- 
 fore little wonder that the youth aims high, namely, at learn- 
 ing the noble craft of writing and penmanship under your wor- 
 ship. A person so undistinguished as myself is of course quite 
 unknown to you. I am a journeyman under Jeff Buhmann, 
 in the harbour street, by name, Adalbert Heinrich Reinhold 
 van der Beeke, called Scheinhold by the little street children, 
 who cannot manage R's." 
 
 Jeff closed the door softly, and, sitting down, astounded, on 
 the anvil, said, after a brief silence, " Among all God's crea- 
 tures this fellow is unique. He's a lover of children, a tippler, 
 a scholar, and a man with a truly magnificent name. What 
 is it? I never knew he had such a magnificent name. One 
 thing is certain Tjark Dusenschon's affairs could not be in 
 better hands. Daniel Peters cannot resist such an address." 
 
 They set off soon after midday the raffle was to take place 
 afterwards Scheinhold in front, in Jeff's black evening coat, 
 which reached past his knees, and had to have the sleeves turned 
 up; behind him, to the left, Tjark Dusenschon, in his beautiful 
 new suit, with shining boots, black bowler, and blue tie ; farther 
 behind, the street rabble in their wooden shoes; at some dis- 
 tance, Pe Ontjes and Kai. From time to time Tjark regarded 
 them with beaming eyes, saying, " You must remain outside 
 the door." 
 
 The two came straight into the office, where they found 
 Daniel Peters sitting at his desk. He rose, as he did to receive 
 any visitor even a child so as to give the full impression 
 of his severely handsome presence, and 'remained standing, strok- 
 ing his immense, silky moustache, to hear what journeyman 
 Scheinhold had to say to him. His constant subject of lamen-
 
 HOLYLAND 55 
 
 tatfon with him was the decay, in our times, of the feeling for 
 rank and authority. Here he found what he sought, and he 
 therefore dismissed them with a gracious inclination of the 
 head. 
 
 The clatter of shoes in the Hilligenlei market-place was 
 something unprecedented, even though three boys had theirs in 
 their hands while they ran in their stockings. Never had a 
 more solemn meeting taken place in Jeff's smithy than that 
 which now celebrated the raffle. Tjark had never been so much 
 the centre of his friend's attention as now, when, with sparkling 
 eyes, he shuffled the lots in Jeff's shaky old black slouch hat. 
 Never were such blank faces as when Scheinhold Scheinhold, 
 the journeyman, and no one else won the coach. A scene 
 of extraordinary dismay followed. 
 
 Pe Ontjes bit his lips and stared gloomily in front of him. 
 Scheinhold sat, quite overcome, on the barrow. He did not 
 hear Tjark whisper to him, " I say, we might raffle the coach 
 again ; there are a heap more things I want." 
 
 Jeff sat on the anvil, puffing hard at his short pipe, and talk- 
 ing about the tricks of fate. 
 
 Suddenly, up got Pe Ontjes, without looking up. " I'm 
 going away, out into the world. Adieu to you all. Never 
 in my life will I have anything more to do with you." And 
 he departed, Tjark also. 
 
 Kai wanted to go too, but, since the smith and his journey- 
 man sat on with downcast looks, he stayed, saying, in a sub- 
 dued tone, " You had better begin to work. Peter Thedeus 
 is anxious for his plough back. Why don't you set to? " 
 
 Jeff got up from the anvil, opened the dusty window looking 
 out over towards the harbour, and, drawing a deep breath, said, 
 " Extremely warm outside. Make up the fire, Scheinhold, and 
 we'll get the plough ready. Just look! there's Hinnerk going 
 out to fish for eels. A lot he'll catch, stupid fellow! " 
 
 Scheinhold, who was still sitting on the barrow, raised his 
 head to snuff the air. " Extremely warm," he said. " My 
 conscience is much too tender. They will all go and say I 
 cheated in the raffle." He got up stiffly, undid the big door, 
 and looked down the street. 
 
 Kai looked anxiously from one to the other, then went up 
 to Scheinhold at the door, and again remarked, in a casual
 
 $6 HOLYLAND 
 
 tone, " You had better begin to work. Make the fire now, 
 Scheinhold." 
 
 Jeff had attempted to unscrew the plough, but a different 
 screwdriver was needed, so he came again to the window. 
 " There's Charles Martin sitting there, too, with his net. He 
 isn't catching anything either far too stupid. It's most 
 gloriously warm ; there will be thousands of eels." 
 
 " Be off, master, and catch eels," said Scheinhold. 
 
 Jeff turned round and said, contemptuously, " Do you think 
 I don't know what time of day it is? You want to be off to 
 your pub to get drunk!" 
 
 Kai wanted to jump up and fetch Pe Ontjes, but he was 
 afraid of coming back too late, so he remained standing, staring 
 at the journeyman with terrified eyes. He had known him 
 since he was a child, and was very fond of him. 
 
 "I go there? not at all." 
 
 He sat still for a time ; giving way again, he began to whine, 
 "If only my conscience weren't so tender; but I can't get 
 over it. It shan't be said that I am a cheat." 
 
 Jeff turned away from the window. " I must just see that 
 my net is all right." With these words he w r ent out into the 
 yard. 
 
 " I don't feel like work to-day," said Scheinhold, in a thick 
 voice. " I shall just go down to the Sadler's and see if he has 
 mended my braces." 
 
 Kai seized him by the arm and looked up at him implor- 
 ingly. " Please, please, don't go." 
 
 " What are you thinking about? I am going to the sadler's; 
 do you understand that? Do you suppose a man cares to work 
 for such a lazy master? " 
 
 " Do you suppose," said Jeff, through the window, " that 
 a man cares to work when he has such a lazy journeyman ? 
 There isn't too much water or too little; it's exactly right. I'm 
 off to the harbour." 
 
 " Ha ! water! " said Scheinhold, shaking himself. " Wa- 
 ter, indeed! " He lifted up his hand, bending his fingers as if 
 he had a little glass in them, and smiled happily. 
 
 Then Kai came quickly over to him and looked anxiously 
 into his eyes, saying, in a penetrating voice, as if he were 
 addressing a man in his sleep, " Scheinhold I say, Scheinhold 
 have you ever heard the story of the blacksmith of Bark? "
 
 HOLYLAND 57 
 
 " Don't know," staring out into the street, his eyes like 
 dirty glass. 
 
 " He was a blacksmith, like you, and a mad dog bit right 
 into his leg. The dog was quite mad and the wound quite deep. 
 Do you know what the smith did? He bolted the door and 
 worked for three days without stopping, so that the whole 
 smithy was full of bright firelight and huge yellow sparks flew 
 out at the chimney." 
 
 " I don't want to hear any stories to-day, kiddie," said 
 Scheinhold, pityingly, getting up as if he had a thousand 
 pounds' weight on each shoulder, and going out into the 
 street. 
 
 Kai looked round for Jeff, to see if he could help him, but 
 he was crossing the yard with his net, smoking like a chimney. 
 So he ran down the street after Scheinhold, and, looking up 
 into his face, went on, eagerly, " On the third day the ham- 
 mering and blasting stopped, and the smith roared like a wild 
 bull." 
 
 " Kiddie," stammered Scheinhold, " I don't like your stories 
 at all." 
 
 " At last his dear brother took courage. He was a carpenter, 
 and as tall and strong as he. He broke the door open with 
 his axe. There lay the hammer and pincers and files and coal 
 heaped up in the corner, and the blacksmith stood on the hearth- 
 stone, foaming and tearing at great chains and bars, with which 
 he had chained himself fast between the hearth and the anvil. 
 And when his brother saw him he said, ' Good for good, dear 
 brother,' and struck him down with his axe, so that he might 
 not torture himself any longer." 
 
 Then Scheinhold pushed the boy roughly aside so that he 
 staggered and fell heavily on to the stone. The stout publican 
 with his beautiful, snowy hair, stood in front of his door and 
 laughed. "That's right. Give it him! Come f in!" And 
 Scheinhold stumbled across the threshold. 
 
 Kai picked himself up and went down the street, breathless 
 and pale as a ghost. He wanted to go home, but Pe Ontjes 
 appeared at the door of his house and said, " I've smashed the 
 shed door ; the coach has lost its wheels ; the leather is all gone 
 the man has mended his slippers with it ; there's nothing 
 left but the wooden frame and the axles. Scheinhold's winning
 
 58 HOLYLAND 
 
 is some trick of Tjark's. They're a set of rascals, every one of 
 them. I'm glad I shall be out of it all to-morrow." 
 
 He came nearer. When he saw Kai's face he was so ter- 
 rified that he threw out his hands. " Boy, what is the matter 
 with you ? " 
 
 Kai breathed once, twice, quick and hard ; then, with a mis- 
 erable cry, he fell down on his knees. Pe Ontjes picked him 
 up in his strong arms and took him up to his mother in the 
 long house. There he lay, whimpering and almost uncon- 
 scious, on the floor. Pe Ontjes related 'what had happened, 
 and old Sarah looked in and said how Scheinhold had knocked 
 him down, and the old publican had laughed. 
 
 Then said his mother, sadly, " Then I know what's the 
 matter with him. He often used to ask me, when he was a 
 little boy, just gone to school, if it was really true that there 
 were wicked people in the world. He couldn't understand 
 it, and I wasn't clever enough to explain. Now he has seen 
 a mass of evil, all at once, one thing on top of another, and 
 that's what has made him so queer." 
 
 " It's a pity," said Pe Ontjes, " that he isn't going off with 
 me. He must go out into the world and see for himself. This 
 sort of thing won't do."
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 THE annual fair at Hilligenlei fell upon a beautiful, sunny, 
 September day. There was a clattering of horses and a rum- 
 bling of carts on the five roads that led thither, and Harbour- 
 master Lau landed on the pier three boatloads of all sorts of 
 people coming across the bay from Friestadt. Pete Boje was 
 the first to spring ashore, his sister after him. They were tall 
 children by this time, both of them, on the point of being 
 confirmed. Glancing shyly at the long house, they saw Kai 
 Jans standing at the door, and behind him his dainty little 
 mother, no taller than he. 
 
 " Come in for a minute," she said, in her friendly way. 
 " Haven't you brought Heinke and Hett with you? " 
 
 The two children came in. Tall and slender, with bright, 
 fair hair, they seemed to fill the poor little room, when, after 
 delivering a friendly message from their parents, they looked 
 about them like a couple of wild roes. 
 
 " Our house is small enough," said Mala, " and the floor is 
 only made of clay, but it is at least clean. There are the 
 newspapers. I read them on Sunday. I haven't any time in 
 the week. Go up and put on your better coat, Kai. You can 
 go with them to market." 
 
 She looked again at the tall, upright children, shyly touch- 
 ing the girl's shoulders. " Look," she said, pointing out the 
 round table with the poor little lamp hanging over it, " that's 
 where he sits every evening, always at his books." 
 
 " He must be very clever," said Anna. 
 
 " You've seen that, have you? " Mala's eyes did not conceal 
 her secret pride. " Mr. Wieber, the teacher, was here about 
 a week ago, and said what a pity it was Kai couldn't be a 
 schoolmaster. It's impossible; we cannot afford it. He is 
 going to be a compositor. He's learning already under Heine 
 Wulk goes there every afternoon and he's quite proud of 
 it. And Heine says he can rise to anything in that profession. 
 
 59
 
 60 HOLYLAND 
 
 Just think ; he wrote a little poem the other day. Heine printed 
 it; he thought it so good. What are you going to be, Pete? " 
 
 " After Easter I'm going to the technical school at Itzehoe," 
 he said. " I am going into business." 
 
 " I thought you were going to teach," said Mala. 
 
 " Teachers don't make enough," he answered, gravely. " A 
 good business man can make a fortune." 
 
 In came Kai. She rather fussed round him, asking whether 
 he had a pocket-handkerchief, smoothing down his sleeves to 
 show that his coat was a good one, giving him twopence that 
 lay ready on the window-sill. They should see he had some- 
 thing to spend at the fair. As they went out she motioned to 
 him with her eyes, saying, " Mind you hold yourself up, dear," 
 and pointed to the girl, as upright as a young princess. 
 
 When they turned from the harbour street into Church 
 Street they found themselves in the thick of the confused crowd 
 of holiday-makers. Tim Solte, the little crippled fiddler, was 
 sitting on the ground under the watchmaker's window, fiddling 
 away and nodding his head, his cap on his knees ready for cop- 
 pers from the passers-by. He lowered his fiddle as the Boje 
 children passed, saying, " Can you change me a shilling, Prince 
 Boje? I've got such a lot of small change." 
 
 Pete felt in his purse. " Yes, I can do that." Then after 
 Tim had counted out the amount in halfpence, he gave him 
 the shilling in exchange. 
 
 When he came to count it up as he went along he found 
 there were only ten pennies. 
 
 " Is it right?" said Anna. 
 
 "Yes; quite right," he said, quietly putting the money in 
 his purse. On a sudden impulse, however, he turned on his 
 heel, seized hold of Tim's cap, and said, with sparkling eyes, 
 " You've cheated me, you old rascal. I'd make short work of 
 you if you weren't a cripple." 
 
 Looking up at him uneasily the fiddler picked up his instru- 
 ment as if he had not understood. 
 
 On the right, at the corner of the market-place, stood a bar- 
 rel-organ beside a big canvas depicting, in lurid colours, a 
 horrible murder, the story being chanted in some peculiar dia- 
 lect by a harsh-voiced female. 
 
 Kai looked at it with dilated eyes. " She must have seen it 
 herself," he said,
 
 HOLYLAND 61 
 
 Pete, more sceptical, declared that the whole thing was a 
 lie. " You can see that the axe doesn't hit him ; the man's aim 
 is quite out." 
 
 Anna hung back, looking coldly at the woman who sang. 
 
 " Let's go to the flower lottery," said Kai. " Every number 
 wins. Look! so it says, ' Every number wins.' " 
 
 " You shall have those flowers," he said, staking his whole 
 twopence. The wheel turned, but the pointer stopped be- 
 tween two numbers. 
 
 " Unluckily it isn't a number," said the man, looking away 
 from the children. " Come, ladies and gentlemen. Every 
 number wins! " 
 
 " That's enough of that," said Kai, turning away with 
 scarlet face. 
 
 " And you've lost all your money," said Anna. 
 
 " I'll get more," he said. 
 
 Then they all went to the puppet show, and stood looking 
 at it for a long while. Every time that Anna gave her short, 
 low laugh, he was happy; it was such a delightful sound. He 
 looked sideways at her little white face and asked her more 
 than once whether she enjoyed it. 
 
 " It's very silly," she said, " but I do enjoy it all the same." 
 
 When he saw the showman's wife coming round with the 
 plate he said, in an important tone, that he must go to his 
 printing for an hour or two, arranging to meet them two hours 
 later outside the Hamburg Arms. 
 
 As he sat in Heine Wulk's dirty, deserted workshop, print- 
 ing a few belated fair-bills, a faint thunderstorm, rising from 
 the south-west, passed over after a slight shower of rain, fol- 
 lowed hard by a tremendous gale. Peals of thunder resounded 
 on sea and land, and vivid flashes of lightning darted across the 
 sky with the rapidity of the angry strokes of a whip. The air 
 was darkened far and wide by swirling clouds of dust collected 
 everywhere on the roads and lanes by the long drought, and 
 now caught up and mingled with sand from the dunes. The 
 storm swept over Hilligenlei and the bay, and was gone as 
 quickly as it came, though across at the Friestadt side dazzling 
 flashes continued to dart across the big, dark-blue clouds. 
 
 Released about five o'clock, Kai soon heard that the storm 
 had had fatal results in and near the town. A young couple 
 had been struck down by lightning on their way to their first
 
 62 HOLYLAND 
 
 dance since their wedding. A number of children had been 
 buried by the dust in the fields, and only saved with great diffi- 
 culty. A carriage had been crushed against the wall of a house. 
 Crossing the market-place, he caught sounds of an accident on 
 the Friestadt wall. The name was Schoolmaster Boje. The 
 Friestadt farmer, when questioned, could only tell him that 
 nothing certain was known, and that Pete was already on his 
 way home. 
 
 He went at once to look for Anna looked and asked for 
 her everywhere in vain. The neighbours could give him no 
 news of her. No one had seen her. He went about asking 
 everyone he knew whether they had seen a tall, upright girl, 
 about fourteen or fifteen, with a small, pale face and loose, 
 straight, fair hair. His cheeks glowed with excitement, and he 
 almost imagined himself in charge of some royal child which 
 had lost its way in a strange town. He had made himself quite 
 hot with running, when he came upon her at last in the little 
 garden with its few tables and benches in the sun. She was 
 sitting on one of these benches in her long, blue dress, the little 
 straw hat well forward on her forehead, looking, with hot face 
 and rather untidy hair and eyes big with astonishment, at Tjark 
 Dusenschon, who stood in front of her in his tight trousers 
 and blue tie, running his hand indolently through the exquisite 
 waves of his fair hair, saying, " It would be a very great pleas- 
 ure to me indeed to introduce you to our little dancing-club, 
 and my influence there is considerable." 
 
 When she saw Kai Jans she looked at him with her calm 
 eyes, saying, " Dusenschon belongs to a dancing-club. Do you 
 dance? " 
 
 He looked gravely at her. " Do you know, dear," he said, 
 " Pete has heard a report of your father's being unwell. He 
 has gone home with a neighbour." 
 
 Her delicate little face underwent a sudden change. Getting 
 up, she came over to his side. 
 
 " There's no boat for some time. Shall I take you home 
 round the bay? " 
 
 She nodded. 
 
 " Then let us be off." 
 
 Tjark went with them down Church Street, his tie blowing 
 about; his lips were tightly pressed together, and at every step 
 he put down his right knee with such force that he almost
 
 HOLYLAND 63 
 
 seemed to limp with the left. The step and the expression were 
 imitated from the mayor's, adopted two years ago in heroic en- 
 durance of an attack of gout. When they came down to the 
 harbour street he politely took his leave, saying that the mayor 
 had entrusted to him the maintenance of order, and he must 
 go and inspect the stall-holders. 
 
 Kai Jans ran up to tell his mother what had happened, and 
 then, as the light began to fade, left the town with Anna. 
 They came out on the high road leading up to the higher 
 ground, and then took a narrow turning to the right with high 
 walls on either side, overhung with hazel and hawthorn bushes 
 and oak-trees, growing very close together. Darkness came 
 on. 
 
 He was proud of his commission, and began to talk to cheer 
 her and shorten the way, although he was naturally one of 
 those silent people whose spirits are stirred by the deep mys- 
 teries of which one can only speak to intimates. 
 
 This evening to this dear listener he did speak, telling her 
 what he had never told anyone how his father had lain ill 
 for eight weeks with pneumonia, and then been unable to work 
 half the winter; how his mother used to weep because they 
 often had not a penny in the house ; how she had had to go and 
 get things on credit from that dreadful, stout publican, and 
 his father had to go there every Sunday afternoon, drink 
 brandy, and smoke a cigar, both of which he disliked. Perhaps 
 in the autumn his old grandmother his mother's stepmother 
 would come to them. She was old and weak, and his father 
 didn't want her to come on the parish. " In the evenings, when 
 I come home from the printer's, I am often fearfully tired, but 
 mother's crying keeps me from going to sleep." 
 
 " Don't your sisters earn anything? " 
 
 " Father won't hear of their paying for board on any ac- 
 count, for fear of their being so dreadfully poor if they were to 
 marry." 
 
 " Yes," she said. " I know. We're poor, too. Father has 
 still his student debts to pay think of that. However, that 
 doesn't matter." 
 
 " She poor ! " he thought. " She knows nothing about it. 
 A teacher," he thought, " must be rich." Their conversation 
 next turned on the confirmation, and he said, " Do you know
 
 64 HOLYLAND 
 
 half the boys don't believe what the clergyman says? Does 
 Pete believe it?-" 
 
 She shook her head, and he could see in the dim light that 
 her brows were knitted in thought. " He certainly wouldn't 
 be confirmed if the clergyman could only hear the things he 
 says to the boys and girls. He doesn't believe a word. The 
 other day we were looking on the stone bridge for earth-worms 
 the long sort, you know for fishing. He looked up and 
 saw the sky full of stars." 
 
 " It was night, then? " 
 
 She looked at him in astonishment. "Rather! you aren't 
 so stupid as not to know that earth-worms only come out at 
 night? We had got out of the window to hunt for 
 them " 
 
 " In your nightgowns? " 
 
 " Yes, in our nightgowns. He looked at the stars and said, 
 ' Just look ! there are more than fifty million stars. Do you 
 suppose that nothing lives on them? Has God had fifty million 
 sons? I don't believe what the clergyman says. I don't believe 
 it, and I don't need it. I'm a good enough sort of person with- 
 out, and I know what I want.' That's what he said. Isn't 
 it dreadful? " 
 
 "You believe, though, don't you?" said Kai. 
 
 " Yes. I believe it all because the clergyman says so." She 
 was silent for a time, looking straight in front of her. " Do 
 you know what often troubles me? God is three in one. Well, 
 what frightens me is that I am often so tired at night that I 
 don't get the order right. I'm sure I pray least to the Holy 
 Ghost, and He must be angry with me." 
 
 " The thing to do," he said, " is to begin with God, Father, 
 Son, and Holy Ghost, before you say your prayer; then you 
 have them all in right order." 
 
 Everything seemed clear. " Oh, yes ! " said she. " How 
 clever of you. Do you know, they say you're a wonderful boy 
 and the cleverest in the school ! " 
 
 His joy at hearing her speak to him thus sent his heart up 
 into his throat, and he walked by her side in silence. 
 
 The birds, sitting in the hedges between the heavy raindrops, 
 watched the two as they passed out of their steady, black eyes. 
 The moon shone from behind the clouds across the calm sky.
 
 HOLYLAND 65 
 
 On tne horizon lay a bank of dark-grey cloud, and, beyond, 
 thunder rumbled in the distance. 
 
 " We must make haste," he said ; " there's going to be 
 another thunderstorm." 
 
 They came down from the high ground and passed through 
 a silent village, the thatched roofs like so many dark patches 
 beneath the black shade of the trees. Only across one garden 
 there was a light to be seen, as the door shut softly on some 
 remark they could not hear evidently a neighbour going 
 home after an evening visit. Suddenly the street was lit up by 
 a flash of lightning. He stood in the middle of the road, a tall 
 man, his broad shoulders a trifle bent. Immediately afterwards, 
 at the cross-roads in the middle of the village, a little pony- 
 carriage came towards them, with two children, a boy and 
 girl, sitting close together inside, and a small mongrel running 
 behind. They could plainly see the children's eyes full of 
 silent inquiry. 
 
 " What a lot of people there are on the road to-night," said 
 Kai Jans. 
 
 The flash and the appearance of the carriage had so con- 
 fused them for the moment that they took a wrong turning 
 at the cross-roads, and came out on to the heath without notic- 
 ing it, as they talked of the rapidly rising storm now hanging 
 dark and heavy over the water. 
 
 It was not until after a quarter of an hour or more that they 
 saw from the rising of the road that they were out of their way. 
 At first they tried to get back by cutting across the heath. A 
 mighty roar came from the sea, as if a number of heavy vessels 
 were breaking their way through the ice-bound waters and 
 being cast heavily on the beach. The roar of the wind and the 
 slashing of the rain sounded like the uneasy movement of wet 
 sails. 
 
 Without a word they took each other's hands and made their 
 way back, full of fears, towards a light they saw on the road 
 just beyond the village. Crossing the tiny garden on tiptoe, 
 they stood still by the wall, near the light ; so that they at least 
 had people near them. As they stood thus the window close 
 to them was thrown open. A big, bearded man of middle age 
 put out his head, and, looking up to the sky, said, in a nervous 
 tone, " Look out there, mother : half the sky has fallen in ! " 
 
 A comfortable old voice replied, " That will make an end of
 
 66 HOLYLAND 
 
 the sparrows, that's all. Look round about, though. I thought 
 I heard footsteps." 
 
 The man looked round. ' There's a child standing there, 
 and there's another," he said. 
 
 They stood stock still meantime. Then the old woman 
 opened the dark, low door, and, saying " Come in, children ; 
 don't be afraid; come in," led the way into the low-roofed 
 room. " Sit down, children," she said ; then, turning to her 
 son, " Run and see if there's any coffee left in the kitchen. 
 He's a bit queer in his ways," she went on, " especially when 
 it thunders. One winter night, when he was a soldier, he was 
 thrown from his horse, and nearly perished of cold, but he 
 wouldn't harm a soul. Sit down, children ; don't be frightened. 
 I tell him a story, and then he forgets the thunder and every- 
 thing else." After asking where they had come from and 
 whither they were going, " As soon as the thunder's over he'll 
 take you across the heath by the footpath, and you'll be in 
 Friestadt in half an hour from there." 
 
 A sudden flash of lightning filled the room with white light, 
 and the thunder was like huge rocks crashing through the sky. 
 The heath seemed to shake under the impact of the falling 
 stars. 
 
 The old woman saw to the door and then sat down again. 
 Her son came back from the kitchen with a face as white as 
 chalk, and fell on his knees in front of her as if all the strength 
 had gone out of him. " Mother, it fell on my skull ; it has 
 gone right into my head." 
 
 ' Then, my child," she said, stroking his hair, grey in spite 
 of his youth, " we must put in a story to fill it up and make it 
 well again. Listen, children. Once upon a time, about seven 
 hundred years ago be still, my son, be still the Bishop of 
 Hamburg passed one day right past our windows do you 
 hear? on his way to Hilligenlei, and, stopping his stout pony 
 on the high ground in front of our house, he looked down at 
 the wide landscape at his feet with here and there a line of 
 grey sea visible, the low Hilligenlei downs, dotted with thatched 
 roofs, the wall of his new church he was building standing up 
 as high as a mast. But the sight gave him no joy. As a young 
 man he had fought hard for the faith, but now that he was 
 growing old he hated anything rough and incomplete. When 
 he came to the solid stone house that the priests had built be-
 
 HOLYLAND 67 
 
 side the unfinished church he found the table laid. There was 
 a pudding bigger than his head, and a pig's cheek, on which 
 they made great inroads. He sat down and ate enormously. 
 A whole day in the sea wind had given him an appetite. After 
 a bit he let out his leather belt and ate more, eating all the 
 time while he listened to the priests' complaints of the laziness 
 and obstinacy of the people. When he got up next morning he 
 complained that he had slept badly, disturbed by fearful dreams 
 that seemed sent by evil spirits visions of beings with large 
 round, white faces, void of all expression. It was with an 
 irritated spirit that he went into the church. There, in the un- 
 finished buildings, stood some three or four hundred men and 
 women, the yellow sand of the dune under their feet, the open 
 sky over their heads, listening, with their eyes fixed devoutly 
 on the grey stone table, to the words the holy man uttered in 
 his unfamiliar speech. His homely goodness appealed to 
 them, and his face was of the type that the people there have 
 always most admired, especially in their priests: the almost 
 harsh manhood that speaks of brave deeds and deep thoughts. 
 Then the Bishop left the table and came down to question them 
 individually according to the Lord's Prayer and the Catechism. 
 The answers were hesitating, and his irritation returned. As 
 he came down the church he saw standing to the left by the 
 unfinished pillars a lanky youth with straight, sleek, fair hair, 
 and strongly marked features. Over his woollen shirt he car- 
 ried a pocket, made out of one piece of sealskin. When the 
 little priest who followed the Bishop perceived this man he said, 
 rapidly, in a low voice, ' Hoc est asinus ferocissimus.' The 
 Bishop turned round. ' Hie, hie, my brother,' he said, crossly. 
 Then turning to the man he said, in dialect, ' What is the name 
 of our Lord's mother, my son? ' . ' Mary is her name,' he an- 
 swered, cheerfully. The Bishop's irritation grew. ' And his 
 father, my son ? ' 
 
 " The young man saw the trap, and was on his guard. ' Is 
 that Joseph? ' he said, reflecting, ' or our Lord himself? ' 
 
 ' The Bishop got angry. ' Our Lord, of course,' he said. 
 ' And she was all his life ? ' 
 
 " ' His wife.' 
 
 " ' Fool,' said the Bishop, his wrath blazing forth; 'she re- 
 mained a virgin.'
 
 68 HOLYLAND 
 
 " Thereupon the young man struck his hand on his fore- 
 head in genuine bewilderment. ' Not really! ' he said. 
 
 " The Bishop, no longer able to contain himself, raised his 
 hand and gave him a heavy box on the ear. The man drew 
 himself up. As pale as death, he stared straight in front of him, 
 and, without moving his eyes, broke off a piece from the pillar 
 you can see the place still let it fall into the sand, and, 
 dropping his hand again, turned round and left the church. 
 For three hours he walked westwards, till he came to the green 
 hillock by the ever-roaring sea, where his reed hut stood. He 
 spoke no word to his wife; he did not play with his little boy. 
 When evening came and the light faded, taking his axe from 
 the hearth, he went back the way he had come in the morning, 
 running, without stopping to rest, over the wide, white sand, 
 over the wide green plain, through the deep water-courses, till, 
 about midnight, he reached the Hilligenlei down and the 
 priest's house. All the time his resolution never wavered. He 
 was going to kill the holy man. The back door was not bolted. 
 He went along the passage till he came to another door through 
 which he could hear the voice of the holy man speaking to him- 
 self. Craning his neck, he peered through the chink of the 
 door into the room. There he was, kneeling in the moonlight, 
 praying in some strange tongue, and every sentence he paused to 
 think. Suddenly, after the fifth, he began to think aloud. He 
 struck the table, and said, in a loud, angry voice, ' That I was 
 so mad as to box his great ear! It was yesterday's pudding and 
 pork that did it, and that confounded busybody who stood be- 
 hind me. Dear Lord and Blessed Saviour and Mary Mother, 
 forgive me my sins and soften his hard heart.' 
 
 " The man with the axe turned round, stole out of the 
 house on tiptoe, and ran home, without stopping, over sand and 
 grass and water, his lips pressed tight together and his eyes 
 sparkling. At the door she was waiting for him. She took 
 the axe and ran her finger along the edge, looking at him with 
 uneasy gaze. But he spread out his arms, drew a deep breath, 
 and laughed out uproariously. ' He is not a holy man at all ; 
 he has a stomach-ache.' 
 
 " Now, although the people all called themselves Christians, 
 they were surprised and angry that he did not kill the Bishop. 
 Even one of the priests, who was a native of these parts, 
 grieved when he thought that the holy man might thus have
 
 HOLYLAND 69 
 
 attained a martyr's crown thereby, although the thought made 
 his hair stand on end. They despised him, one and all, until 
 the Frisian invasion gave him an opportunity of showing mag- 
 nificent courage; and from that time they learnt how to praise 
 the mild justice he had shown before." 
 
 The old woman removed her hands from her son's head, 
 and he stood up, lost in dreaming thoughts, at the side of the 
 stove. Anna Boje had gone to sleep during the story, her head 
 on her arms, and her pretty, fair hair spread out all over the 
 table. Kai, with his elbows on the table, was still gazing at 
 the old woman out of his dark-gray eyes. 
 
 " Do you see ? " she said to her son. 
 
 His thoughts were like children playing in the dark. 
 "What does it mean?" he said, uttering his thoughts. "Are 
 there no saints now? no holy men?" 
 
 " No," said the old woman, shaking her head, " not a 
 single one. It's all mixed up in men now holy and unholy 
 together. There are none all holiness. Look out, Hans, and 
 see if the sky is clear again." 
 
 He went to the window and said, in genuine astonishment, 
 ' The stars are all there again." 
 
 " Yes ; I thought so," she said. " Now take the children 
 to the road. Wake up, girlie; you're off again now." 
 
 He led them across the heath, and at its edge, without a 
 word, he left them. Silently, they clambered down the defile 
 into the flat ground, and were soon once more on the narrow 
 footpath that led to Friestadt, the straight line of the dyke 
 appearing on their right. 
 
 When they were close to the village, by the mill, Anna 
 looked up, frightened, and still half-asleep. " All the houses 
 are lit up ours, too. Why is it? There's a light in the 
 schoolroom, too ! " She burst into tears, and began to run. 
 
 " What has happened ? " asked Kai of a man on the road. 
 
 " The schoolmaster tried to stop a heavy cart that was 
 coming along the sea wall during the storm. A child had 
 got under the wheels, and the driver was drunk. The weight 
 was too much for him, and he fell right into the sea. They 
 have just brought him home." 
 
 Anna burst through the crowd of mud-bespattered men in 
 the hall and schoolroom, to her mother, who stood by the 
 desk, quite overcome. Pete, also covered from head to foot
 
 70 HOLYLAND 
 
 with wet, gray mud, stood beside the dead body of his father. 
 Hella Boje gave a loud cry of joy when she saw her child. 
 " You are safe," she cried, " darling child, you are safe." She 
 caught the big girl on to her knees and covered her face with 
 kisses. " At least I have all my children. Where are Hett 
 and Heinke?" 
 
 " In the bedroom," said Pete, in a steady, restrained voice. 
 
 Hans Martin, the parish overseer, said, in his harsh voice, 
 " His death comes too early for his family. He had paid off 
 a good seventy-five pounds of his college debts, but fifty pounds 
 is still due I stood his surety as a neighbour." 
 
 Hella Boje looked up questioningly. She had only half 
 heard. But Pete got in front of the overseer, and, striking 
 himself on the breast, cried out, "I I will set it right. I 
 will." 
 
 " All right, little neighbour," said Martin. " That is not 
 how I meant it." 
 
 " You did mean that," cried Pete, striking himself again. 
 " I will I will set everything to rights." Then turning to 
 his mother, " Never mind, mother; you've got me. Everything 
 will be all right." 
 
 Hella laid her arm round him and said once more, " Where 
 are Heinke and Hett? " 
 
 "In the bedroom. Yes; let us go there. We cannot do 
 anything for father now." 
 
 Kai Jans had remained standing at the door, his head erect, 
 horror in his eyes. In the light cast by the lanterns which the 
 men now lifted as they made room, he saw the dead man lying 
 in the midst of the disordered schoolroom, the beautiful head, 
 still young, bent helplessly back; the fair mother, with her face 
 contracted by pain, and her garments in disorder; Pete and 
 Anna, quite changed from their ordinary peaceful expression. 
 As he saw all this he turned round as if seized upon by some 
 force outside himself and ran, ran home, stopping breathless 
 for a moment, only to start off and run once more, weeping 
 in a maze of confused anguish as the wretched picture burnt 
 itself into his soul and his mind wrestled helplessly with his 
 disordered thoughts. 
 
 It was morning when he reached home. Hot and perspir- 
 ing, he gave his mother a broken and stammering account of 
 what had happened. She went into the kitchen and sat down
 
 HOLYLAND 71 
 
 in front of the fire. He stood before her. " It is appalling," 
 he said, " appalling." 
 
 . " Yes," she said, " yes ; it is appalling. What will become 
 of her and the children? The pension is tiny, and they have 
 debts. Pete will have to give up school." 
 
 " That's not the worst," he said. " Pete will manage that; 
 it's the other." 
 
 " What ? " said his mother. 
 
 " Mother," said he. " Only think. If the driver had not 
 been drunk! He was saved, and Mr. Boje and the child 
 drowned. Think of the struggle the Bojes will have all their 
 lives now, just because of that man's being drunk! It's all 
 wrong." 
 
 She looked at him. His eyes blazed in his pale face. " That's 
 how the world is," said she. 
 
 " Yes. But I tell you it shall not be so. The woman at 
 Heesedorf may say, ' There are no holy men,' but there shall 
 be some. All men shall be holy." 
 
 "Get to work, my boy," said she, coldly; "that will put 
 an end to your brooding." 
 
 "Oh! mother," he said, looking at her anxiously, "yes; 
 but if that must be so for me, I couldn't stop thinking of it. 
 I think till my head will one day break with thinking."
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 WHEN Kai Jans came in, Heine Wulk was sitting in the 
 musty old office, grey with accumulated dust, in front of the 
 long, dirty table littered with cuttings, scissors, writing mate- 
 rials of every sort, and heaps of newspapers, his pasty face 
 buried in his Berlin correspondence. The boy, who had shot 
 up into a tall, pale-faced youth, went straight to his accus- 
 tomed place, and began to set up the advertisements which 
 had come in. He had come from six hours at school, but in 
 a week he would leave school and devote his whole time to the 
 firm. 
 
 " I say," said Heine, smoothing down his long, sleek hair 
 to the collar of his coat. " A magnificent leader from the 
 Berlin man again, on the coming of spring; but in one place 
 he talks of dragon-flies playing round the water-lilies. What 
 does he mean? I've never heard of dragon-flies! " 
 
 ' They're what we call devil's darning-needles," said Kai. 
 
 " So, ho ! that's what it is ; but we can't talk about devil's 
 darning-needles in a leader. Dragon-flies it must be; it's a 
 fine word, anyhow. You must alter a word here and there, 
 Kai for example, when he talks of lasses and lads you had 
 better say girls and boys, d'you see? But don't spoil the swing 
 of the thing; that's the great point, after all swing and go. 
 You're getting on finely, but there's still room for improve- 
 ment, as I'm always saying. Look at the mayor. There's 
 style for you. And further down, where the Berlin man 
 it's very fine on the whole, of course but where he talks of 
 the ' sun's shy beams ' you can add that the hens are beginning 
 to lay again. He's stupidly left that out." 
 
 Kai looked at the passage. " It does not go very well 
 there," he said, meditatively. 
 
 " In it must go, for all that," said Heine Wulk. " Don't 
 you see, if a farmer sees that, ten to one he'll try an adver- 
 tisement and pay with eggs. I've often done quite a good 
 
 72
 
 HOLYLAND 73 
 
 thing in that way at this time of year. Well, tell me any 
 news in the town. Have you heard any?" 
 
 " Skipper Tarns has bought a smack in Finkenwarder. 
 That's the fifth in Hilligenlei, and Harbourmaster Lau says 
 a fine smack too." 
 
 "What of that?" said Wulk. "Anyone can buy a 
 smack!" 
 
 " Pe Ontjes Lau has got distinction in his pilot's examina- 
 tion in Altona." 
 
 " I don't like Lau. What's that to do with Hilligenlei, 
 either?" 
 
 " The drain in Church Street has been choked up since 
 yesterday evening. The bad water has run out into the 
 streets, and has no outlet." 
 
 Heine shook his head vigorously. " What's the good of our 
 putting that in? It would annoy the mayor and set the 
 policemen against me. No. We'll have nothing to do with 
 that. Anything else? " 
 
 " Dickson, the merchant, has found the betrothal ring that 
 he lost in his garden twenty years ago." 
 
 " Now that is really interesting. That will go in nicely. 
 These little traits of human life are what we want, don't you 
 know." 
 
 " Birnbaum, the publican, has put out a bottle full of peas 
 and offered a dozen of beer for the best guess at the number." 
 
 " That will do nicely. There is what you call humour in 
 that. You can make a clever thing of that by working it up 
 a bit plenty of go, of course showing how ingeniously 
 contrived the idea is on Birnbaum's part, and how, by pro- 
 moting friendly intercourse in this way, he is contributing to 
 the healthy activities of the town, and with a verse or two, if 
 you are in the mood some sort of poetical motto. So get 
 to work. You ought to be pleased, my boy, to be at the centre 
 of things at your age! Well, be diligent. I will run down 
 to the town and see if there is any more news." 
 
 Heine Wulk drew on his old overcoat, and, plunging both 
 hands in its huge, gaping pockets, made hi way first to Birn- 
 baum's, where he drank a glass of grog and had his estimate of 
 the number of the peas noted down, then on to the other public 
 houses. After exchanging a few words with the citizens 
 lounging and grumbling there, he returned to his office.
 
 74 HOLYLAND 
 
 Kai Jans had in the meantime set up the two articles and 
 read part of a novel sent in in yellow backed numbers by a 
 Berlin firm, in order to decide whether it was worth repro- 
 ducing. He was now occupied in setting up the programme of 
 a variety entertainment. Heine, squinted towards the galley 
 where he ought to have been working, but, too lazy even to 
 take off his overcoat, sank down into his comfortable chair 
 by the table and picked up the Hamburg paper. 
 
 In came the Bojes' neighbour, Anna Wiesche Martin from 
 Friestadt, filling the office with her portly person. Putting 
 down her basket on the long table, she said, " We've got a 
 cow for sale, Heine. Will you put in a short advertisement ? " 
 Then, taking a small packet of butter out of the basket, " I've 
 brought a pound of butter for you ; we're rather short of cash." 
 
 " It's a great nuisance," said Heine, " that no one pays in 
 cash. I don't mind taking the butter, and I shouldn't have 
 anything to say against half a sack of potatoes. Last autumn, 
 when pigs were so cheap that Hans Hansen let five run about 
 the market-place, Jacob Sothmann thought he would do me 
 by giving me a pig for the notice of his wife's death. How- 
 ever, the price rose, and I was all right. But just look here 
 in this corner." He pulled back a goatskin. " Have you any 
 use for that? Come here, Kai, my boy, and look in here. If 
 you ever get on to a big paper, think of what you may collect! 
 One must have an all-round education! Look here! children's 
 clothes." He felt in a big, soft heap. " The merchants are 
 the worst of all." 
 
 " All rubbish," said Anna, shaking her head. " I must go 
 on oh, yes ! " she stopped. " I wanted to tell you School- 
 master Boje's wife is coming across by the afternoon boat. She 
 is going to move into Hilligenlei, and wants a little house 
 three rooms so that she can take in a schoolboy as a boarder 
 a low rent." 
 
 Heine, lost in his reflections on barter, shook his head. 
 Anna departed. 
 
 She had only just gone when Kassen Wedderkop came in, 
 big and heavy. A Hilligenleiman by birth, he had travelled 
 all over the world and spent years in Eastern Asia in the 
 employ of an old-established Hamburg firm. When he was 
 forty he received an injury to his spine which made him an 
 invalid and obliged him to give up his profession. Returning
 
 HOLYLAND 75 
 
 with a modest competency to his native town, he had begun, 
 tentatively at first, to write articles on. commerce and commer- 
 cial policy. He soon realized that his gifts fitted him better 
 for the theory than the practice of commerce, and now, ten 
 years after his return, he was a writer of repute on important 
 English and German papers. He had no friends in Hilligenlei; 
 people did not know him. Grave and taciturn in manner, 
 he went about lost in thought. His voice, when he did speak, 
 was a loud bass. 
 
 Now, supporting his short, thick-set figure heavily on a 
 crutch, he asked, in his usual dry and entirely practical manner, 
 for a particular back year of the newspaper in which, as he 
 had recently learnt, his father had given an account of his hon- 
 ourable career. 
 
 Heine, who could not bear him, gave him the paper, and 
 Wedderkop went to the window where Kai stood at his work. 
 He looked attentively at the tall, pale youth, whom he had 
 met from time to time in the street ; then, sitting down heavily, 
 he began to read, groaning from time to time, a habit which he 
 had. 
 
 All sorts of people came in. A woman whose ill-fed, untidy 
 children played in the streets, ordered confirmation cards. The 
 sexton brought the church notices. Then came the mayor. 
 
 " Oh ! his worship ! " said Heine, bowing low. 
 
 Daniel Peters gave Wedderkop a distant nod. Pulling up 
 his light trousers, he took his seat with dignity. " I had not 
 much time for the article," he said. " The care of the town 
 leaves one no rest, day or night." 
 
 " It is fearful," said Heine, smoothing down his hair, " to 
 think what your worship might have been could you have put 
 the pound that God has given you out at interest." 
 
 " Yes," said Daniel Peters, stroking his long, silky mous- 
 tache. " One is used to the full as an official. Life goes by. 
 But enough of that. I will read you what I have written." 
 
 " Put down your work, Kai listen with all your ears." 
 
 Daniel Peters laid his hand on his knee and read, with 
 raised shoulders and contracted throat all Hilligenlei folk 
 raise their shoulders and contract their throats when they want 
 to say something important "Title, ' The Future of the 
 Town of Hilligenlei.' 
 
 " Our sea, the murderous North Sea, is wonderful mur-
 
 76 HOLYLAND 
 
 derous in its wrecks, North in contradistinction to the English 
 name of German Ocean most wonderful of all when it is 
 not there at all, when it presents us puny mortals with its vast 
 expanse of sand, and invites us all, citizens of Hilligenlei, from 
 magistrate to labourer, to go forth to the Danish sandbank. 
 And why thither? Is the question just? No, no; and yet 
 again no. There, in the Danish sandbank, over which the sea 
 comes gliding up, lies the hope of the good old town of Hilli- 
 genlei, so often sorely tried. Our readers know what we 
 mean. Every man who is a true citizen and, thank 
 Heaven! there are still many such knows that. It was in 
 the year of our Lord 1813. In that year His Gracious Maj- 
 esty, now, alas! long since gathered to his fathers, had des- 
 patched to Gliickstadt a ship laden with three hundred thou- 
 sand florins for the use of His Majesty's army. Was it by the 
 effect of merely natural causes? No! As Christians, faithful 
 adherents to our early faith, we say it was by the will of a 
 wise and gracious God that the ship, driven by a mighty storm 
 into our bay, sank with all on board, and was swallowed up 
 at once in the sandy depths below. And the will of God was 
 shown in this also, that He directed the heart of His Gracious 
 Majesty to grant that if ever the ship should be recovered, its 
 cargo should belong to the town of Hilligenlei. Behold ! God 
 uses the forces of Nature for the service of His creatures. 
 Having determined to help this town, He has brought it about 
 that in the last ten years, since the present mayor, Daniel 
 Peters, has directed the affairs of our community, the sandbank 
 has been gradually dissolving. As the poet says, ' Fate has yet 
 some golden day in store.' The ship will come to light, and 
 Hilligenlei be a Holyland, as its name foretells. Now, well 
 administered, true to the faith of his fathers, it will then be 
 also freed from the burden of debt. And yet, although God's 
 goodness has been thus vouchsafed to us, some people are not 
 satisfied. From one year's end to the other they are for ever 
 agitating to have the harbour stream cut straight for the sake, 
 forsooth! of some fifteen wrecked crabfishermen, plying their 
 trade in miserable crafts, or the twenty smacks that come into 
 port. Supposing that their numbers did increase in conse- 
 quence of the widening of the harbour! Do we want that? 
 Do we want more intercourse? more life? more population? 
 Do we want a second newspaper, for example, to carp and
 
 HOLYLAND 77 
 
 criticize in present-day fashion? What should we gain? We 
 live peacefully here. We want none of the subverters of State 
 and Church. Alas that, as it is, we are not wholly without 
 them. As it is they lurk among us, polluting our Holyland. 
 We know their names and their comings and goings." 
 
 Daniel Peters drew a deep breath and stroked his long, silky 
 moustache. Heine, deeply impressed, said, in a low tone of 
 great solemnity, "There, Kai; there's style for you. I hope 
 you took it all in. There's a model for you an ideal. Put 
 the article in type straight away. I will come with you, your 
 worship." 
 
 They went out together without taking any notice of Wed- 
 derkop. Kai returned to his work. 
 
 After a time Wedderkop looked up again from his news- 
 paper. It seemed to him that there lay behind those deep-set, 
 serious eyes a wondering spirit, strangely mature in such a boy, 
 that looked out with the timid eagerness with which the heart 
 of a high-born maiden turns to her lover, trembling lest he 
 should not prove worthy. His mouth was firmly cut and his 
 chin broad. " What a strong, beautiful face," he thought. 
 
 " That's a good piece of work of the mayor's," he said in 
 his loud voice. 
 
 " Yes," answered Kai, rather startled ; " he writes well." 
 
 " His ideas are clever," thundered Wedderkop. 
 
 " He is a very clever man," said Kai, intelligently. " He 
 could be in the Government if he liked, I expect, if he did not 
 sacrifice himself for the sake of Hilligenlei." 
 
 Wedderkop opened his eyes still wider. " You learn a lot 
 here, I suppose? " 
 
 " Rather," said Kai, emphatically. " Mr. Wulk is so good 
 in letting me do a lot of work for myself." 
 
 "For example?" 
 
 The proud red in his pale cheeks contradicting his modest 
 manner, Kai gave an account of his share in the leading arti- 
 cles. " Quite recently, the first article I have written all by 
 myself was published the story of the bishop and the coun- 
 tryman. Perhaps you read it." 
 
 " It was you, then," said Wedderkop, " who sheltered at 
 the old woman's in Heesedorf on the night of the storm. I 
 have heard the old lady tell the story myself." 
 
 " She tells it quite plainly. I have improved it."
 
 78 HOLYLAND 
 
 Kassen Wedderkop looked at him attentively and nodded. 
 The young artist had made the countryman a spiritless fellow 
 and the bishop a perfect madman, and added all sorts of mean- 
 ingless detail. "Yes; you improved it! Where are you in 
 school?" 
 
 " I have been in the top form for the last two years." 
 
 Kassen Wedderkop got up, groaning, and began to move 
 away. " If you care to," said he, " to-morrow morning, being 
 Sunday, you might come and see me about ten o'clock. Bring 
 the newspapers for the last quarter with you, do you hear? 
 Yes; bring them with you." 
 
 Nearer acquaintance with this man, whom Heine Wulk and 
 the mayor dismissed with such contempt, filled Kai with consid- 
 erable respect. He looked up at his bulky figure with a certain 
 timidity and promised to come. 
 
 Next morning Kai found Kassen Wedderkop at home in his 
 house outside the town, busy making notes on a block that 
 rested on the arm of his chair from the portentous foreign news- 
 papers and reviews that he was reading. He groaned heavily 
 from time to time, rather from the dull sensation of oppression 
 in his back than in actual pain. 
 
 " Sit down, my boy," he said, " and don't be frightened if 
 I speak rather loud. I got into the habit in Korea, where I 
 was for a long time and everyone is hard of hearing. It's a 
 great, open country. That's right. I see you've brought the 
 papers." 
 
 He took up the first and, without any further remark, began 
 to read aloud in his tremendous, droning voice, making short 
 remarks from time to time. Kai sat on the edge of a chair, 
 cap in hand, looking straight in front of him, growing first red 
 and then paler and paler. 
 
 " Just look at this sentence there. You see how utterly 
 absurd that is ? And here, further on here are three sen- 
 tences of which two are quite superfluous and the third is 
 drivelling. And here just listen to this Look at that 
 stuff with those quiet, intelligent eyes of yours and tell me 
 what you think of it? Yes, I should rather think so. Here's 
 some more. That's true enough, but only half a truth the 
 rest of it is lunacy, stark lunacy, and the conclusion is fatuous.
 
 HOLYLAND 79 
 
 As a matter of fact, the truth is You know that well 
 enough yourself." 
 
 He went through two or three entire newspapers, sentence 
 by sentence, in this way. When he came to any article by 
 Heine Wulk or the mayor, " Nonsense," he said ; " wretched 
 rubbish! It's all a mass of nonsensical lies. The amount of 
 harm these people do with their newspapers is fearful. People 
 drink in all this gas this tall talk about nothing, this self- 
 satisfied patriotism and think it so splendid that they go and 
 make a faith out of it. They think by it, speak by it, write 
 by it, and the result is that, through the newspaper, their whole 
 lives are made a lie. Have you no eyes? Don't you see all 
 the lying, all the pretence, there is in Hilligenlei? " 
 
 Kai sat motionless on the edge of his chair, staring at his 
 cap without seeing it. He was deathly pale. All his gods were 
 falling from their thrones and turning to ridiculous puppets 
 before his eyes. 
 
 The story of the bishop came next. Kassen Wedderkop took 
 it up and pulled off all the fine plumage in which Kai had 
 decked it out, feather by feather, showing him the simple 
 beauty of its original form. Kai's lips twitched and his hands 
 trembled. 
 
 "It's all nonsense, my boy your whole existence stuff 
 and nonsense. I know you're right-minded and sensible enough 
 at bottom. I thought, when I saw you in that filthy office, 
 ' That's a true Saxon ; he won't follow other people ; he will 
 think things out for himself.' The inside is right enough, but, 
 Good Lord! the outside! A windbag, that's what you are 
 a windbag. Do you understand ? You ought to be thoroughly 
 ashamed of yourself." 
 
 Kai leapt to his feet and looked at the terrible man with 
 agonized eyes. " I know that you are right," he said. " You 
 don't need to say any more to me," and he darted out of the 
 door. 
 
 He ran out into the fields, not knowing what to do with 
 his life. It was like having been lifted up into the air and then 
 not knowing what field to fall on to when he could hold aloft 
 no longer. How often he had boasted to his parents of his 
 wonderful doings at the office, giving them to understand that 
 the mayor looked upon him with favour, and he was somebody 
 already in the town. When he was mayor, as he well might
 
 8o HOLYLAND 
 
 be one day, he would see that Hilligenlei was really a Holy- 
 land. How they had listened, their eyes full of quiet happiness; 
 his father smiling a little in his joking way over his son's proj- 
 ects, but pleased enough; and his mother she believed every 
 word. His face grew hot with shame. He groaned as he 
 ground his teeth together. 
 
 No, no ! Hilligenlei was no Holyland. He saw that plainly 
 enough now. He knew it well enough now. There was noth- 
 ing holy in it. It was a Bedlam a Bedlam full of lies and 
 deceit. He had been blind. He had not known what holiness 
 meant. He did not know the world, that was what it was. 
 Now he must learn to know it. A smith has to understand 
 his hammer. A man must know the world if he is to be any 
 good at all. Know the world? To do that he must get away 
 from Hilligenlei and go to Hamburg. Hamburg was in the 
 world: Hamburg was the world: there he would go into a 
 really big printing-office: the great thing was that he could 
 open his eyes there and get to know the world. 
 
 He got up and went slowly towards the town as if his feet 
 were weighed down with lead. In the harbour street he saw 
 Anna and Pete Boje coming up from the pier and wanted to 
 get out of the way, but their keen eyes had perceived him, 
 and they called to him with their clear voices. They told him 
 that they were on their way to the park: their mother had 
 taken a house in Chestnut Row and they were going to look 
 at it. They went up together, counting the pleasant-looking, 
 red-gabled houses built in a straight row under the chestnuts 
 by the moat till they came to an empty one without any cur- 
 tains: that was the one. It was a slip of a house, one story 
 high, the smallest in the row; downstairs the door and a win- 
 dow on either side, one window in the gable. They went in, 
 along the narrow passage that led out into the garden : looking 
 into the rooms, and out of the kitchen window. It was a very 
 small garden, but it had an apple-tree and a strip of grass for 
 drying at the end, and a little gate opening on to the pleasant 
 lane leading between the gardens back into the town. 
 
 The children inspected and considered everything with a 
 wisdom beyond their years, pronouncing it very satisfactory. 
 Anna especially was loud in her praise. 
 
 " The kitchen is my province," she said, pressing her fore- 
 head against the window. Then looking into the bedroom,
 
 HOLYLAND 81 
 
 " I shall sleep there, and the two boarders from the cathedral 
 school upstairs, and I will look after them." 
 
 " What will your brother do ? " said Kai. 
 
 They exchanged looks, then Pete said quickly, " Mother 
 has bought a knitting machine ; father left debts sixty 
 pounds that have to be paid off." 
 
 " We don't mind telling you" said Anna. " Mother wanted 
 Pete to go to the technical school at Itzehoe, but that would 
 have meant her working ever so hard at the old knitting 
 machine. So it's settled Pete is going to begin earning straight 
 off; he's going to sea in four weeks to Hongkong just 
 think!" 
 
 Kai looked at Pete ; there was a new expression in the open 
 face, the earnestness of a set purpose that has counted the cost 
 and is not afraid. 
 
 An idea came into his mind, possessed it with irresistible 
 force. Suppose he were to go out into the wide world as a 
 sailor? Pe Ontjes was a sailor. Pete was going to be one. 
 Why shouldn't he? He no longer saw or heard what the 
 others were doing. ... A strange coast, what sort of people 
 live there? are they holy or not? Somewhere, somewhere in 
 the wide world there must be a Holyland if there is not life 
 is a strangely meaningless affair. . . . Well, the only thing 
 was to search, ask the people. What sort of people live there? 
 What is their manner of life? And to go right round the 
 world searching and asking; only so could one get to know 
 the world, and somewhere in the world one must surely find 
 the Holyland. When he had found it, then he would come 
 back home and make . . . He no longer saw or heard what 
 the others were doing; lost in his own thoughts, his own 
 dreams, he walked silently beside them; in the harbour street 
 he shook hands and left them. 
 
 When he came into the low little room at home he found 
 his parents sitting at dinner with his three sisters and his little 
 brother; there were pieces of potato all over the table, a 
 saucer with a few wretched ends of bacon in the middle; that 
 was their dinner. The hard frost had kept Thomas Jans out 
 of work for seven weeks. 
 
 " Father," he said, at the door. " Pete Boje is going to sea. 
 I want to go too. Don't ask me whether it is right: I know 
 it is right. Father, I must go! "
 
 82 HOLYLAND 
 
 They turned pale, and silence fell upon them. They looked 
 down, not knowing what to say. If a son had come home 
 drunk, even though he were thirty years of age, Thomas Jans 
 would have chastised him with the sudden resolution of fierce 
 anger. But now that his fifteen-year-old son looked up at 
 him with these serious eyes and said, " Father, I must go," a 
 vague feeling of uneasiness and fear came over him, a feeling 
 that he dared not bar the way on which his son's spirit seemed 
 to be sent forth as if by great, unknown, and secret forces, 
 sent forth to find strength. There was a mixture of humour 
 and bitterness in his keen, deep-set eyes as he murmured, " So 
 to sea and then, the lightship . . . and so a labourer, and 
 the best room empty, always empty." 
 
 " No, father," said he, " no, trust me for that. My eyes 
 are open, I shall find something." 
 
 Little Mala Jans sat silent by the table, her eyes full of 
 tears. She only thought he was going away from her, and to 
 sea 
 
 Four weeks later the two boys were sitting on their chests, 
 looking first to the right and then to the left down the Ham- 
 burg quay, fairly deserted at this time of day, and then across 
 to the ship, lying at anchor. They were waiting for the boat 
 to come and take them across. Pete, feeling casually in his 
 pocket, came upon a piece of paper. Pulling it out he saw 
 written in a little crooked writing that he knew, " Keep God 
 before your eyes and in your heart all your life. Guard 
 always against sin and against anything contrary to God's 
 commandment. Your loving mother, Hella Boje." Sticking 
 the paper quickly back into his pocket he looked down the 
 quay again as if nothing had happened, wondering, as his 
 father had done sixteen years ago, how his tall clever mother 
 could possibly write so badly. Kai had seen, and when Pete 
 looked away he began to feel secretly in his pocket, and there 
 he found a piece of paper right enough. He pulled it out and 
 glanced quickly over it. He recognized it at once as one of 
 those grand poems that Heine Wulk was so fond of reprinting. 
 The title was " The Pious Mother's Farewell to her Son on 
 Confirmation Day." Flushing red he stuck it back in his 
 pocket without another thought.
 
 HOLYLAND 83 
 
 Pete craned his neck and said, " I say, who's that coming 
 along? Isn't it your friend the Dusenschon boy?" 
 
 " Very likely," said Kai, " he has been four weeks in Ham- 
 burg." " 
 
 It was Tjark Dusenschon, certainly. He came along tall 
 and straight-limbed, a graceful figure now that he had aban- 
 doned the stiff walk copied from the mayor, his blue tie blow- 
 ing about. 
 
 " I knew you were going on board to-day. It's a pity for 
 you to be going, Kai, you ought to have gone into an office 
 like me. I have a very good position with a barrister." 
 
 Pete paid no sort of attention to him. His eyes were fixed 
 on the ship watching the people go on board, and a man slide 
 down into the boat. 
 
 "Where are you going now?" said Kai. 
 
 " I am on my way to meet a friend who is going to introduce 
 me to his club only for officials and their wives. I don't 
 care anything at all for women, but that's just the sort of per- 
 son to whom they are most useful. Always polite, pleasant, 
 cool, you see, that's what I am! And then my name is mag- 
 ficent, Tjark Dusenschon, and my royal blood " 
 
 " You don't talk about that, do you ? " said Kai. 
 
 " No, not I. I leave that to others." Seeing the boat 
 approaching he stepped back. 
 
 " Well, boys," said the sailor, " there you are. If you 
 haven't got sense you have got luck, she's a right good ship. 
 Is the long thing coming too? " 
 
 " No," said Dusenschon, taking a step further back. 
 
 " A good voyage to you ! " and waving his hat gracefully 
 he stalked away. 
 
 When the boxes were on the thwarts Pete caught hold of 
 the oars with both hands and pushed the boat of!. 
 
 " Holloa," said the sailor, " so that's the sort you are, are 
 you?" 
 
 Kai Jans, lost in thought, was gazing into the water. 
 
 "Push the box to one side," said the sailor "a philos- 
 opher, eh ? " he said to Pete. 
 
 Pete gave a short, scornful laugh. " Yes, he is looking for 
 a kingdom ! "
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 IN the little house under the chestnuts by the park the two 
 Boje girls grew up apace, very tall, very slender, with masses of 
 thick, fair hair, so tall indeed that strangers who happened to 
 pass by when one of the children came out of the house would 
 say in surprise, " What big people live in that little house ! " 
 Anna Boje passed her seventeenth year and entered on her 
 eighteenth. She carried her magnificently proportioned figure, 
 crowned as if by a royal diadem by the waves of her fair hair, 
 with a grace of movement that would have befitted the highest 
 rank. Nothing in Hilligenlei was so beautiful as she. Igno- 
 rant alike of herself and of the world she dreamed the dreams 
 of girlhood with no wishes beyond the accomplishment of her 
 household duties for her mother sat all day at the knitting 
 machine good news from Pete, and, one day, a clever, hand- 
 some husband for herself. Heinke was in her eleventh year, 
 a long-legged, fair-haired child, with dainty clear-cut features, 
 and eyes as grey as steel. She played with the boys of the 
 neighbourhood, in winter in the park, under the trees or on 
 the ice, in summer on the sands at low tide right out to the 
 mouth of the harbour stream. Like her sister Anna at the 
 same age, she was never without a bruise somewhere on hand, 
 knee, or foot, the mark of a push, a knock, or a tumble; and 
 yet, though she was in the thick of everything, shouting and 
 running with the best of them, she was reckoned proud, like 
 her sister, because of a kind of royal dignity in their erect 
 bearing, their delicate pink and white faces, their calm, clear 
 eyes. Heinke's thoughts did not travel very far. When she 
 was alone she thought of her big brother Pete's home-coming, 
 with a certain fear of his being rough and boorish ; for the 
 rest she was content with a day on which her pride was grati- 
 fied by success at school, and her mother did not scold. No 
 day passed without some wrangle with Hett, her youngest 
 brother, who wanted everything his own way. His mother 
 
 84
 
 HOLYLAND 85 
 
 loved him most of all, and always took his part, but as a 
 matter of fact he was a liar, greedy, and weak, the rotten twig 
 on a splendid tree. 
 
 Hella Boje's hair lost its beautiful sheen in these years. She 
 could not get into touch with her daughters, their shyness kept 
 them from any expression of tenderness. She knew that they 
 would not turn to her until the years brought to them also 
 understanding of a man's love and so of their mother. Now, 
 therefore, all her love expended itself upon her two sons, one 
 gone out into the wide world to help her, the other so pretty 
 and loving in his ways, who put his arms round her with such 
 coaxing tenderness although a big boy now. It was of them 
 and of their future that she thought as she sat at her knitting 
 machine all day long. 
 
 It was an evening in April: the chestnuts were beginning 
 to be spiked with green. Anna dawdled instead of going down 
 to Harbourmaster Lau's to borrow the big map of Eastern 
 Asia on which her mother followed the route of Pete's ship 
 with never wearied interest. '' I don't like going now," she said, 
 " that great Pe Ontjes is there, the map belongs to him. Lena 
 Winkler says he gives himself the airs of an old man of fifty, 
 though he can't be more than twenty-four. He was insuffer- 
 able even as a boy." Her mother paid no attention, merely 
 remarking, " Go, now, don't make a fuss." 
 
 It was with a very haughty expression that she took off her 
 apron, and went out by the back door through the garden into 
 the lane, and so in at the kitchen door to the harbourmaster's 
 house. She hoped to find the mother there and get her to bring 
 out the map. She was there washing up, but her only reply 
 was to say, pleasantly enough, "Am I your train-bearer? Go 
 and get it for yourself, he won't bite." 
 
 Mate Pe Ontjes Lau sat by the table at work on a big 
 drawing. Looking up calmly he said in the tone which a 
 young mate uses to a sailor, 
 
 "Well? What do you want?" 
 
 She stood as straight as a dart, anger rising within her, and 
 told him in a high, rapid voice the reason of her coming. 
 
 He got up in his slow, comfortable way, and took down the 
 map from the wall. " How is your brother getting on? 
 Rather at a difficult stage just at present." 
 
 " How do you mean, Mr. Lau? "
 
 86 HOLYLAND 
 
 " Well, about eighteen one does not want to be a boy any 
 longer, and one hasn't quite become a man." 
 
 " Pete wants to be what he is, always," said she, " he hasn't 
 got such an immense idea of himself as some people." 
 
 He did not see the hit, but was pleased at being addressed 
 as Mr. Lau. His tone was rather more friendly as he said, 
 " Look what I am drawing here." 
 
 She came quietly close up to the table and examined the draw- 
 ing. As she did so he looked at her and was conscious of a 
 curious feeling of pleasure in the contemplation of the strength, 
 health, and purity of this handsome girl, a feeling such as one 
 has when, after going far and passing thousands of houses, 
 forgotten as soon as seen, one suddenly comes upon one, stand- 
 ing in a quiet green garden, full of an intimate charm that so 
 sets it apart from all the others that even after one has passed 
 it also one cherishes a tender remembrance. 
 
 " That's the Hilligenlei harbour stream," he said. 
 
 "What's the drawing for?" 
 
 " I have long had the idea " 
 
 " Fifty years at least " said she. 
 
 "What are you saying about fifty years?" said he. 
 
 " You talk as though you were fifty," said she, calmly. 
 
 This froze him again. He said coldly, " I have worked out 
 a plan for having the channel laid straight so that the crab- 
 fishers can get quicker to their lines and the smacks come in 
 and out at any time; I'm going to lay it before the mayor 
 to-night." 
 
 " Indeed." She gave another hasty glance at the map. 
 
 " When do you sail again ? " 
 
 " To-morrow. I am going to Samoa as mate on the Gude 
 Wife. I have been mate for the last three years." 
 
 " Indeed," she said, tossing back her head so that he could 
 see her white throat. " Pete will be mate in two years." 
 
 The force of unconscious attraction held them, but they tried 
 hard to hurt one another in some way. 
 
 " I should like Kai Jans and Pete on board with me well 
 enough," said he, as if lost in thought. 
 
 " I daresay you would," said she. " They will take good 
 care of that ! " 
 
 "Why?" said he.
 
 HOLYLAND 87 
 
 "Why?" said she, standing by this time in the doorway. 
 " Why ? It would hardly be pleasant for them." 
 
 "Why not?" 
 
 " Well," said she, " you played with us as children, and now 
 now you like me to call you Mr. Lau! Mr. Lau indeed! 
 And who are you ? Think of that time on the sandbank ! " 
 
 Suddenly it flashed across his mind that he had stood naked 
 before her. She blushed and cried out in an outburst of un- 
 controllable rage, " You are just the same now, just as insuf- 
 ferable as you were then. That's what I wanted to say to you. 
 So there!" 
 
 She banged the door and was gone. 
 
 When she got home she said to her mother, " He is the most 
 insufferable person in the whole world, and a fool to boot. I 
 am not going to Aunt Lau's again as long as he is there." 
 Then she went to prepare supper. 
 
 After supper a mad idea took possession of her; she would 
 run down the lane into the town hall garden. The mayor 
 always sat with his curtains drawn back so that everyone could 
 see him at work. She would give a cautious peep in at the 
 window. 
 
 As soon as it was dark the idea was carried out. She took 
 up her position among the shrubs by the window. There was 
 Pe Ontjes Lau standing by the big table, his drawing spread 
 out in front of him. At the table sat Daniel Peters, hand- 
 some and dignified, the two aldermen beside him, struggling 
 not to fall asleep. Pe Ontjes was saying with his usual calm 
 assurance, " That's what must be done." 
 
 The mayor twisted his beautiful silky moustache and began 
 affably, with a side glance at the two old men, 
 
 "My dear Mr. Lau Then he began a discourse on 
 what he called a " sound system of local administration," 
 which seemed to have every reasonable prospect of lasting in- 
 definitely. While he was still in full train Pe Ontjes suddenly 
 packed up Hilligenlei and the harbour stream under his arm 
 and saying calmly, " I will reserve my scheme for the new 
 mayor," departed with his drawing. 
 
 Anna Boje was still standing confused and annoyed by such 
 behaviour when she heard his step draw near. He also was 
 making his way home through the garden. 
 
 " Hullo," said he, mockingly, " Eavesdropping? "
 
 88 HOLYLAND 
 
 " What is that to you ? I can stand where I choose, I sup- 
 pose?" 
 
 " You're a cross-grained, quarrelsome chit," said he, in a tone 
 of serious annoyance. " Unless you change you will come to 
 no good." 
 
 " Who are you to speak to me? " said she, " when you can't 
 even spell channel on your drawing it was written channal 
 channal ! You didn't learn much at school. Do you sup- 
 pose I don't know that? You only got to the top by beating 
 everyone who knew more than you. There! " 
 
 Pale with anger he turned away. Going in the opposite 
 direction she breathed deep with excitement, thinking. " You 
 will never hate anyone so much in all your life as you hate 
 him." She absolutely revelled in this new feeling until it spread 
 so as to fill her soul, while she imagined ways of showing 
 him her boundless contempt, and wondered whether Pete could 
 help her to pain him. " I wish I could do him some harm. 
 If I could only harm him somehow." Her spirit was troubled 
 with dark confused thoughts, and her lovely eyes had a hard 
 look in them. She gave a quick sob. Then she walked down 
 the chestnut walk towards her house, and then turning up and 
 down several streets till she became more calm, a great longing 
 filled her for someone towards whom she could feel friendly. 
 For some time she could not find anyone ; then near Ringerangs 
 inn, under the lime trees on the further side of the park, she 
 came upon a farmer's son who had sat next to her in school 
 at Friestadt. He recognized her, and waited till she drew 
 near. 
 
 " I knew you from your walk," said he. " I should know 
 you half a mile off! " He walked by her side and told her he 
 had come back the day before yesterday from serving in the 
 army. 
 
 It was quite exciting to have this handsome boy walking 
 by her side, so full of friendliness. Anna talked in a way 
 unusual for her, about her mother, and Pete ; asked him about 
 his sister and one mutual friend after another, and as they 
 talked their eyes filled with a tender pleasure in one another 
 that rose higher and higher. 
 
 " What dear eyes he has! " 
 
 " How dear and pure her eyes are!" 
 
 "What a delightful laugh,''
 
 HOLYLAND 89 
 
 " How I should like to touch her hair with my hand; it is 
 so, so beautiful." 
 
 " Dear boy, how nicely he speaks of Pete." 
 
 " If I could only press her to me once, and hold her fast! " 
 
 When they turned into the lonely limewalk that goes 
 across the park to v the chestnut trees, his thoughts became more 
 and more insistent and absorbing; he became silent, and she 
 likewise, quite silent. In his young manhood he thought fear- 
 fully. " Dare I kiss her? she is very proud. . . ." 
 
 Her heart thumped and her throat seemed to close up as 
 she thought, " He is going to kiss me. . . ." She thrilled 
 with the sweet joyful thought. When they came to the last 
 piece of shade he caught hold of her, and kissed her, kissed 
 her many times, without saying a word. She stood quite still 
 in unspeakable confusion. 
 
 When he let her go she ran till she came to the door of her 
 house. Then going into the kitchen she cooled her burning 
 cheeks and brow with water ; but they still glowed with excite- 
 ment. In order to have an excuse for ^remaining in the kitchen 
 she fetched her mother's store of silver, six dessert spoons, a 
 dozen teaspoons, and a sugar bowl, and began to clean it. 
 
 Still dreaming herself in his arms she rubbed and polished, 
 and in the midst of her absorption the child in her balanced 
 each spoon between two fingers of her uplifted hand so that 
 it stood out bright against the darkness of the kitchen wall. 
 
 " Oh, how heavenly it was . . . firm and strong he stood 
 there and clasped me fast ... so that I couldn't move. . . . 
 Oh the joy ... the wonder of it ... my knees felt quite 
 weak ... I was utterly happy." 
 
 Dreaming thus, her hands and eyes playing, like children 
 left alone, with the spoons, came upon the names written upon 
 them, " On the occasion of their marriage . . ." it stood on 
 each, with the name of the giver and the date after it. 
 
 " I wonder what mother looked like then. She was as young 
 as I am, only two years older . . . young and beautiful and 
 happy. Oh, what happiness to be always with the one one 
 loves best in the world . . . that must be lovely, and fearful 
 too at the same time, fearful ... oh no, not fearful at all, 
 altogether lovely. Then the first baby came that was me. 
 I wonder was mother very big then : some women look so 
 hideous. Was she very ill? How long did they live alone
 
 90 HOLYLAND 
 
 together without children? . . . Oh, yes, I can tell from the 
 spoons." Holding a spoon up against the light she counted 
 from tKe wedding day to her birthday, then counted again, her 
 lips contracting to a narrow line and a hard expression coming 
 in her eyes; she threw the silver noisily into the drawer and 
 went upstairs to her room without saying good-night to her 
 mother. 
 
 From this day her natural pride and shyness grew. At first 
 she could not resist the temptation of going along the limewalk 
 when she had shopping to do in the evening, to stop at the 
 spot where he had kissed her, standing with her eyes shut to 
 feel all the sweetness of that kiss. Soon, however, she forced 
 herself to resist. She did not want to think of such things. 
 They seemed to her now full of hidden dangers, like the soft 
 grass that grows above a bog; she felt vaguely that hot blood 
 ran in her veins, and was uneasy as is the wood in May when 
 the morning grey brings the first birds. 
 
 She was harsh towards her mother, speaking as little as 
 possible, and found fault continually with Heinke and Hett. 
 
 In autumn, when the big schoolboys who lived in their attic 
 threw down a chestnut or a branch to her as she passed below 
 she took no notice. 
 
 When she went to balls she was in great request as a dancer, 
 especially among men who danced well. The exquisite grace 
 with which she danced and her superb beauty made it a joy 
 to move and be near her; but no one ever ventured to invite 
 her to take a glass of champagne or stroll under the dark trees. 
 And she noticed that this was so, and she grew more and more 
 proud and scornful, and pretended that she had no inclination 
 for such things, almost persuading herself that it was the case. 
 
 Her mother bore her eldest child's coldness in silence, remem- 
 bering her own restless unhappiness at that time in her life, 
 and feeling powerless to help. She worked all day at the knit- 
 ting machine to pay off the sixty pounds of debt, taking every 
 penny and shilling that Pete sent from his small earnings for 
 that purpose carefully wrapped up in paper to the savings bank, 
 to be ready for the naval school, longing for the day of his 
 return to come at last. 
 
 Autumn came again with its beautiful days of fresh wind 
 and clear sunshine; and the sun shone through the little win- 
 dow above the door into the dim little passage, and at last the
 
 HOLYLAND 91 
 
 postman came, and this time with a parcel. A parcel ! After- 
 wards they could hardly tell how they had all managed to get 
 into the passage together; the little place was illuminated by 
 the fair heads. Then they took the parcel into the sitting 
 room. Heinke, always ready and never in a hurry, had the 
 chisel ready in her hand to break the wood open ; and she took 
 out the little Chinese boxes carefully packed close together 
 inside in a strange fibrous kind of straw. The name of the 
 owner was on each. 
 
 " That's yours, mother." Hella Boje sat down on her chair 
 beside the machine and touched the shiny black wood with 
 trembling fingers. 
 
 " He bought it," she said softly, " he held it in his hand," 
 and her eyes suddenly filled with tears. 
 
 Anna gazed in silence with an expressionless face at the deli- 
 cate object in her hand, thinking with a secret softening of the 
 heart of the brother whom she dearly loved. 
 
 Heinke had put aside her song book, and taking off her jet 
 necklace placed it in her box, admiring its workmanship and 
 praising her absent brother in affectionate tones. " It is too 
 sweet of him, mother. . . . One thing, mother, Hett sha'n't 
 have this one, anyhow." 
 
 Hett looked around, ready to complain if the others had 
 come off better than he had; seeing no present grievance he 
 went out to play. 
 
 Hella Boje held the letter in her hand, but could not read 
 it because her eyes were full of tears. 
 
 " Read it out, mother." 
 
 " I can't, dear : you read it." 
 
 So Heinke read: 
 
 " MY DEAR MOTHER, I bought this for you the day we 
 came here, Hongkong, from Vladivostock. I wanted to give 
 it to you myself, but now I have come to the conclusion I am 
 not going to come back to Hilligenlei until I can go straight 
 to the navigation school. That's another year from now. I 
 am earning more here, you see. I don't know whether Kai 
 Jans will go with me on to my next ship. You see we have 
 served our time now and we're on the lookout for a first-rate 
 sailing vessel. If he wants to come with me again I shall be 
 quite glad, for he is really a nice fellow, but I don't depend
 
 92 HOLYLAND 
 
 upon it. I expect he will stay with rn,e because he needs to 
 have somebody to talk to about everything, and he can't do 
 that with the old sailors. He is an extraordinary creature. 
 
 " Dear Anna, you can keep darning needles in your box. 
 You must have a great deal to do for the two children. What 
 am I saying? Heinke must be a great girl by now and Hett 
 is eleven ! When I was buying your box the Chinaman, hav- 
 ing no respect for my eighteen years, tried to cheat me. He 
 didn't see our sail-maker standing behind me, however, and he 
 gave him such a box on the ear that he fell down on the mat- 
 ting. So here it is. I have had to buy a new suit of clothes, 
 my old coat was quite done, and I had grown out of it. I have 
 still seventy-five shillings in my box which will come to you 
 soon after this parcel. Fifty shillings are to go into the savings 
 bank for the navigation school, twenty-five to go to paying off 
 father's debts, if you are well and can spare the money. Dear 
 Anna, be a good daughter and don't let mother sit all day at 
 the knitting machine. If I keep my strength I can pay off 
 father's debts in five years. She is not to sit doubled up for 
 that! Dear mother, you are not to worry over the stockings, 
 I can darn my own just as well as Anna does them. I can tell 
 you there's not a button missing on any of my shirts or drawers. 
 Always smart, that's the first thing: then second, attention! 
 and third, never contented always learning and getting fur- 
 ther on. Trust me, my eyes are always open. There was a 
 young American on board our old ship, he only wanted to see 
 the world, he said, that was all, and then become whatever he 
 chose. His father is a clergyman. I learnt a great deal from 
 him. Never say die that's my motto ; one must always be 
 ready and bright, and I am that, you can be sure. Kai is no 
 good at it, he's always so shy, like neighbour Martin's two- 
 year-old do you remember it, Anna? Once we ran after it 
 for half a day. You wanted to ride on him, but we could not 
 catch him. 
 
 " Dear mother, I have decided always to go on a sailing 
 vessel. Lots of people think they are going out of fashion, but 
 the captain said to the mate, ' You'll see, mate, big sailing ves- 
 sels will always be the cheapest for heavy freights and long 
 distance journeys.' A little while ago a lovely American sail- 
 ing vessel passed us, magnificent, I can tell you. It hadn't any 
 more canvas than we had, but it beat us for all that. The
 
 HOLYLAND 93 
 
 mate swore and the captain pretended not to see. I examined 
 it to see how it was. In Vancouver and San Francisco I spent 
 the whole day at the docks; I enjoyed myself, I can tell you. 
 A dock like that is my Hilligenlei, my Holyland. 
 
 " Kai Jans, I do believe, went to sea to find it. Every time 
 we go on shore he cranes his neck and goes among the people 
 and through the streets with his eyes open ever so wide, not 
 saying a word. We were in Vancouver for twenty days, and 
 pretty free. He got hold of an extraordinary old sailor who 
 went on shore there and they went off for three days right 
 through the town and up into the mountains. Afterwards, 
 when we were being towed out of the harbour he forgot his 
 work and everything in gazing over to the mountains; and 
 suddenly he said to me, ' Do you know, there is a magnificent 
 country there, beyond the mountains, wide and broad and clean 
 as if it was holy. I shall go and settle there one day, I think.' 
 The end of the story, of course, was a talking to from the 
 mate. All the time we have been away from Hilligenlei he 
 hasn't got to know anyone except me and the queer old man. 
 He's always by himself or listening with wide-open ears. They 
 all like him because he's a good fellow, always ready to help ; 
 and when the steward was so ill he burst into tears. 
 
 " Dear mum, when I come home you'll be astonished to see 
 how big and brown I have got. You can't imagine what my 
 hands are like. Goodbye. Keep well, and think often of your 
 loving son and brother, 
 
 " PETE BOJE." 
 
 Each of them read the letter at least three times to herself, 
 and they talked it all over, with occasional intervals of silent 
 thought. Then Hett came in and went to bed. Then Anna 
 and Heinke went too Anna, cold as usual, without saying 
 good-night; Heinke quiet and gentle. 
 
 Holla Boje sat for an hour at the machine. The dull, 
 monotonous tick-tack of the lever went on in the low, little 
 room. Then she went into the bedroom. She went up to her 
 children's beds and bent over their faces first Hett, her 
 youngest; in the dim light of the lamp she could see the strongly 
 marked, obstinate lines of his handsome face ; then Heinke ; and 
 for a long time she stood, lost in thought, as she gazed at the
 
 94 HOLYLAND 
 
 clear, calm face with its open features and strong, beautiful 
 mouth. 
 
 Going across to the room where Anna slept, she saw as she 
 looked down upon her that the time was not far off when she 
 would be a woman a strong, passionate woman, like herself. 
 
 She went back to the other room, and, sitting on the edge 
 of her own bed, thought of the conversation she had more than 
 once had with her husband. " Unless our children are fortu- 
 nate enough to come early into good hands, they are almost 
 sure to suffer much." Folding her hands, she began to pray 
 fervently for her children. 
 
 As the ardour of her prayer abated, her thoughts, now more 
 at rest, came to her hero, her brave one in the far, far distance, 
 wondering how he looked and whether he were now voyaging 
 on a new ship. So she fell asleep and dreamt dreamt that 
 she saw his ship, a tall and graceful vessel with two masts 
 placed in front at a curious angle. And it was cast from side to 
 side by a heavy swell, purposelessly, as if by the hands of wanton 
 children. She seemed to see the deck desolate and ruined, and 
 thought, " That is no Hilligenlei." She stood anxiously on the 
 bank gazing at the ship, and saw it distinctly how distinctly! 
 Yes, there it was, driven on, tossed and turned by the swell 
 that rose in waves as big as houses.
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 
 THE schooner Clara from Hamburg drove before a light 
 breeze and heavy swell on the southern China sea. She had 
 suffered severely in the eight days' storm, having lost half her 
 rail and the whole of the forecastle, to say nothing of the main- 
 sail. 
 
 They had chosen very ill. Fourteen days ago, when they 
 were hanging about the quay at Hongkong, the Clara lay in 
 harbour, long and narrow, with her masts bent very far for- 
 ward. Pete, who devoured every vessel with his eyes, stared 
 across at the schooner till its boat came to land, and then he 
 asked its name and destination of the awkward, emaciated- 
 looking man who sat in it, looking at them with anxious eyes. 
 
 " Havre, with tea and matting. We want two hands. I am 
 the mate." 
 
 They asked one question after another, Pete casting longing 
 eyes the while at the grey schooner. Then they stepped back 
 and consulted together. They would rather have gone to 
 America, 'Frisco, or Vancouver on one of the huge wooden, 
 four-masted schooners, new and strongly built, and the best 
 pay in the world. But, after all, where they went did not 
 matter much, and the schooner was splendidly built, certainly. 
 
 They took their leave of the good old ship with everything 
 in order, but their consciences were strangely perturbed, and 
 they shrank away as if doing something that they would not 
 like to be seen. 
 
 They had now been eight days at sea, and knew that they 
 had done a very stupid thing. 
 
 The captain was drunk all day long; the mate was a fool, 
 who should have been a tailor instead of a sailor. The cook, 
 an elderly man, generally more than half-drunk, had been on 
 the Clara for years, and in the course of time got the captain 
 completely under his thumb. The crew twelve hands in all 
 had been picked up eight days ago in Hongkong and Macao 
 
 95
 
 96 HOLYLAND 
 
 from the ends of the earth. There was a Hamburger, who had 
 destroyed himself, body and soul, with brandy; a tall, pale 
 Frenchman, two Austrians, a Dutchman, three Italians, two 
 Belgians, a short, pleasant little Dane, and a dirty labourer from 
 Gateshead, who was lame. They were all young and inexpe- 
 rienced, all more or less possessed by the brandy fiend. Not 
 one of them was over two-and-twenty. 
 
 And the vessel ? What is the use of graceful outline if every 
 week you have to spend an hour at the stiff, creaky pump, and 
 canvas, ropes, and metal-work is all rusty and mouldy? 
 
 And now the storm had washed away the whole forecastle, 
 with galley, bunks, chests, sacks everything in it. They 
 stood, now, on the greasy decks, the ship rolling heavily from 
 side to side, most of them half-drunk, all of them wet to the 
 skin, hungry, and cold. Some were clearing away the ropes 
 that hung about the scupper holes; others were mending the 
 wretched old sails; others patching the railing, cursing the 
 while, and discussing the damage that had been done. 
 
 Pete Boje sat half-buried in a sail with an angry, forbidding 
 expression on his face, Kai Jans beside him, splicing a topsail 
 yard. His features looked drawn and pinched showed the 
 signs of exhaustion and want of sleep. They shpank from 
 meeting each other's eyes, in shame of their own stupidity. 
 
 Then the others began to mock at Pete Boje. " Come now, 
 Hilligenleier, what are you working so hard for? Why do you 
 always hang about the captain and the mate when they are on 
 deck? And why, when it isn't your watch, do you lie on deck 
 in the cold instead of going to sleep? " 
 
 Pulling himself together, Pete laughed pleasantly and said, 
 " It's because I'm afraid for all your lives that I'm always on 
 the watch, day and night." 
 
 Thereupon they said, " Not if we know it! We don't trust 
 you the least, not in the least! " 
 
 " He's false ! " said several voices. 
 
 " Only yesterday," said the Austrian, " I had just had a 
 glass, and was busy splicing not fast enough for him. He 
 wrenched the rope out of my hand and glared at me like a wild 
 beast, I can tell you that." 
 
 Then up spake Kai Jans, the silent, and laying his thin hand 
 on his breast, " I will lay my life on his honesty. I have known 
 him since he was a child."
 
 HOLYLAND 97 
 
 They were silent with astonishment. 
 
 After a time Kai Jans came up to Pete. " I say," he said 
 in a low, thick voice, " if you have any game on, play it for all 
 it's worth, so that they may not suspect anything." Suddenly, 
 as he said this, the thought crossed his mind of why he had left 
 Hilligenlei and gone out into the wide world. Hot tears rose 
 to his eyes. " This hideous hole will make an end of us! " he 
 groaned. 
 
 " Head up," said Pete ; " don't be afraid. As sure as God 
 is in Heaven and I keep strong, in spite of all this filth, we 
 shall see Hilligenlei again. Come, lying and deceiving and 
 eyes always open that's what does it." 
 
 A time of misery followed. They slept, stowed away, with 
 fourteen men in the wretched, dark hole forward. When the 
 captain was off duty he sat in his cabin, drinking and sleeping 
 and tinkering at dainty little models of sailing ships, of which 
 he had constructed at least fifty, all different and all correct in 
 every detail. Each of them had in its hold a paper with par- 
 ticulars of speed, weight, and numbers. He played with them 
 endlessly, drinking the while. 
 
 " I will tell you about the old 'un," said the Hamburger. 
 " You must know that when he was young he had a lovely 
 shipbuilding yard on the Reiherstieg at Hamburg. When he 
 took to drinking, how r ever, he let his business go to rack and 
 ruin. He was bankrupt, and went to sea." 
 
 In his watch he used to sit, huddled up, without moving, on 
 the skylight, one of the models on his knee, staring first at the 
 dainty little object in his hand, and then out to sea. 
 
 The mate was oppressed and uneasy among the men. Now 
 that he had to share their quarters he lost the last of his assur- 
 ance hardly dared to say anything to them. They took no 
 notice of him at all. 
 
 The cook stirred the dirty semi-raw food in a big iron pot 
 held together at the top by pieces of twine. The beans were 
 hard, the salt fish smelt bad, and the biscuits began to be alive. 
 However, they took what came, since the cook had the brandy 
 under lock and key. Drinkers do not mind dirt. 
 
 Eight days more, and the tall, pale Frenchman became ill. 
 His legs swelled. He hobbled along the leeward side, catching 
 hold of the railing as he gazed out to sea, full of homesickness.
 
 98 HOLYLAND 
 
 His parents were respectable people, but an early taste for gin 
 had ruined health and character. 
 
 Soon one of the Belgians sickened. He got as yellow as a 
 quince, as he lay with burning eyes in the dark corner of the 
 captain's room on a bit of old sailcloth, his hands folded on his 
 breast, eating nothing except, now and then, a bit of mouldy 
 biscuit, which the Frenchman dipped in brandy and forced 
 between his unwilling teeth. 
 
 The others kept well, but were always either drunk or lazy. 
 Pete Boje worked like two men, and watched like three. He 
 got as thin as an underfed hound, but his iron strength was 
 unbroken. Poor Kai Jans, ( always slight and fragile, seemed 
 to shrink; his chest sank and his back got bent as if there were 
 a heavy sack of corn on his young shoulders; he walked wearily, 
 and his eyes had a dry, unhealthy glint. 
 
 In this miserable plight they drove south to the burning 
 southern islands, and the smell aft became unendurable. Kai 
 Jans, Pete, the Dane, the mate, and the Frenchman the 
 whole forecastle watch got matting out of the hold and made 
 a sort of hut on deck. There they lay, and at night looked up 
 to the calm splendour of the tropical sky, the tops of the masts 
 grazing, the stars. 
 
 They saw that the captain often went to sleep on his sky- 
 light, the ship's model held carefully in his hand a most 
 curious picture in the starlight and went down below from 
 time to time to refill his wretched little lamp; and they saw 
 the bottle going round amidships, and, therefore, they resolved 
 that one of them must always be on the watch. But Kai Jans' 
 eyes would not keep open. 
 
 Thus they slowly approached the Malay Archipelago. The 
 wind was very squally, and kept hauling forward. On the 
 fourth night they all fell asleep, exhausted by work and 
 wretchedness. Suddenly a loud banging noise awakened Pete. 
 Rousing himself by a violent effort of will, he sprang up, and, 
 running aft with a loud cry, seized hold of the helm. A black 
 squall was driving hard against the sails. The man sat, dead- 
 drunk, at the wheel. Pushing him aside with his foot, Pete 
 exerted all his strength to port the helm. The others came up 
 and leaped to the braces, calling to the watch. The watch was 
 huddled together in a drunken sleep. They had to pull down 
 the topgallant sail alone. The ship recovered itself.
 
 HOLYLAND 99 
 
 The mate was desperate: he smote his forehead with his 
 hand. 
 
 " What am I to do? What am I to do? " 
 
 ''Overboard with the brandy," said Pete; "now, this very 
 moment. There's the cook lying there he's got the key." 
 
 " That's no good," said the mate, shaking his head despond- 
 ently. " I did that once, but the captain quite lost his head, 
 and the cook spat in the pot." Sitting down on the companion, 
 his hands folded between his knees, he became lost in thought, 
 and said: " If I get home this time I shall give it up and buy a 
 public-house at the wharf." 
 
 " Yes," said Pete, bitterly, " if we ever see a wharf again." 
 
 " I know the owner," said the little mate, opening his eyes 
 wider and wider. " He has large feet, and a face like an ox. 
 The Clara is on the condemned list ; it will have to go. That's 
 why it has such a captain and mate." 
 
 Suddenly, eighteen-year-old Pete Boje was close by his side, 
 and said to him with blazing eyes : " Mate, let us speak frankly, 
 as one man to another." He struck himself on the breast. 
 " Will you manage to get the captain to give me the starboard 
 watch? " 
 
 " He won't do it, Hilligenleier never! What would the 
 cook and the Belgian say ? " 
 
 " I am twenty-two. I was two months at Emden, until the 
 money came to an end." 
 
 " No good, Hilligenleier not a bit of it." 
 
 " Thy father has a dockyard in Hilligenlei: I grew up among 
 the shavings. I used to tear my stockings on the splinters. 
 Tell the old 'un that. . . . You know it's true, Kai Jans." 
 
 " Yes, it is so," said Kai, in a loud voice. " I can take my 
 oath on it, mate." The mate got up and walked away. Pete 
 Boje's face contracted until it was positively ugly. 
 
 " I will flatter him up all I know, but the day I leave this 
 ship I'll spit in his ugly face." 
 
 " Be quiet," said Kai, anguish in his face, yellow with 
 fever. 
 
 Soon afterwards the captain himself appeared and called for 
 Pete Boje. He looked straight at him with his true honest 
 eyes, and told him everything he wanted to know. Whereupon, 
 calling his watch together, he said to them : " From now on, 
 do ye hear, Pete Boje has my watch."
 
 ioo HOLYLAND 
 
 Immense excitement. Pete swore furiously that he would 
 not take it. 
 
 Kai Jans said in a tone of contempt: "Navigation school, 
 indeed ! You can do without that ! " 
 
 Even the kindly little Dane, who had stood by them 
 staunchly, remarked that he liked Pete; but this was out of 
 order, and order must be preserved. They all lied right and 
 left: a magnificent display of Saxon cunning. Gradually the 
 others calmed down and said, " Let him stand there on the 
 poop and hold the helm and watch himself; we'll have our 
 supper." 
 
 So this evening Pete took the first watch, leaning over the 
 compass and gazing with restless keenness at the sails. Kai 
 Jans, transferred to the larboard watch along with him, stood 
 with aching limbs and heavy head by the helm, his arms twitch- 
 ing from hard work at the pumps. 
 
 The rest of the watch got more drunk than ever. About 
 midnight, one of the Italians, a very young good-natured fellow, 
 who had taken to drink for want of food and a kind of false 
 pride, came aft with a full bottle in his hand, which he offered 
 to Pete, staggering and saying something in his own language. 
 Suddenly overcome, Pete seized hold of him and pressed him 
 to his breast, looking at him with distraught eyes, saying: " Je 
 veux voir ma mere, coquin!" then let him go. He went for- 
 ward cursing. " Kai Jans, mon cher, using your hands and 
 legs is not enough; you must use your head too, as I do. Do 
 you know a Hilligenlei boy told me once that you could tell 
 stories. Now then, open your mouth, and talk to them so that 
 they forget this swilling." 
 
 "Pete, I can't I'm too shy." 
 
 " The wind is getting up, and they won't watch ; there is 
 four foot of water in the hold, and they won't pump." 
 
 " Pete, I can't. I can do it all right in my head, but tell it 
 to them I can't." 
 
 "Kai you must. We want to get to Hilligenlei, don't 
 we? Only get us to Capetown, and then we'll run away. Kai, 
 once we're at Capetown we'll run . . . ." 
 
 So Kai went down the companion, dragging one foot after 
 the other, and said cheerfully : " Now, boys we must pump 
 a bit." 
 
 "Pump! . . . Come and drink with us, man."
 
 HOLYLAND 101 
 
 "Very well. . . . but now come to the pumps!" 
 
 They began to pump, but soon got tired of it. " That's 
 enough." " Lord, what hard work." 
 
 " Yes," said Kai, " my grandfather was better off than I 
 am." 
 
 "What has your grandfather got to do with us?" 
 
 "What's my grandfather? He had a queer experience, I 
 can tell you." 
 
 "Tell us about him," said the little Dane; "tell us about 
 your grandfer." 
 
 "Go on we'll pump a bit the while." 
 
 " Well . . . about my grandfather. For a great many years 
 he was a thresher with a man called Ohle Griesack; and this 
 man . . . every evening he used to fill his huge boots with 
 corn, and so bring home about four pounds of corn every eve- 
 ning. That was the sort of creature he was." 
 
 " Go on we'll pump a bit more." 
 
 " The mad thing was that he had not a bad conscience about 
 it. If he had the parson wouldn't have said anything to him. 
 But when Ohle Griesack came home and shook out his boots, 
 he used to laugh. Of course, that would not do for the parson, 
 and he went to him. He sat himself down with his full weight 
 in the armchair, and rattled off some twenty or thirty texts. 
 But Ohle Griesack remained unmoved. All that did not mat- 
 ter to him, he said : he might do anything that his conscience 
 approved of. He felt he had a right to take the corn, and was 
 never happier or more peaceful than when he sat down in his 
 armchair of an evening, took off his boots, and shook out the 
 corn. What the parson said was so much Greek to him. He 
 got quite jovial, poured the parson out a glass of brandy, and 
 wished him as good a conscience as his own. Well so the 
 same evening the parson went to talk to God about it." 
 
 " Let's pump a bit, now." 
 
 " Well first of all, God thought of going Himself. Then 
 he sent one of His lieutenants. Towards evening, when Ohle 
 Griesack was slowly making his way home across the fields, 
 feeling pleased with himself and with his heavy boots on ... 
 who should he see sitting on Ahrens' hedge? The angel Ga- 
 briel. His heavy white wings hung down to the ground, and 
 when he got down one wing stuck on a nail, so that he had to 
 unfasten it with his white hands. Then he went with Ohle
 
 102 HOLYLAND 
 
 Griesack and talked to him. But he stood firm. With the 
 best intentions he could not do it ; if he were to look into every 
 hole and corner of his inner nature, with a lantern like the 
 poor woman in the Gospel he could not find a single dark 
 or dirty spot for the devil to turn in. He invited the angel in, 
 took off his boots, and shook out the corn in his jovial way; 
 then going in stockinged feet, he fetched the brandy flask, and, 
 apologizing for having only one glass in the house, he drank 
 with the angel and was glad that he approved of the flavour. 
 The angel went to God, and told Him how it was ... all as 
 it should be! So " 
 
 "To it, again, boys! " 
 
 " Well . . . then said God. ' There is no help for it. I 
 must put on my boots and go and speak to Ohle Griesack my- 
 self.' He got up, not meaning to have a whole day's work 
 with the business, but to polish it off before breakfast, and so 
 he went on the morning of our Lord in aller Herrgottsfriih 
 and was already sitting on a sack of wheat when Ohle Grie- 
 sack and my grandfather came in to the threshing floor. Ohle 
 Griesack was rather frightened when he saw the Lord God sit- 
 ting there on the sack of wheat, without any state, but with 
 immemorial eyes: eyes that were not made yesterday. He 
 spoke to Ohle Griesack in friendly fashion; but to no purpose; 
 none at all. Ohle was a stout little person, with high round 
 shoulders. He drew up his shoulders a shade higher, so that 
 he really looked as if he had three heads, and said: If God 
 would only be so good as to give him a bad conscience, he 
 would be very much obliged : he could not manage it for him- 
 self, though he had taken a great deal of trouble over it. 
 
 " God went away without more ado ; but, of course, he did 
 not care about being seen up on high, and so he spent the whole 
 day hanging about the harbours in London and Hamburg. 
 Evening came, however, and he had to go home. You can 
 imagine they made faces there behind his back, glad that the 
 Chief had failed for once. So they sat down to supper and 
 enjoyed it very much. Then God, who always sits at the head 
 of the table, lifted up his grey head, and commanded Death, 
 who always stands at the door, to go and bring Ohle Griesack 
 that night to the end of his journey, and then go to the old sur- 
 geon Riihrnann in Hilligenlei, and tell him to be ready to take
 
 HOLYLAND 103 
 
 off Ohle's cap in the morning. He wanted to know what was 
 wrong with the man, he did." 
 
 " To it again, boys ; pump away ! " 
 
 " Well ... so it happened. My grandfather watched by 
 the side of the man till he died. Very early, next morning, 
 when, my grandfather had just lit Ohle's short pipe, which he 
 had taken in compensation for his watching, in came first old 
 Ruhmann and then God, with two of His angels. Old 
 Riihmann cut away, and the angels bent over Ohle. God sat 
 comfortably in Ohle's armchair, looking round the room, well 
 pleased to see it so clean. Then old Ruhmann shook his head 
 and said he could not find anything, 
 
 ' No, nor we either,' said the two angels. ' He is just like 
 everybody else.' 
 
 " Then God gave a deep sigh and said ' What a lot of trou- 
 ble about a Holstein working man ! ' Then he got up, and 
 taking the brain in the hollow of his hand, he examined it with 
 his clear, shining eyes. Then, after looking at it for a short 
 time, he said : ' Yes, look here. Do you see this little twist 
 . . . there . . . and here, again it turns aside just the least 
 bit. Do you remember that time when we examined the great 
 poet's brain? The twist was just the same, only it went the 
 opposite way: one a thief, the other a poet! What an endless 
 trouble and fuss these men do make. They trouble and fuss 
 and judge they're always judging. It's simply incredible 
 how they always know best, and always find fault with every- 
 thing. And yet, only two days ago, the Saviour made my 
 meaning clear enough to them: ' " Judge not, but see that your 
 land is holy "... Do not forget,' he said, ' that Ohle dines 
 with us this evening; his clean room pleased me.' " 
 
 Kai Jan told stories all the time they sailed past Borneo 
 towards the Sunda Strait. He sat on a spar, and, taking his 
 hands from his knees, which had become as sharp and hard as 
 flints, he spread out his fingers as if holding a golden ball in 
 them to prevent it from rolling away. His big nose had got 
 sharp and pinched, and under his thoughtful forehead his eyes 
 shone like a fire beneath a dark grate. The sailors said to one 
 another in astonishment : " What has happened to him ? He 
 was the quietest of -us all, and now he tells such stories." 
 
 He began to rejoice in his weird gift, and in a voice hollow 
 with hunger and exhaustion, he told them all sorts of stories,
 
 104 HOLYLAND 
 
 mostly of the sea. The cook and the mate were laying evil 
 plans, and the crew was in subjection to them. The captain 
 was very ill. But then, lo! the storm clouds came . . . cross- 
 ing the mead of heaven . . . like great black swine, getting 
 bigger and bigger, and darker, and covering sky and sea . . . 
 and then suddenly there came down angels from heaven 
 and stood there in crowds. And from the stern God's clear 
 voice rang out a hard, hard judgment. There was nothing 
 on earth or in heaven that did not present itself in glowing pic- 
 tures to his sick, over-strained mind. The pale, sickly French- 
 man lifted up his thin arms and said : " O Hilligenleier, tu es 
 truly un bon Catholique; car les Saints the holy run 
 among the people." The cook only stared at the brandy-bottle 
 in his hand. Pete stood at the poop gazing at the compass and 
 the sails. The captain, by his side, stared gloomily across the 
 sea. 
 
 " I, Pete Boje, from Hilligenlei, am to drown and why? 
 To give that rich blackguard with the big feet his money? No, 
 thank you. Although my eyes are burnt out of my head by 
 thirst and fever and weariness, I am going to see Hilligenlei 
 again. Hush . . . mother raises her head . . . she has stopped 
 working the machine . . . hush . . . children . . . what a 
 quick step that is ... Anna, Heinke ... do you hear? Our 
 door. Yes ; oh, oh, Pete ! Pete, my dear boy ! 
 
 " Captain, you have never had a mate who had to ask so 
 many questions! " 
 
 " Ask away ; you're a man with the desire and the power to 
 learn that's what matters." 
 
 " Show me another model, captain." 
 
 " I'll bring up a couple." 
 
 "The sails, captain?" 
 
 ' They are right." 
 
 " Thank you, captain." 
 
 " Look here : this model. . . ." 
 
 They got safely to the Indian Ocean, and through the mon- 
 soon, and held their course. Their existence was wretched 
 enough. The bacon was putrid, the biscuit and the meal alive, 
 the water bad, their only shirt a torn one. The tongue clave to 
 the roof of the mouth, their eyes were burning. They jumped 
 and sang, always on the watch, lying through thick and thin. 
 
 " Laugh, Kai . . . don't look so sour , . . tell the black-
 
 HOLYLAND 105 
 
 guards a story . . . what's the matter, man? Have you been 
 drinking you? For shame! " 
 
 " Pete, I can't drink the water." He looked at him with 
 piteous eyes. " I sha'n't get drunk, you needn't be afraid 
 never. You needn't look at me like that. I say, the Dutch- 
 man is furious because you snatched the bucket away from him. 
 He is quite drunk, and raging against you. Speak pleasantly 
 to him, somehow." 
 
 " I will go afterwards and embrace him ! Go and tell them 
 a story." 
 
 Kai Jans told them a story. His tales grew unnatural and 
 violent. His fevered imagination drove his fantasies rushing 
 like wild beasts into their muddled brains. He told them 
 about the women's ship. " A crew of twenty women : just 
 think: all young, and all mad with love: the captain the most 
 beautiful of all. When their desires grew uncontrollable, that 
 is, about once a month, they used to make up to some ship in 
 the night, on the open sea. Ships side by side . . . they jumped 
 on deck . . . just imagine, boys, if that were to happen to 
 us ! " They all discussed it till they roared with excitement, 
 and so to the pumps; and he shouted to them in time to the 
 groaning of the pump, so that the wild pictures stood living 
 before their eyes. For him, indeed, they were mere stupid, 
 empty words; he was still pure. 
 
 It was fortunate that they escaped storms, and that the 
 nights were clear and starlit, for the mate could not have 
 held out. 
 
 " Captain, here is a comfortable chair. My father always 
 used to say we ought to build the sort of clipper they make in 
 Glasgow steel, with sharp bows and rounded prow : he said 
 we were far behind them. America and England, he used to 
 say." 
 
 " I built three of that sort," said the captain. " I was the 
 first in Germany to do it. I'll show you the model." He got up 
 stiffly, and went down the companion with unsteady step, re- 
 turning with the model carefully under his arm. Never by 
 any chance did his trembling hands break one, delicately con- 
 structed though they were. 
 
 " My father sent me to Glasgow, and across the sea. We 
 two, he said, were to teach Germany to build sailing vessels. 
 As an apprentice, I began in the rivet yard, and then rose to
 
 io6 HOLYLAND 
 
 drawing. I was quick and ambitious, and a hard worker. 
 Afterwards, I built ships myself, seventeen of them. Then I 
 didn't care about it. I went to sea, and now I am on the 
 Clara" He looked round for something. 
 
 " The bottle is beneath your chair, captain." 
 
 " My brother, the youngest, had a sandalwood cradle ; but 
 when I gave up the yard he lost spirit too, and now he is a 
 fireman on an English steamer. Many Germans stoke English 
 fires. Such heat, and dirt, and darkness poor, ruined Ger- 
 mans." 
 
 " Drink, captain, to get rid of such memories." 
 
 " The bottle is a curse, mate, but I can't do without it. We 
 Germans would have gone far if it were not for this accursed 
 drinking." He took a big draught, and, becoming lively again, 
 explained the model. When his voice became drowsy Pete 
 pushed the bottle towards him and he drank. 
 
 At last they came to Capetown. The two sick men had to 
 be put ashore. Pete and the young Italian rowed them. The 
 captain came, too, to buy more drink. Pete remained to watch 
 the boat. He went up to two or three sailors who were walk- 
 ing about the quay, but they did not tell him what he wanted ; 
 so he went on, looking about him. Then a very young sailor 
 came along in wide canvas trousers and shirt, a fresh-faced 
 fair-haired little fellow, with a quick step and lively eyes. 
 They recognized countrymen in one another. 
 
 "I'm on a three-master from Hamburg the Gude Wife 
 there. Cargo from Hamburg here. To-morrow we're going 
 to the South Sea, and we want two hands." 
 
 " Indeed," said Pete, giving a longing look at the ship lying 
 proudly in the roadstead. 
 
 " What's your name? " 
 
 " I'm Hans Jessen, from Brunsbiittel." 
 
 "You don't mean it! Not the chemist's son? I am Pete 
 Boje from Hilligenlei ; and there's another fellow from there 
 Kai Jans. Is your ship a good one? " 
 
 "Splendid! We all came from Blankenese and Gliickstadt 
 and that part." 
 
 The Hilligenleier stared in front of him. 
 
 " I expect," said Hans Jessen, " that when the mate hears 
 you came from Hilligenlei he will manage to have you taken 
 on.
 
 HOLYLAND . 107 
 
 " Look," said Pete, pointing to the Clara. " There we are. 
 Tell your mate two fellows from Hilligenlei are simply perish- 
 ing there. He can fetch us away this evening about ten if he 
 will." 
 
 Hans promised and went off. 
 
 The captain came staggering along, his eyes like glass; be- 
 hind him a case of bottles. They rowed back to the ship. 
 Pete took the case from the Italian, and carried it into the 
 captain's room. 
 
 " Good stuff, captain ? " 
 
 With his hoarse, embarrassed laugh the captain struck the 
 bottle with a trembling hand against the edge of the desk so 
 as to smash the neck, and filling up the glass offered it to him. 
 
 "No harm in that," said Pete, handing back the glass and 
 looking at him with speaking eyes. " Drink, drink! Have a 
 cosy evening, captain. We are lying here very snugly, and I'll 
 answer for everything." 
 
 The larboard watch went below; the starboard sat forward 
 drinking. He went up and down the poop. Kai Jans, who 
 wanted to keep near him, sat down on the companion and went 
 to sleep. He had not said a word to him. 
 
 After an hour, it being now dark, he went down into the 
 captain's room and found him asleep. Providing himself with 
 the keys he took his papers and Kai's, and taking twenty of 
 the best models he put them in a sack in the corner. Then he 
 went forward with five bottles of the rum, and, laughing shyly, 
 with his hand to his ear, he said, " Sh-sh . . . here are five 
 bottles for you of the very, very best ... sh ... So that the 
 old 'un doesn't notice." 
 
 They drank in silence and were soon asleep. Kai Jans 
 slept also. 
 
 Soon afterwards he heard the muffled sound of oars and a 
 cautious call. Pushing over the sack, he went to Kai Jans and 
 touched him on the shoulder. He stood up without a word 
 as if he had been expecting the summons, and followed with 
 half-closed eyes; following the teacher's clear-eyed son, as he 
 did in all practical matters. 
 
 Half an hour later they clambered on board the Glide Wife. 
 
 " Look," said Hans Jessen, in his cheery voice, " here is the 
 mate." 
 
 The two Hilligenlei boys looked up and saw a tall man
 
 io8 HOLYLAND 
 
 approach, pushing aside a boy who was in his way. They 
 recognized him in the starlight. 
 
 " Good Heavens," said Kai, in a low voice, " Pe Ontjes 
 Lau!" 
 
 He looked at them with a calm, distant manner, and think- 
 ing, "What starved, ragged objects!" asked them coldly for 
 their papers. 
 
 They felt in their pockets and showed them to him. 
 
 " You are in my watch." 
 
 When they were going below Kai saw for the first time 
 that Pete was carrying a sack, and heard a jingling noise inside 
 it. 
 
 "What have you got there?" he asked, suppressed anguish 
 in his tone. He knew already. He sat down on the ladder, 
 and, resting his head in his hands, said in despairing accents, 
 " We have deserted the Dane, who was always so faithful 
 . . . and now, we are thieves . . . and . . . oh, how he 
 looked at me ... Ugh! How dirty I am." 
 
 He covered his eyes with his hands. 
 
 " You'll always be a fool," said Pete, " and no use at all." 
 He entered the cabin with a distorted face.
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 
 THE Gude Wife. 
 
 Let there be no mistake; the three-masted full-rigged Gude 
 Wife, built on the model of Jan Marbst's pinnace. 
 
 Who has seen her? Not in harbour, her naked rigging 
 standing stiff and dry as a withered pine-tree, the temporary 
 stay collars grinding and whirring, the men working noisily in 
 the hold. No, not then. But when she charges, chased by the 
 south-easterly gale, through the raging seas, sixty-three degrees 
 south, off Cape Horn, and takes one grey wave after another 
 as she lies on one side with storm sail set, sheets and railing 
 glistening with ice ! Or when she holds her graceful course over 
 the endless expanse of dazzling sunlit water in the southern 
 seas, all her light grey sail spread like five-and-twenty light 
 grey wings, the pride and glory of her distant native town? 
 Or when she labours, buffeted by the north-western gale of a 
 dreary November morning, through the grey waste of waters 
 to the opening of the Elbe, or past the Texel breakers, dashing 
 white and terrible on either side, on, brave and grand, however 
 the weather bends her. 
 
 Can anything be said against the Gude Wife? Is there a 
 single piece of mouldy rope on board her to annoy the sailor 
 to-day, and throw him down dead upon the deck to-morrow? 
 Is there a single piece of superfluous ornamentation which gives 
 him useless trouble? 
 
 Think of the captain ! 
 
 The captain is Jan Deeken of Blankenese. True, his fine 
 body is set on a pair of short bow-legs. And nobody can deny 
 the fact that he goes up and down, up and down the deck with 
 short steps, head sunk on his breast, till he suddenly looks up 
 to cast a rapid glance on deck, and out to sea, and then, drop- 
 ping his head again, spits softly. True it is, too, that he is not 
 precisely soft-hearted. But what of all that? Was he not 
 just? did he not provide at the right time for Christmas? and 
 
 109
 
 no HOLYLAND 
 
 did he not give the cook a splendid store of provisions? and 
 what is most important of all did he understand his pro- 
 fession or no? 
 
 There was something almost uncanny about it. It seemed 
 impossible not to think that there was some connection between 
 his short-legged body and the elements. The whole sky was 
 clear blue, not a cloud anywhere on the horizon, and a steady 
 breeze blowing. Suddenly Captain Deeken stands still ; he stops 
 spitting. All the sailors stop their work to stand and look 
 at him. He lifts his head and snuffs the air. Then, turning, 
 goes straight down into his cabin and comes back wearing, 
 instead of his blue cloth cap, an old woollen cap of English 
 make, with a tassel on top, pulled down to his ears. 
 
 " So," say they all, " he's mistaken this time," so they all 
 say. " He's mistaken the old 'un ! The Lord be praised ! " 
 
 But he w r as never mistaken. Half an hour later the first 
 order was given. 
 
 Could anything be said against Jan Deeken? Not possibly. 
 The laziest sailor if a lazy sailor were conceivable on board 
 the Gude Wife had nothing but praise for him. 
 
 Then think of the mate! 
 
 He was proud no doubt about that. No one had ever 
 heard him make a joke: it was only seldom that he was even 
 friendly. It was not till much later that he used to joke, 
 secretly and not often, with Anna Boje and her children. 
 But he never bullied or swore at his men always calm, 
 always polite. And he knew his business. 
 
 Have you seen mate Lau? On Sunday mornings as he went 
 about the deck in fine weather, in the carpet slippers that his 
 mother had embroidered for him, with beautiful coloured 
 beads? Or that time when the boy fell off the beak into the 
 canal ; when he was on the railing in an instant, throwing out 
 the life-belt, while the word of command rang out clear: 
 " The lee boat out ! " Or when he took a hand with the rest ; 
 that time when they were worn out by six days of storm south 
 of Cape Horn, and five men could not bring down the halliard, 
 the wind was so fierce: then he suddenly took hold and they 
 found themselves all five sitting on deck! Or did you see him 
 turn the old seaman off the poop? The man had been pilot 
 on a Norwegian barque in his young days, with his certificate 
 from Trondhjem, and all the rest of it, until the brandy fiend
 
 HOLYLAND in 
 
 robbed him of his certificate, and turned him off the poop back 
 to the forecastle. Ordinarily a quiet simple fellow, once on 
 land he would drink until his heart grew sick within him, 
 and then he would climb up on the poop, his heart full of 
 the good old days. But when he looked up, there was mate 
 Lau, who looked at him and said a few words, quite quietly; 
 and he went grumbling forward again. Or if you had seen 
 him as he sat in his white linen suit, with a bottle of soda 
 water in front of him, outside the little tavern at Apia! Up 
 there came a troop of pretty brown girls, their bodies naked, 
 save for a wreath of flowers round the waist, and smiled at him. 
 He looked at them for a moment, and for a moment his eyes 
 were full of fire, that is true; only a moment, and then it was 
 gone absolutely gone. He looked at them calm and un- 
 moved. Certain it is that anyone who knew mate Lau of the 
 Gude Wife knew a strong and upright man. 
 
 Then the cook! 
 
 The cook was sublime. Klaus Gudewill was capable, clean, 
 smart; and no captain's cook, either! He was glad to set 
 a good meal before the aft cabin, but for the fo'c'sle it was a 
 labour of love. When it was possible, as it always was, he 
 stole for the fo'c'sle. And it was something worth while to 
 be the cook's mate ! Last and not least he possessed the quality 
 of a true ship's cook: he told stories well, and could sing. His 
 birthday came when they were in the Apia roadstead. The 
 captain had to stand him grog for the occasion, and then, in- 
 deed, what yarns, what songs! They lay on the deck and on 
 the spars listening to him. Last of all came the " Cook's 
 Song," a long one, with a verse for every day of the week. 
 He sang right to the end, and was so inspired that he thought 
 of singing the captain a serenade; but he declined, spitting as 
 usual. 
 
 Then the crew! 
 
 The crew? An unnecessary question, that. A good ship 
 and a good captain can always get good men if they want 
 them. Jan Deeken wanted them, and got them. 
 
 Captain Deeken did not trouble about the starved scare- 
 crows that had come on board in the Capetown roadstead. 
 The mate was responsible for them. And he did not trouble 
 about them either. Far from it. He looked away as if he 
 had never seen them, as if he had never shown them how to
 
 112 HOLYLAND 
 
 bite off an eel's head. He did not know them. Pete Boje 
 said, " He is puffed up with pride." From time to time Kai 
 Jans would try to catch his eye, fixing an imploring gaze upon 
 him; but without success. On the fifth day of their being 
 on board he found two beautiful clean shirts on top of the 
 little trunk that had been assigned to him. They were huge, 
 and the name had been cut out. Again he tried to meet his 
 eye, again in vain. So he went silently about his work, with 
 quivering lips. 
 
 The crew regarded them coldly. They had almost all been 
 six to ten years on the Gude Wife, and formed a kind of set 
 which had no need whatever of two ragged starvelings they 
 must look out for themselves, and see to their behaviour. No 
 one can become a member of a family in a day. Even the 
 boys and the three inferior sailors stood, with the others, aloof 
 from them. 
 
 Our two heroes of the Clara found themselves very small 
 and very unimportant all at once. They worked zealously, 
 were modest and friendly when off duty, lied hard about the 
 company they had left, marvelling at what seemed to them 
 such a number- of wise and upright men, and awaited the 
 progress of events. So things went on for thirty-five days, till 
 the great storm by Cape Horn gave them their position among 
 the others. 
 
 In spite of a heavy, wet north-wester they had held on suc- 
 cessfully to 63, and had come far enough west to pursue a 
 northerly course. Suddenly the wind veered round to the 
 south-west and raged for three days with icy squalls. 
 Towards evening on the third day, when the deck began to 
 be frozen over, the captain produced his woollen cap with 
 the big tassel. Darkness came on, and the steady icy wind 
 blew hard. About nine o'clock, when it was pitch dark, the 
 stir of wind and water grew. The air was filled with an 
 ominous rushing that roared and whistled in the masts and 
 rigging, whistling shrill and high. Pete Boje happened to be 
 at the wheel, the captain stumping, unwearied, up and down, 
 up and down. Then mate Lau took the wheel and said, 
 " Fetch the relieving tackle." 
 
 Pete ran and soon came up the ladder, the tackle in his 
 hand. At that moment a heavy sea came up suddenly from 
 aft, threw the Gude Wife forward, and knocked the old cap-
 
 HOLYLAND 113 
 
 tain's wretched legs from under him, so that he seemed in 
 danger of a bad fall. Lau let the wheel go and seized the 
 captain. In the twinkling of an eye Pete was in his place, 
 seized the wildly whirling wheel, brought it to a standstill, 
 drove it back. The pilot handed over the groaning captain 
 to the cook's care, and crying to Pete, " Well handled ! " 
 gave the helm to the boatswain, signed to Pete to go forward, 
 and, going up the companion, ordered both watches on deck 
 and all three upper topsails made fast. 
 
 The men stumbled out of their cabin in their heavy oilskins 
 and brailed up successfully. The storm shrieked wildly round 
 the ship. The Gude Wife rolled heavily. Huge seas dashed 
 over her, filling the main deck with foaming water. Lightning 
 darted fearfully across the dark sky. 
 
 The larboard watch, ten men strong, went up to the fore 
 topsail; the starboard, eleven men strong, "to the main topsail. 
 It was pitch-dark so dark that one could not see one's own 
 hand, and a sharp hail cut against their faces. Nevertheless, 
 they got aloft, and, buffeted by the wind, caught hold of the 
 stiff new canvas with fingers bent and frozen with the cold. 
 Kai Jans was at the arm, next him the man from Dantzig, and 
 then clever little Heine Marquard. Everything went well, 
 although the Gude Wife swerved at least thirty-five degrees 
 from side to side, and they could see nothing but the lightness 
 of the sails. All went well. The sail was on the yard. Kai 
 bent down to hand on the gasket to the Dantzig man. Trying 
 to catch hold, the Dantzig man, a tall fellow, bent over the 
 yard. Just at that moment the Gude Wife gave a sudden 
 lurch forward. A frightful cry rent the dark air. 
 
 Kai Jans saw nothing, but feeling a burning pain run 
 through the hand holding the line, gives a loud, wild groan; 
 looking to one side into the darkness, sees nothing but empti- 
 ness there, lays his hand again upon the sail to feel once more 
 the awful pain, lets the line go, and climbs down after the 
 others in the hideous darkness and the shrieking, roaring noise, 
 whimpering in speechless pain. 
 
 The starboard watch was there already a dark spot for- 
 ward. Then up came the mate, crying aloud: 
 
 "What was that cry up there?" 
 
 They shook their heads. One said, " Somebody gave a 
 shriek."
 
 114 HOLYLAND 
 
 " Twice they shrieked." 
 
 Then said the Norwegian, Torril Torrilsen, in his calm 
 voice, " I think that's one of them one of the larboard 
 watch, mate." 
 
 Pe Ontjes Lau stretched out his head towards the larboard 
 watch, which was climbing out of the sheets, and cried aloud, 
 " Kai Jans, my boy." 
 
 " He isn't here yet," said Pete. 
 
 Once again he cried aloud, " Kai Jans, my boy, art there? " 
 
 At last he came, last of all, stumbling, sobbing, on to the 
 deck. Seeing before him in the darkness the great Pe Ontjes 
 Lau, he ran to him with uncertain steps, and, holding up his 
 bloody hand, cried out, " O Pe Ontjes, dear Pe Ontjes, my 
 hand is all torn to pieces. I'm a cripple," and he held out his 
 hand as much as to say, " There it is for you." " The 
 Dantzig man flew from the yard, and tore it with the 
 line." 
 
 Pe Ontjes Lau had taken hold of him by the shoulder. 
 " Be quiet, my boy," he said. " Pete, take him aft to my 
 cabin." 
 
 The others, having scattered over the deck, now came back. 
 
 " He is nowhere on deck." 
 
 " Boys," said the mate, " You must see that we can't pos- 
 sibly put about. We're going ten miles an hour in front of 
 this storm." 
 
 Then Torril Torrilsen, the Norwegian, lifted up his two 
 hands and prayed aloud, " Our Father " praying quickly, 
 to bring rest to the struggling soul. 
 
 It was about midnight. 
 
 In the morning, about five o'clock, as they lay with both 
 lower topsails reversed, the wind got up more and more. By 
 six the main deck was covered with a wild, white sea, foaming 
 and roaring, and mountains of water, white as snow against 
 the darkness, flew over the fore deck. All hands stood on the 
 poop. About seven, when the morning grey began to appear, 
 wind and water came with such force against the ship that 
 she was hove on her beam ends, and could not right herself. 
 They stood waiting twenty above and the two wounded 
 below. 
 
 " It's coming." 
 
 " No, it's not coming."
 
 HOLYLAND 115 
 
 Then out cried the mate, "Topsail sheets up! Who vol- 
 unteers? " 
 
 Torril Torrilsen and the carpenter tried to hold Pete back 
 by the arms. 
 
 Dierk Peters cried out, " Let me. There is no one depend- 
 ent on me." 
 
 "He is too young." 
 
 The mate tried to say, " I will go myself." 
 
 But Pete Boje from the Friestadt dyke was already down 
 the companion, up the railing. Over came a great sea, but 
 he ducked, just right, with his arms fast round the post; and 
 then, how he sprang up! like a fox that has lurked a long time 
 behind the wall when he sees the hare coming out of the 
 wheatfield in the morning grey. Now he is by the forecastle. 
 Now he has let go of the railing. Now he fell heavily 
 against the cabin, leaned against it, and disappeared. 
 
 The next moment the huge light-grey sail flew out; whew! 
 how it rises. 
 
 Slowly the Gude Wife recovered. 
 
 "Where is Pete Boje?" 
 
 " He won't come back." 
 
 " The chain hit him." 
 
 " He's too young." 
 
 The mate looked quickly at Torril Torrilsen. " You are 
 in command on the Gude Wife," and ran down the com- 
 panion. It was wonderful to see the roaring water clothe the 
 big man as he went. Then Pete Boje appeared up aloft, 
 jumping on to the rail. Half way they met, and turned back 
 to the others. 
 
 Seven days the storm lasted. Seven days they toiled without 
 taking off their clothes, mourning for the man from Dantzig. 
 No one uttered a jest. 
 
 The eighth day was bright and sunny. A fresh south-east 
 wind blew them over the sea to the beautiful distant islands. 
 They packed his chest, tied it up, and set it in the storeroom. 
 Then, putting aside all thoughts of tempest, death, and weari- 
 ness, they were cheerful once more. Kai Jans and Pete were 
 now received as true comrades, but Kai was still an invalid. 
 The captain had put back the torn portions of his thumb and 
 first finger in their right place, smeared the whole with oint- 
 ment, and made an elegant bandage. More he couldn't do.
 
 Ii6 HOLYLAND 
 
 Kai went up and down the deck pale with pain and grief at 
 being a cripple and unable to do anything. He did as much 
 as he could with his left hand. 
 
 By the third day Pe Ontjes could bear the sight no longer, 
 and said to Pete, " What are we to do with him ? " 
 
 " Have you nothing he could read, sir? That might give 
 him something else to think about." 
 
 " When we are alone," said Pe Ontjes, " you might drop 
 the sir." 
 
 ' Just as you like," said Pete, proudly. 
 
 'What sort of books does he like? Nautical ones?" 
 
 'No; that isn't his line." 
 
 'Not his line. He's no sailor, then?" 
 
 ' No, of course not." 
 
 'Oh, ho! " said Pe Ontjes; "that alters the case." 
 
 ' He is fondest of the sort of books you read at school," 
 said Pete. " As a boy he read the French grammar through 
 and through. He's a curious being. He doesn't see anything 
 that's going on about him. He sees wonders, that's my 
 opinion." 
 
 Pe Ontjes looked across the sunlit water, lost in thought, 
 and said, as if to himself, "Yes; that is what he is like, and 
 it's an utter mistake for him to have become a sailor." 
 
 " Yes, of course," said Pete. ' There are lots of people who 
 otoght to have kingdoms, but where are they to get them 
 from?" 
 
 The mate walked aft, thinking deeply. As he did so his 
 eyes happened to fall on Heine Marquard, squatting on the 
 deck with his cap at the very back of his head, leaning against 
 the railing and scraping off the rust, whistling softly the 
 while. 
 
 "Tell me. You did Latin at school, didn't you? I've seen 
 all sorts of books about in your place. It was Latin, wasn't 
 it?" 
 
 Heine Marquard stopped whistling in his astonishment. 
 " Yes," he said, quite taken aback. " I brought the stuff with 
 me, and sometimes when I am alone in the cabin I amuse my- 
 self by knocking the books from one corner into the other. 
 One must revenge oneself somehow, sir." 
 
 " Well," said Lau, " you would be doing Jans a very good 
 turn if you would give him those books and help him a bit
 
 HOLYLAND 117 
 
 with them, don't you know just show the main road. I 
 expect he can find out the side paths for himself." 
 
 That afternoon Heine Marquard, son of the Berlin Coun- 
 cillor, fetched his Latin grammar and his Caesar, and after 
 spitting exactly like Captain Deeken, and making a number 
 of weird gestures expressive of horror and disgust, squatted 
 once more upon the deck, and began to point out the " main 
 roads," finding a pleasure in them for the first time in his 
 life. Kai Jans sat by his side with an eager, anxious face, 
 holding up his hand for it had begun to suppurate, and 
 throbbed painfully. 
 
 They all took to him. When they saw him secretly loosen- 
 ing the bandage and looking at his wound they all came up, 
 inspected it, and told stories of remarkable cases of healing. 
 "You needn't be afraid," they would say; "it will get all 
 right. You'll be able to pull down a tree with it. Only wait 
 and see ! " 
 
 When he sat in his corner reading and looked up they 
 made some joke, and Jan Petersen pretended to defend him 
 against all the others, saying, "You stick to your learning; 
 that's the thing for you ; " and to the others, " I will tell you 
 something. When I was at school there was a boy who learned 
 and learned till his head swam. He was always at his books. 
 He learned himself into a fever at last, and his mother had 
 to put him to bed." 
 
 "What happened to him?" 
 
 " What happened to him ? They put his books into his 
 little coffin with him. He asked them to do that, you see. 
 When a man's got learning in him there's nothing to be done. 
 I can tell you, it's as bad as drink." 
 
 They did not care so much about Pete Boje. Though he 
 had jumped down the ladder so bravely at Cape Horn and 
 was mighty friendly, they did not care for him. They felt 
 that there was something behind his friendliness, and that he 
 wanted to rise above them. Mate Lau saw little of him, 
 though he spoke to him from time to time. 
 ' The Clara was a bad ship," said he. 
 
 " I learnt a great deal there all the same," said Pete. 
 
 " I know the captain and the mate," said Pe Ontjes, con- 
 temptuously.
 
 ii8 HOLYLAND 
 
 " That explains it," said Pete. " They were not much like 
 the almighty here and his representative ! " 
 
 "Oh, indeed!" said Pe Ontjes, going away. 
 
 He came back next day when he was off duty. As usual, 
 Pete was sitting rather apart from the others, reading a book 
 on naval architecture which Heine Marquard had been given 
 by his father. Lau had his short pipe in the corner of his 
 mouth, and seemed to be in a good humour. He only smoked 
 when in exceptionally high spirits. 
 
 " I say, how is your eldest sister? " 
 
 " I think she is quite well," said Pete. 
 
 " How old is she now? about eighteen, isn't she?" 
 
 " Yes." 
 
 " What does she write to you about? " 
 
 " Oh, different things." 
 
 " I suppose she goes now and then to see my parents? " 
 
 " She never says anything about it." 
 
 " Has she ever said anything about me in any of her 
 letters? " 
 
 " She said once, ' I hope you will never have the bad luck 
 to get on the same ship as the big Lau boy ! ' 
 
 Pe Ontjes gave a short laugh. " How long ago was that? " 
 
 " Oh, about a year ago." 
 
 " So long? " he said, in a tone of relief. " She has changed 
 her mind since then, I think." 
 
 " I don't imagine so," replied Pete. 
 
 "What does a brother know of his sister?" remarked Pe 
 Ontjes, turning on his heel. As he went he said, " You can 
 fetch the year's numbers of the English Shipbuilders' Journal, 
 if you like. There are lots of models there. You know Eng- 
 lish?" 
 
 " Of course," said Pete, indifferently. 
 
 " You want to rise, of course. Nose in air I see." 
 
 ' That is in the family." 
 
 "Yes, indeed," said Pe Ontjes; "it is that!" 
 
 They had a glorious voyage. Everyone who took part in it 
 remembers it most vividly of all those who afterwards went 
 ashore to follow a profession. They were all so united. 
 There were no sets among them no cliques ; they were like 
 children in a real family. Didn't they, like the village chil- 
 dren, change their games according to the seasons? They play
 
 HOLYLAND 119 
 
 Puss in the Corner in winter, after the swine-killing; tops 
 and tig at Easter; dancing in summer; and in autumn they 
 run about the open fields flying their kites ; and in the same 
 way a proper ship's crew that goes far out over the wide, deso- 
 late sea, has special games for special times. 
 
 When they had rounded Cape Horn there was a great 
 cutting out of caps. " A plate, cook a big one and a little 
 one." Then two circles, cut round the plates, the difference 
 to make the edge, and there's your baker's cap. They could 
 easily have put all the work on to one person. Good Torril 
 Torrilsen and William Baldermann, who was rather weak 
 in his head, would gladly have made the few caps and 
 finished them off ready: but no! like properly-brought-up 
 children, they all took their part in every game. 
 
 Later, when they got into the southern monsoon they fished 
 and caught birds every man, no ! every child of them. A 
 bit of bacon at the end of the line, and they all gazed over 
 the stern into the water drawn by the keel. Hans Jessen held 
 the line. Then Hinnerk Lornsen, looking up, "Boys! here 
 are albatrosses. Quick, where's the sling? " 
 
 Hinnerk Lornsen plucked them and stuffed the feathers 
 into a canvas pouch which he brought home with him. His 
 children, seven of them, sleep in the little red house behind the 
 Elbe dyke on the feathers that their father plucked in the 
 South Sea. 
 
 Eight weeks later they had rounded Cape Horn again, 
 after a few rough days, and were slowly taking their home- 
 ward way towards Teneriffe with the south-east monsoon, not 
 touching a sail for three whole weeks. Then there was a great 
 carving of ships. The fore deck was entirely covered with 
 shavings. The best of all were made by old Dierk Peters, 
 who was close on fifty. As a young man he had become 
 acquainted with a pretty Holstein girl, whom he met in a 
 street in Hamburg. She yielded readily enough to the fiery 
 young sailor. He treated her honourably and married her. 
 In the first year of their marriage he spent twelve days with 
 her altogether. The first time he came home she was quite 
 beside herself with joy. The second time he found a strange 
 cigar-case on the window-sill. The third time his child lay 
 in the cemetery, and she could not even tell him the number 
 of its grave. The fourth time he found her lying unconscious
 
 120 HOLYLAND 
 
 on her bed : when she awoke and saw him she went out of the 
 room and did not return. He went back to sea, and became 
 quieter and quieter. He had become possessed with the idea 
 that he was a double murderer of his wife, inasmuch as he 
 had brought her to Hamburg from her native village, and of 
 his child, inasmuch as he was the cause of his miserable exist- 
 ence, and, therefore, of his death. He came of a stock that 
 bears burdens on its own shoulders instead of casting every- 
 thing on Providence or Fate: and the shoulders have grown 
 broad and strong in the process. 
 
 He carved the best ship, working at it for six weeks until 
 they reached the heights of Teneriffe, and presented it to the 
 mate. When Anna Bojes's little children lay on their backs in 
 their cradles and let their eyes wander, they saw either their 
 mother's lovely face or the ship hanging from the beam which 
 had been carved out on the Atlantic by Dierk Peters, who 
 called himself a double murderer. 
 
 Pete carved too. He was clever enough to take his part 
 in all the games which the Gude Wife's children played; but 
 he soon withdrew, and sat buried in the Shipbuilding Manual 
 lent him from the aft cabin, or in the study of his models. 
 
 They were in the south-east monsoon for five weeks. From 
 Slate Island to the Equator not a wind climbed into the rig- 
 ging to change the sails. Then came a slight squall, the 
 wind veered round to the north-east, and for weeks more, until 
 they reached Western Island, there was no work on the sails. 
 
 Such Saturday afternoons as they had! 
 
 Everyone knows what Saturday afternoons on a first-class 
 Hamburg sailing-ship are like; but there were never such 
 delightful ones on any ship as on board the Gude Wife on this 
 voyage. They all sat on deck to the leeward side one patch- 
 ing, another washing, a third darning, a fourth reading, a 
 fifth whistling, and a sixth talking to anyone who would 
 listen. 
 
 William Baldermann sat with his back to the water-cask 
 mending the lining of his mess-jacket. He really deserved 
 a new one, but he wanted to save. He had not been very 
 successful in doing it so far, but now he was really going to 
 save. As a matter of fact, it had hardly been worth while 
 before. What is five pounds, or even ten ? You can't begin to 
 save so little as that. Three days ashore, and it has all slipped
 
 HOLYLAND 121 
 
 through your fingers gone for ever. This time, however, 
 it was worth while. In Apia he had mercifully been ill, and 
 stayed on board, and now he had twenty-five pounds in the 
 old 'un's box. Twenty-five pounds! That would be some- 
 thing like, going home with that. First to Gliickstadt, to 
 the old people, and throw fifteen pounds on the table. " For 
 your old age." Then to Altona, to the navigation school. 
 High time for that, he was twenty-eight. That was why he 
 was darning away at his coat, and smiling happily to himself. 
 
 He did not carry out this plan. As soon as he got to Cux- 
 haven he fell into the land shark's hands. They passed off 
 two watches upon him one for each waistcoat pocket the 
 very newest thing; and the next day there he was in a box 
 in the music-hall at St. Pauli with a bedizened female on 
 either side. On the ninth day he slunk away from Hamburg 
 on board an English vessel. 
 
 Heine Marquard had brought his workbox on deck, and, 
 after soaping it over, was now standing upon it with legs wide 
 apart, working away with his broom, thinking, as he laughed 
 to himself, " Mother ought to see me now, and my lieutenant 
 brother;" and with that his home went out of his head, and 
 he began to wave his broom in time to an air he was whis- 
 tling. 
 
 Jacob Simsen and Otto Fink sat back to back. Jacob was 
 carving a panel with a Latin inscription to the effect that one 
 must wander far and wide, to distant countries, over the wide 
 sea, although one might meet death on the way. Otto was 
 darning. They were the same age about twenty that is, 
 in the fulness of their youthful prime; but their faces were 
 very unlike. Jacob had grown up in the kindly atmosphere 
 of a parsonage, among brothers and sisters now scattered 
 throughout Holstein in parsonages of their own; he was a 
 constant reader of the Bible and his great friend was Torril 
 Torrilsen, although the good old man was thirty years his 
 senior. The carving was for his mother, and as he worked at 
 it he thought of those roguish brothers of his and the little 
 sister, who will marry, one day, and have children, with a 
 gentle, kindly expression on his face. 
 
 Otto Fink scowled at the world. He was the son of a 
 rich farmer in Ditmarsh. One morning, when he was seven- 
 teen, he and the farm boy were ploughing over a wet ditch
 
 122 HOLYLAND 
 
 with four horses when suddenly the off-horse slipped and 
 pulled the one behind down with him. The boy and all' four 
 horses lay in the ditch. 
 
 His father, standing at the door with his hands in his 
 pockets, saw it all, and came up just as the boy and two horses 
 had been safely extricated. Although he saw how steep and 
 slippery the place was, he flew out against the boy in uncon- 
 trolled rage. " You're a good-for-nothing. . . . Get out of 
 my sight, and never let me set eyes on you again. It's the 
 best thing you can do. Tell me when you want to go and how 
 much money you want with you. I don't care about anything 
 so long as you go." And with these words he turned and 
 went. 
 
 The boy put everything to rights and ploughed till mid- 
 day. Then he went to his father, his face hard and set, and 
 said, " Give me the money." 
 
 His father, his face as hard as his son's, threw a fifty pound 
 note on the table without a word. The boy went to his sister's 
 room and got her to make him a purse of white linen, on a 
 stout cord. He put the money in it and hung it round his 
 neck, next to his bare chest. Then he left the house and went 
 to his aunt, who lived an hour's ride away, and stayed eight 
 days with her. Every evening for eight days his eyes rested 
 at curfew on his father's big, beautiful farm, and every evening 
 at the same time his father stood in front of the farm and 
 looked across to him. They saw each other standing thus, and 
 each knew how the other's heart yearned ; but pride would 
 not yield the pride of seventeen no more than that of fifty. 
 And no one else could reach those hard hearts mother, 
 sister, clergyman, or friends. They knew that every word 
 only hardened them the more. On the eighth day he went to 
 Hamburg and joined the Gude Wife. And now he sat back 
 to back with Jacob Simsen the one carving at his cheerless 
 Latin with happy thoughts of his dear home, the other living 
 again, with darkened face, the dark episode of his departure. 
 
 Two years later Jacob died of malaria, on board ship, near 
 the Gold Coast. Torril Torrilsen prayed with him, and spoke 
 the Lord's Prayer over him, slowly, as he lay on the rail. 
 Every day his father and his mother look up at the carving. 
 It came home safely, and hangs now over the sofa. 
 
 Soon afterwards Otto Fink left the Gude Wife at a South
 
 HOLYLAND 123 
 
 American port. Nothing was heard of him. He never wrote. 
 Twenty-five years later, a year after the death of his father, 
 he suddenly appeared in his native place, a cold, handsome 
 man, the image of his father, unmarried, captain on a large 
 steamer sailing between San Francisco and Yokohama. He 
 visited the aunt who had befriended him and made some short 
 excursions in the neighbourhood, drinking a glass of wine with 
 a few old acquaintances, but communicating little of his present 
 life. To his younger brother he spoke like a stranger. His 
 sister was dead. He remained eight days without going to 
 his father's farm or visiting his father's grave. In his stern 
 face and rigid bearing anger still seemed to smoulder, and no 
 one touched his heart. And all from one angry word 
 " Never let me see your face again ! " 
 
 Pete Boje stitched a loose button on to his best suit. He 
 was not really fussy, but everything in his kit was clean and 
 tidy. 
 
 Kai Jans sat in a heap, his wounded, bandaged hand resting 
 on his head it did not burn and throb so much when he 
 held it up reading Caesar and consulting the grammar alter- 
 nately. Hinnerk Lornsen, sitting by his side, was telling the 
 sailmaker his favourite story of how the pilot's fair-haired 
 daughter, fourteen years old, had sailed about with him in 
 his canoe on the river at Aberdovev in Wales, and taught him 
 to speak English and to kiss. That was a long time ago. 
 Now he was forty, and father of five children. In the middle 
 sat Hans Jessen, flat on the deck, with a volume of the Boy's 
 Own on his knees that the kind neighbour at home had given 
 him kind to him, although she had eight children of her 
 own. Idly turning over the leaves, he cried out, " Look here, 
 here's the crew of the expedition to the North Pole! ' Two 
 or three were at his shoulder on the instant. Heine Mar- 
 quard, who, having sat sulky and dumb on the bench at school, 
 was now glad of any opportunity of showing off his learning, 
 leant over him, and good old Torril Torrilsen, who was sitting 
 by his side mending Kai Jans' jacket with grey wool of the 
 thickness of your little finger, leant over too, and, putting his 
 rough-worn brown forefinger under the picture, said, "Look; 
 there's my name." They all looked at the picture and recog- 
 nized him. Even Kai Jans lifted up his eyes to look, and 
 then gazed, dreaming, across the sea into the dim darkness.
 
 124 HOLYLAND 
 
 Afterwards, as evening came on, they sang old songs. Who- 
 ever shared these Saturday evenings on the Gude Wtfe has 
 never forgotten them. 
 
 It was a lovely, clear September evening, a hundred and 
 fifty days after the Gude Wife and her children had raised 
 anchor in the harbour of Apia. They all stood on deck, look- 
 ing out, waiting. The sun went down, twilight came on, 
 still no fire. So they went below, for the air was chill. They 
 had hardly got down William Baldermann, always the last, 
 was actually still in the doorway when out sang the cheer- 
 ful voice of Jacob Simsen, the look-out, "Light ahoy!" 
 
 They all rushed on deck, on top of the forecastle, and 
 stared across the twilit sea. There in the distance was the 
 Lizard light, glaring down from the cliffs over the grey waste 
 of waters with its wild-beast eyes. 
 
 " Think, only think, man. What shall we do when we 
 first get to Hamburg?" 
 
 " What will mother say? Think of that! " 
 
 " Pete, do you know I haven't been home for two years." 
 
 " I haven't been home for four! " said Pete. Looking round 
 with sparkling eyes, he found no Kai Jans among the others. 
 He went down below and found him crouching in the darkest 
 corner on Torrilsen's locker with his bandaged hand resting 
 on his knee. He stopped at the door and said rather hesitat- 
 ingly, " Be glad ! " 
 
 " What for? " said Kai in an expressionless voice. 
 
 Pete went up again. 
 
 The next day the English coast slowly came in sight. In 
 two days more they had come through the Channel. On the 
 evening of the fourth day they passed the first Elbe lightship. 
 By the fifth they were being hauled in, and there was no get- 
 ting them away from the forecastle. Mate Lau might harangue 
 them sapiently, but it was no use. 
 
 Hans Jessen kept coming up to Pete. " Look ! look ! there's 
 Neufeldt. Look! look there! I say, man, isn't it first-rate?" 
 
 Pete listened, seeing in his mind's eye the Hilligenlei tower 
 and the low room where his mother 
 
 Up came mate Lau. " What are your plans? " he said. " I 
 mean, for the rest of your life always a sailor?"
 
 HOLYLAND 125 
 
 Pete shrugged his shoulders. " If it was like the old days, 
 when the ship was your own, or a bit of it! " 
 
 " Yes, if!" replied Pe Ontjes. " If! Now it's a confound- 
 edly poor affair. You're only an official, and on the water at 
 that. It's all right while one's young. But afterwards " 
 
 "Yes!" said Pete, deep in thought; and, looking into the 
 future, he seemed to see his life's course dimly stretching out 
 before him, as one sees the harbour stream through the morning 
 mists. " Since I went to sea I've been more interested in the 
 ship itself than in sailing. It's the construction and the way 
 it goes under the sails that interests me so tremendously. And 
 the old man on the Clara, he made me feel it all a great deal 
 more. I don't know, but if a man devotes himself, heart and 
 soul, to a thing from his youth up, and at the end really knows 
 it, he must be fit for something; he must be really worth 
 something; and the grander, the more important the thing is 
 in itself. . . . Yes, yes; that's what I think. I don't know 
 any more." 
 
 The mate nodded slowly several times. " Yes ; there is a 
 good deal in that," he nodded again, and waved his hand in the 
 air, " nose in air, eyes wide open, there is a great deal in that. 
 Dock inspector, or something like that? Upwards, always 
 upwards! " 
 
 " And you ? " said Pete, politely. 
 
 "I? Well, I will tell you something, only don't talk about 
 it to the others. I shall stick to the Gude Wife for three or 
 four years, and then I shall see if I can't fix myself up on 
 shore." 
 
 " In Hamburg? " 
 
 "No; in Hilligenlei." 
 
 "In Hilligenlei?" said Pete in astonishment. 
 
 " Yes ; my dad has a plan which he is beginning to put into 
 execution a corn exchange on a small scale, to deal in maize 
 and barley with the Hamburg smacks. There's nothing to be 
 done in Hilligenlei; it's dead alive; but the neighbourhood 
 is good, the country folk Anyhow, I'm not going to Hilli- 
 genlei this time. But go to my dad, will you, and give him 
 my love, and regards to your mother and sister." 
 
 " I thought," said Pete, " you were coming to see what 
 became of Kai Jans." 
 
 " I have thought a great deal about it, I can tell you, but
 
 126 HOLYLAND 
 
 nothing has come of it except writing a very long letter to old 
 Wedderkop. Do you know him? He is the one creature in 
 the place with a soul above the commonplace. Go and see the 
 old boy, and tell him what a fine fellow Kai is. You know 
 him as well as I do. No good as a sailor, quite apart from his 
 useless hand. If he doesn't know of anything else he might get 
 him into some business in Hamburg." 
 
 As the sun was sinking next day they were just about to 
 sit down to supper in the little, low house. The mother was 
 still at the machine, but Heinke and Hett were playing im- 
 patiently with the cups. Then a quick step came along a 
 quick, uneven step that stopped under their window. 
 
 Their breath stood still. Oh! how happy they were! how 
 happy they were! How his mother stroked him! Heinke 
 and Hett began to cry aloud when they saw it. They had 
 never seen a big man stroked before. 
 
 Then what a wondering. 
 
 "How tall you've got." 
 
 "Not tall, mother; broad!" 
 
 " I say, Anna, what a huge girl you've grown." 
 
 " I'm as tall as you are," said she. 
 
 " And I'm nearly as tall," said Heinke, " though I'm only 
 twelve ! " 
 
 " I seem to be the littlest, then," he laughed. 
 
 " But who is the stupidest? " 
 
 " Oh! " said she; " we shall see in time. We haven't fallen 
 on our heads yet ! " 
 
 He looked round and rejoiced all tall, all fair-haired, all 
 with proud, grey eyes. Then what questions! He put fifteen 
 pounds on the table. " Mother has paid off ten pounds," said 
 Heinke. " The work's far too hard." 
 
 He sat down by the machine to see how it was made, and 
 scolded his mother, who stood by him, her laughing eyes full 
 of tears. 
 
 " How did Lau treat you? " 
 
 He praised him. "A bit proud ! but we're that, too ; but 
 a fine sailor, and just. He sent regards to you you too, 
 Anna." 
 
 She threw back her fair head without saying anything. 
 
 Heinke stood, a question trembling on her red young lips.
 
 HOLYLAND 127 
 
 " Do you know, I have read all the letters that Kai Jans 
 sent home, and I've always sent my love to him, and he his to 
 me." 
 
 " Yes, I know. His hand isn't better yet." 
 
 "Oh! not yet? May I go now, mother?" 
 
 She flew down the harbour street, up the side of the dyke, 
 and went in. There sat the tall, brown youth with his band- 
 aged hand, at the table, his father and mother with him. All 
 three faces were oppressed and sad. They were as far again 
 from each other as they had been four years ago. She stood in 
 awkward embarrassment at the door, looking at him and think- 
 ing, " How thin and ugly he is." She had only seen him once, 
 four years ago, when he went away with Pete, and had thought 
 him handsome. 
 
 " Look," said Mala Jans, lifting up her head. " There is 
 Heinke Boje. She thinks a great deal of you." 
 
 She stepped up to the table, holding away her arm. " I am 
 glad to see you," she said, in a friendly tone. " Does your 
 hand hurt? " 
 
 He shook his head. " No, not now." Then, reaching to the 
 window-sill, " Look, I have brought you a little basket from 
 Samoa." Knowing that the Bojes had to be treated circum- 
 spectly, he added, " I bought it on purpose for you." 
 
 ' That was very nice of you," she said, slowly and distinctly, 
 looking happily down at the basket. " What are you going to 
 do now ? " 
 
 " Oh! if I knew! " said he, despondently, looking nervously 
 at his silent parents. 
 
 " I did not tell you," said his mother, " that Kassen Wedder- 
 kop had read all your letters. He said Pe Ontjes had written 
 to him. Perhaps he may know of something for you." 
 
 The door op.ened, and Kassen Wedderkop came in. Decid- 
 edly, he was too tall and too broad for the low room with its 
 two tiny windows. His groaning and his voice were much too 
 loud for so smaira space and three such shy auditors. 
 
 " Oh, ho; there he is," said he. " Well, how's the hand? " 
 Taking hold of his arm, he led him into the declining light to 
 look at him. The refined, intelligent eyes, the wide, proudly- 
 cut mouth, pleased him as much now as they had done four years 
 ago in Heine Wulk's office. " How's the Latin grammar get- 
 ting on ? and Caesar ? The people in Korea were all deaf, that's
 
 128 HOLYLAND 
 
 why I speak so loud. Well, to go to the point at once, if you 
 like you can go to your books. The old manager is dead, and 
 there are two or three young teachers who are glad of anything 
 out of the way." He gave a deep groan, feeling his back. 
 " One thing only I ask of you. Later, when you are a man, 
 you are to be inspired by my great idea that is, that the 
 peoples round about the North Sea, they are of one race, of 
 one faith they all have the lion as their coat of arms. They 
 are to join together, offensive and defensive alliance and 
 even if it is fifty years before it happens, and wars come be- 
 tween, you are to believe in it ! " 
 
 " That I will," said Kai, his emaciated face glowing with 
 joy and goodness. " All peoples should be one." 
 
 When their first joy was abated Thomas Jans remarked, 
 with that expression of shy shrewdness, touched with roguish- 
 ness, which often came into his eyes, especially when talking 
 with so-called educated folk, "Yes!" he said, "yes! He has 
 seen so much America, Africa, China. He has been right 
 round the world. But he hasn't found Hilligenlei, the Holy- 
 land, yet!" 
 
 Kassen Wedderkop laughed with some embarrassment. 
 
 " No? Where is it to be found? " 
 
 "Where, indeed?" said Thomas. "I believe" his eyes 
 were full of roguery "I believe it doesn't exist yet; it Is 
 somewhere in the future ! " 
 
 He was thinking of the Utopia of the Labour Party. That 
 seemed the Holyland to him. And he thought, " Now he will 
 be a learned man, and he will help us to reach it ; " but he did 
 not dare to say so before his son, or before the educated man. 
 
 His little mother leant against him, saying softly, with beam- 
 ing eyes, " Kai, shall you go to school "in your mess-jacket? " 
 
 But he heard nothing that they said. He stood in wonder 
 and astonishment at the entrance to a new life. He saw him- 
 self wandering along it wandering, wandering thinking 
 at every turning in the road, at every rising in the ground, 
 " The Holyland is coming here it is."
 
 CHAPTER XI. 
 
 A YEAR after his return Kai Jans, able-bodied seaman, now 
 twenty years of age, went to the grammar school with a blue 
 cap on no trifle that. Think of Torril Torrilsen, who never 
 took up a book or paper of any kind except the old hymn book 
 with the Bible picture in front. Think of Heine Marquard, 
 who said that if he were king he would see that everybody, 
 instead of going to the grammar school, went to sea, fore or 
 aft cabin, according to his worth. And now he sat among 
 people who would spend half an hour over a Latin sentence, 
 among teachers, one of whom said that Horace was the wisest 
 man that ever lived in the world, while another regarded the 
 binomial theorem as the key to all wisdom. Most assuredly, 
 he had got into a different world. Instead of the fresh breeze 
 blowing over the wide, boundless sea, he had a funny little low 
 room, with heaps of books and very small windows. 
 
 The greatest hardship was the old one. The trouble he had 
 had as a child, had never lost while at sea, was with him 
 still, more acute than ever, among these sharp, learned people. 
 The expression of his deepest thoughts, thoughts that seemed 
 to him natural and even obvious, used to rouse wonder and 
 ridicule in others. Had he known that what he said was as- 
 tonishing he would have kept silent, but he only discovered it 
 to be so from the scorn and astonishment in their faces. 
 
 There was a school ball, to which he went, for he was fond 
 of dancing in the genial sailor's way. He liked dancing with 
 Anna Boje best. She was just his age ; both were twenty. He 
 talked to her about Pete, now at the navigation school, and they 
 got on well together in a straight-forward, friendly way. If 
 he did say anything extraordinary he knew that Anna would 
 not repeat it. The Bojes stood by him, and never allowed 
 anyone they cared for to be laughed at. 
 
 Afterwards, however, he danced with the daughter of one 
 of the masters. He jestingly compared Ringerang's hall, where 
 
 129
 
 130 HOLYLAND 
 
 they were, to the Hamburg harbour, making those stout old 
 beer-drinkers into the quay with the dredgers; the seven portly 
 elderly dames into the four-masted full-rigged vessels in the 
 sailing-dock; and the doctor's two malicious little daughters 
 into the tugs. She held her fan in front of her smiling face. 
 ' Now," said he, " let's cut across the harbour. Take care. 
 We almost grazed that coalship great black thing she is. 
 Look! there's Anna Boje sailing past, the proud Gude Wife. 
 Now we cast anchor." 
 
 The pretty creature soon spread the report of what Kai had 
 said, and there was no end of talk. His schoolfellows teased 
 him remorselessly. " You have hardly a word to say for your- 
 self generally! and now all at once a whole history! " 
 
 The dredgers and the full-rigged vessels declared he was 
 only a workman's son, and would be a common sailor all his 
 life. The director took him aside and advised him to be more 
 careful. 
 
 The whole thing was painful to him. He resolved firmly 
 only to open his lips when it was absolutely necessary. 
 
 It was very well to resolve to be careful. People of his 
 simple, trusting disposition forget their fine resolutions; a time 
 comes when the over-full heart pours out, in the exquisite con- 
 fusion of immaturity, all the glory of those secret dreams which 
 wait shyly for their blossoming time. 
 
 Jacob Sill was in the highest form, and excelled all his com- 
 rades in mind as in body. Later, as a student, unbridled li- 
 cense drove him in the bloom of youth into a desperate grave. 
 Now his eager spirit, thirsting for beauty everywhere, saw it 
 throned in the dark depths of Kai Jans' eyes. He sought him 
 out and won his confidence. On the three paths on the foot- 
 path up the hill, and along the tow path on top, from which you 
 can see far over land and sea, Kai Jans let fly his beautiful wild 
 doves. Aha! how beautifully they flew! how they tumbled 
 over one another in the air when Truth, that tiresome jay, 
 swooped down upon them. 
 
 " Don't you think so? Do you believe what he said about 
 the French Revolution? Wasn't it just and right? When 
 a lazy, incompetent government allows the people to be 
 so crushed by the deadweight of a ruling class that it can 
 neither stir nor breathe, one day the people will shake off that 
 weight, in sheer need of air. Good government provides for
 
 HOLYLAND 131 
 
 interest and advance in every class for hope and movement 
 everywhere. To do so is the highest political wisdom. . . . 
 Anyhow, one must not accept what the teachers say every 
 preposition, wherever found, even if it be in the Bible, even if 
 it be spoken by the Saviour, must be examined with the open 
 eyes, with which Adam regarded the new aspects of nature 
 opening before his gaze. The other day he threw down a state- 
 ment there would always be war, he said, always. How 
 can anyone say ' always ' ? What do we know about always ? 
 Moltke said that; he took it over from him without examining 
 it. We get it from him, to hand it on in our turn without ex- 
 amination. What does it matter to me what Moltke thought? 
 What is his opinion worth to me, or the opinion on this or 
 any subject of the Emperor, the Pope, or the newspapers? 
 Anybody who simply listens to other people has lost his blue 
 ribbon and gone down into the second class. Life is too serious 
 a business, too full of danger and responsibility, to be carried 
 on by running after other people. 
 
 " Were you there the other day when I had forgotten my 
 Testament and Fritz Petersen lent me his? He gave it me, 
 saying, in a mock serious tone, ' This is my blood, poured out 
 for you.' I looked at him. He has a beautiful, serious sort 
 of face, and I was astonished at such a jest on his lips. If you 
 pass a nice girl you don't take her and push her into the 
 gutter. You respect a brave man when you meet one. But 
 do you know why it is? The reason is, the church doesn't 
 represent the Saviour humanly. They have made a golden im- 
 age of Him with dead, speechless eyes an old, dead image, 
 and that I throw into the gutter. Aw r ay with it. Fritz Peter- 
 sen would never mock at Frederick the Great or Bismarck or 
 a nice-minded girl never ; but he mocks at the Saviour." 
 
 The German master was a clever, conscientious teacher. He 
 set an essay on " If I rest, I rust." A few days later the essays 
 were given back without his saying a word about Kai Jans', 
 although at the end he wrote " A good essay." Kai, suspecting 
 something beneath this brief comment, asked the teacher. He 
 replied, " If you want to know, the essay is good, but it is not 
 your own work. The ideas can only be those of a man of fifty." 
 Kai Jans turned pale and sat down, not knowing what to do. 
 
 Towards the end ol the hour Jacob Sill stood up suddenly 
 and said, "May I say something, sir? I am convinced that
 
 132 HOLYLAND 
 
 we are all aware that Kai Jans has naturally the thoughts and 
 the knowledge that other men only acquire in the course of long 
 experience." 
 
 The teacher looked at him with astonishment, and after some 
 thought said, simply, " In that case I take back what I said." 
 But he was not convinced, and continued cold towards Kai. 
 
 Jacob Sill had promised not to reveal a word of their con- 
 versations on the tow path, but in a weak moment he talked, 
 and taunts and scoffing looks revived. Teachers, too, scoffed. 
 From that time he became more circumspect, only talking with 
 his schoolfellows about things connected with the lesson, or 
 things they saw around them. But all the time his spirit was 
 working its way, pained and astonished, through the brambles 
 of opinion, gazing about it with the eyes of which he had spoken 
 to Jacob. 
 
 Oh! that it were possible for these proud, lonely spirits to 
 find someone to help and admonish them in the awful brood- 
 ings, the wild, fanatic dreams of youth. But if they found 
 him they would not listen. In their youth they listen not 
 not to the Saviour, not to Goethe. They will they must 
 make their way alone through the fearsome lovelinesses of that 
 ruddy, fairy forest beyond which is the Holyland. And if Kai 
 Jans was alone, unguided, because he would accept no guidance, 
 in the depths of his inner life, he had good instruction in all 
 the knowledge and wisdom of the world. Yes, indeed ; yes, 
 he learnt to know the variety of human life and the strangeness 
 of the human heart. 
 
 Every afternoon, as soon as he got out of school, he went 
 straight to Kassen Wedderkop and sat opposite him at the din- 
 ner table. First over the meal, and afterwards over the news- 
 paper, Kassen talked away, groaning at intervals, in his Korean 
 voice, about all the doings of the big world ; and he talked no 
 longer to the " greenhorn," the " stupid boy; " now it was his 
 intelligent young friend. Nor did he now say " That's it, and 
 everything else is nonsense," but " That happened to me while 
 I was in a situation in Berlin," or " When I was in the office 
 in Hongkong I got to know a man," or " From my experiences 
 in East Africa, we Germans but things are said to have 
 changed since my time;" or "Every Sunday while I was in 
 London I went to church and saw " " Just listen, Kai, to 
 the Chicago quotations for corn and meat ! " or " They believe
 
 HOLYLAND 133 
 
 in Japan I should very much like to know the opinion 
 of an intelligent Jap on our dogmas! Listen to this article 
 in the Times on Japanese religion. It seems to me quite cor- 
 rect ;" "What a blessing that you know English, and 
 have four years at sea behind you. Even if you haven't found 
 Hilligenlei, you donkey, it is possible to talk sense to you." 
 
 Yes, that was something like instruction. He began to see 
 the rush and ebb of life. He was the son of Thomas Jans, 
 the labourer, and he lived in the long house at Hilligenlei. 
 
 In these years life got rather smoother and more easy there. 
 The two elder sisters went to America with their husbands 
 the youngest married a decent artisan. The youngest boy, u 
 simple, straightforward fellow, was apprenticed to a good, hard- 
 working plumber. 
 
 There was a calm, even cheerful expression in Thomas Jans' 
 clever, weather-beaten face now that he had only his wife and 
 himself to provide for, and his son was able to learn, and learn- 
 ing so that his head swam with it. He used to sit in a corner 
 at the meetings of the Labour Party, which had grown so that 
 they filled Reimer's big room, and listen. Occasionally some- 
 one would make a thrust at him, but he never spoke. They 
 were very extreme in those days. They all laughed when the 
 word religion was mentioned. When he came home he would 
 take down his Bible and hunt out the passages that spoke of 
 great times to come, and he rejoiced and believed. He did not 
 speak of these matters with his son. 
 
 They spoke together a great deal about human destiny. 
 After supper, or after tea on Sunday afternoons, he would lean 
 back, thinking and drumming on the window-sill with his fin- 
 gers, as his habit was; then, as if moved by the sound or the 
 action, he would begin to talk about someone whom he had 
 met in the course of his life, speaking of his parents and grand- 
 parents, of his character, and how he had changed, the events 
 which had influenced his life, and the issue of human life in 
 general. Thus Kai heard many a life history, and much quiet 
 native wisdom, as he listened with silent interest. 
 
 Mala Jans had grown smaller' since the day her son went 
 to sea, and his return as a cripple. One could hardly believe 
 that this thin, dainty little slip of mother had such a tall son. 
 She was very proud of her clever, brooding, mocking husband 
 and her serious, silent son, and even almost satisfied, now, with
 
 134 HOLYLAND 
 
 his face. From her girlhood she had speht Sunday afternoon 
 in reading the stories in the newspaper about beautiful high- 
 born lords and ladies, who always addressed each other politely, 
 even after marriage, and whose children all had high foreheads 
 and aristocratic eyes and noses. She had often looked secretly 
 at her son and found his forehead too low, his nose too broad, 
 his eyes too small. After he went to the grammar school, 
 however, she asked no more of his face, but rejoiced secretly 
 in its strength and the slim uprightness of his carriage. Their 
 silver wedding-day came when he was in the upper sixth, and 
 Thomas bought her a dress the first time since their marriage 
 
 bought it by himself in Slider Street, and paid ready money 
 for it. This Sunday afternoon, while father and son discussed 
 human destiny, she sat opposite to them at the table by the other 
 window, reading about lords and ladies, in her new dress. 
 
 There were others who helped him, too. Yes, it was instruc- 
 tion indeed his. Sometimes, when he came out of the little 
 blue room where his bed and writing-table were, through the 
 dark little kitchen into the sitting-room, he found Stiena Dusen- 
 schon with his mother. His mother was a proud and clever 
 little woman, who mingled sympathy with her friendly amuse- 
 ment at Stiena's vague inconsequence. She now complained of 
 Rieke Thomson. There was no being on good terms with her 
 
 and this although she and Rieke used to drink seven cups of 
 tea together every day; and as for Tjark Tjark never came 
 to Hilligenlei to see her, and would not let her go to Hamburg 
 to see him; but he did write sometimes, and at Christmas he 
 had sent her a piece of money and a beautiful black skirt, silk 
 one way, and had written she was not to spend her whole life 
 darning other people's stockings. He would do something for 
 her some day. " Now he is head assistant, with five people 
 under him. Tjark yes, he will get on." She talked away, 
 her knitting needles clicking the while, and her bonnet strings 
 and the fringe on her mantle dancing to some sweet far-away 
 melody. 
 
 Sometimes, when he was jumping over the fence to go out to 
 the sea wall for the fresh air, Rieke Thomson would throw 
 open her window and talk away. " Well, old Lau has bought 
 a second smack, and he is really bringing maize and barley from 
 Hamburg to sell to the farmers. Pe Ontjes is going to give 
 up the sea, and then they will increase the business. It will be
 
 HOLYLAND 135 
 
 a grand concern. The old man can't write, and Pe Ontjes is 
 a stiff creature. Have you heard? Stiena says Tjark has 
 twenty clerks under him. I don't believe a word of it. He 
 will come to no good I've always said so. Jeff Buhmann is 
 the only creature who believes in him. By the bye, have you 
 heard a sound or even a spark come out of the smithy this last 
 month ? He squats all day in the meadow, frightening the fish 
 with his great leather apron. Tell your mother to come and 
 see me. I'm a poor, deserted old female. Look! there's Triena 
 Soht. Her mouth is always full of gossip. Do you see? She's 
 got her pipe in the front of her dress. I have to stand her 
 tobacco! " 
 
 " Indeed ! " said he. " I am just going along the wall." 
 
 " It's all very well, your learning and learning," she con- 
 tinued. " You'll never make up the four years you wasted at 
 sea. Your parents spoil you, Kai. You may be very glad if 
 you get through the school. I have always said so." 
 
 Sometimes, when he came out of school in the afternoons, 
 he went through the chestnut avenue. If he saw Anna's fair 
 head at the window he went in and spoke to her mother, sit- 
 ting at the machine, then sat down opposite Anna, playing with 
 her reels and scissors, and talking in a sensible, manly way 
 while he gazed at her. She answered composedly, looking at 
 him with complete indifference in her clear eyes, then out of 
 the window, as if expecting something pleasant to pass by. 
 
 Ever since passing her twentieth birthday she had felt a 
 secret, uneasy astonishment that no one came and desired her 
 love, and her uneasiness grew. He saw nothing. To him she 
 was what she seemed all beautiful, calm peace. Nor did 
 he see that little Heinke, sitting at the table with her lessons, 
 would often raise her head and fix her clear, grey, child's eyes 
 upon him, seeking him as the carrier bird seeks its goal. 
 
 When he was in the upper sixth he founded a club called 
 " Truth." As the oldest and most experienced, he soon be- 
 came president. Naturally, they chose for discussion the most 
 difficult subjects in the world, with which they were least fitted 
 to cope religion, politics, character handling them from 
 a lofty and enthusiastic point of view as radicals competent to 
 pronounce judgment. Occasionally, indeed, being, after all, 
 thoughtful, genuine young fellows, the judgments they passed 
 disturbed their consciences. This was most olf all the case with
 
 136 HOLYLAND 
 
 Kai Jans, and he used to express his doubts and go into the 
 question again with rather more reverence. Still, in this last 
 year he certainly became a trifle arrogant. He forgot what he 
 had seen so clearly four years ago, that Torril Torrilsen, with 
 his big, knotted hands Torril, who could not write, and 
 whose only reading was the Trondhjem hymn books and the 
 Bible was a far wiser, a far more worthy man than any of 
 the teachers. He forgot that altogether. His knowledge and 
 his talents made him arrogant. His voice used to ring out at 
 the club loud and clear as a victorious blast. " Behold, I know 
 Hilligenlei, the Holyland. I, Kai Jans! I shall find the mean- 
 ing of the world." In his eyes it shone. " Wait and see what 
 Kai Jans will become!" 
 
 He said to his mother with an air of great wisdom, " I don't 
 like father's going to the workmen's meetings, and, mother, 
 what about his reading the Bible? No one can understand the 
 Bible without a long, special training. His reading is simply 
 absurd." 
 
 Mala Jans bit her lips in silence, deeply pained. She looked 
 at him almost with hatred in her eyes, and said with an assur- 
 ance very unusual with her, " Leave him alone, I tell you. 
 Don't speak of that to him." 
 
 His arrogance did not last more than a year. With the 
 spring came reflection. His sharpness gave place to a gentler 
 and more generous temper as his dreaming eyes began to look 
 beyond the leaving examination to the beginning of student 
 days. Age did its share. He was now past two-and-twenty. 
 Anyhow, a change of which he was unconscious was taking 
 place in him. 
 
 To be a student ! to be free ! to live in a strange town 
 that was life, and life was the thing! What was the use, after 
 all, of all this thinking this narrow, petty round? How 
 beautifully Anna Boje walked! 
 
 So when midsummer eve came he let the people go past him 
 to the bonfires as he waited in the dark road for her coming. 
 She came, arm in arm with Anna Martens, who was living at 
 that time with the Bojes in Hilligenlei to learn fine sewing. 
 She was a pretty girl, as tall as Anna, but dark, and more 
 stoutly built. All day long she sewed away diligently, laughing 
 at her work laughing so incessantly that it affected all the 
 other girls at the tailoress's laughter that seemed to arise
 
 HOLYLAND 137 
 
 without any cause. In the evening, however, she became se- 
 rious, and would say to Anna, " I am going up to the dyke to 
 gaze across the bay and see if I can bewitch him to come across 
 this evening." And sometimes she succeeded, for, as he said, 
 he was already in bed, when heigh ho! he had to get up, jump 
 on to his horse, and gallop round the bay. He stood with her 
 under the apple tree in front of Anna Boje's window, and Anna 
 could hear the sound of whispering and kisses. Afterwards 
 she became his happy wife, and bewitched him all his life long. 
 
 " Do you see? " she said; " there is Kai Jans in the shadow 
 of the trees. He will go with you, and I will turn back." She 
 wanted to try her witchcraft again. 
 
 So they went on alone, up the three paths. He walked by 
 her side: or sometimes, when the path got narrow, behind her, 
 feasting his eyes on the outline of her figure dimly visible in 
 the gloom. They spoke very little, for what was the use of 
 words when each was thirsting for action? Moreover, his 
 youth and innocence made him too nervous to address her. 
 
 When they reached the summit they looked about them, far 
 and wide. On every side they could see across the country, 
 see the bonfires in a great semi-circle. 
 
 There to the south-west was the Friestadt fire. Time was 
 when Anna herself had helped to light it. With burning peats 
 for torches they had lit the fire, and then jumped round about it. 
 
 There to the north, across the marshes, was the Hemme fire, 
 the big wooden belfry rising up big and black behind it. Every 
 year the parson used to send a ton of fuel and help to build up 
 the fire with his own hands. 
 
 Far away in the west, slightly southwards, there gleamed a 
 faint blaze, built by the shepherd, who lived alone with his 
 sheep on his island in the midst of the grey shadows, built out 
 of dried sea-grasses and driftwood. By his side stood his bright- 
 eyed dog. Further off, the sheep stared stupidly out of the 
 darkness into the glowing blaze. 
 
 On midsummer eve countless fires burned all round the 
 town of Hilligenlei. For a thousand years or more they have 
 burned there, so that the night encircles the town like a dark 
 belt set with three burning jewels. 
 
 One belongs to the west quarter that burning up on the 
 dyke. The young brigands who make it think it no crime to 
 steal for the bonfire, and it is none. The children claim for the
 
 138 HOLYLAND 
 
 fire everything that is neither nailed nor hung up, everything 
 that neither grows out of the earth nor is fixed there. Ten 
 years ago it was bigger than now. When Pe Ontjes Lau was 
 ringleader, then indeed the flames rose to heaven, and the 
 angels had to tuck up their feet ! But it's still a grand sight. 
 
 The second, belonging to the north, stands where the open 
 fields extend for seven miles as flat as a table. The children 
 could make a splendid fire if it were not that they are at feud 
 among themselves and quarrel like cats. They are a big, sturdy 
 set. Only think! There are six Wittes, seven Suhres, and nine 
 Hanses. But their bonfire suffers from their quarrelsomeness. 
 Twice some cankered enemy of the people had kindled their 
 fuel the night before, so that it burned away while they slept, 
 and since then they had to set watchers to guard the fire, who 
 gave summary chastisement to anyone who drew near, without 
 waiting to judge or identify the person. 
 
 The third fire was up on the heights where Kai Jans and 
 Anna Boje stood together. There on the height the grammar- 
 school boys had made their fire, from time immemorial, among 
 the barrows of their Pagan ancestors, with only two interrup- 
 tions. Once, five hundred years ago, the Canon had forbidden 
 it, fearing a return to Paganism. His fear was not wholly 
 unfounded. Thode Witt, a cross-grained old greybeard from 
 Volkmersdorf, a village just below the summit, had put a 
 horse's skull into the fire and then stared into the blaze as if he 
 could see a thousand years into the past. Only forty years ago 
 it had been forbidden by the headmaster and the mayor, on the 
 plea that it was out of date that midsummer bonfires were 
 out of date! May they sleep sound in their graves, those who 
 are not out of date! 
 
 Anna Boje stood at a little distance watching the blazing 
 fire, the little grammar-school boys jumping round it like so 
 many imps of darkness, the dreaming faces of the elder boys 
 lit up by the beautiful illumination. There were many grace- 
 ful, youthful figures among them. Anna stood in the shadow 
 regarding them with her clear, calm eyes, thinking, as she had 
 thought so often in the last year, How is it possible that in all 
 Hilligenlei not a single man cares for you? And suppose any- 
 one did care, would you take him? She did not know of one. 
 
 " Anna," said Kai, his voice quivering, " I wanted to ask 
 you whether you "
 
 HOLYLAND 139 
 
 " What ? " She looked at him with calm curiosity. 
 
 " I want to know " she could hear his breath come and 
 go "I want to know, can you care for me, a little? " 
 
 For awhile astonishment kept her silent. Then she said, 
 calmly, " You have always been a friend to us all. I care for 
 you in that way." 
 
 " That isn't what I mean," he said. " Do you know The- 
 deus, in the highest form, is secretly engaged? Anna, I know 
 I am a restless creature restless always, and unhappy and 
 I don't know the right thing to do; but if you only really 
 cared for me, oh ! you are so beautiful, so pure ! then you would 
 see how faithful, how devoted, I could be." 
 
 Anna shrugged her shoulders. " The girl who is engaged 
 to Thedeus must be a very different creature from me," she 
 said, in her calm, clear voice. " No ! " She shook her fair head 
 decidedly. " No! that is not for me. You are far too young 
 
 not the right man for me at all. And to have to wait five 
 or eight years ! No ! I tell you, No ! I had rather die ! " 
 
 He was crushed by the consciousness of having made a 
 grave mistake. " Oh ! " he said in a low voice, biting his lips. 
 "Is there someone else someone older?" 
 
 Her proud face darkened. " Who will marry me ? Some 
 families do not know me because I am the daughter of a poor 
 teacher's widow. The others think me arrogant. I do not 
 belong to anyone, except Anna Martens from Friestadt, whom 
 I have known since we were children. As for the young men 
 
 there are very few real men here. Look ! do you call those 
 men?" 
 
 Two teachers came past. One was a valetudinarian, the 
 other a mollycoddle. They stood silent for some time. Then 
 she said indifferently, " Go to your friends. I am going home." 
 
 " Oh ! " he cried with passionate bitterness, " I love you. I 
 have loved you ever since I was a child. You shall see there is 
 something in me; I shall make something of my life; but you 
 
 you repulse me so." 
 
 " I cannot help it," she said, and, turning from him, went 
 down the path. 
 
 For a week Kai Jans went about with folded lips and sombre 
 eyes. People asked him whether he was ill, and Jeff came out 
 into the street to say to him, " The best thing for toothache
 
 140 HOLYLAND 
 
 is to burn it out with a sharp, red-hot nail." He meant never 
 to enter the house under the chestnuts again. 
 
 One day, however, when he had not been there for a fort- 
 night, Heinke, grown into a tall girl, came up and said to him 
 in her shy, winning way, " Kai, please help me. I've got such 
 a dreadful exercise to do." 
 
 He could not resist this confiding appeal. He went, and was 
 glad to be in the cosy little room again with the busy click of 
 the machine inside, the graceful movements of the girls' 
 pretty hands, and the light of their fair heads; outside, the 
 big chestnuts casting a ruddy light and so he came again ; 
 but Anna was seldom there. She used to find something to 
 do in the kitchen or in her own room, and leave Kai alone with 
 her mother and Heinke. He had long talks with the child 
 about her work at school and about Pete. He lent her books 
 and played cards with her and Hett, and he grew to be very 
 fond of her, attracted by her shy, spontaneous devotion to him. 
 
 Passing once, he met her in the street, and, seeing that she 
 had been crying, asked her what the matter was. She began 
 to sob, and told him her mother had scolded her severely for 
 taking Hett's book, although he had beforehand given her ex- 
 press permission to use it. It was always so. He lied, but 
 mother believed him. 
 
 " Mother doesn't love me at all," she sobbed. " She says I 
 do everything wrong, and am always stiff and horrid." 
 
 " How does she come to say that ? " 
 
 " Well, Hett is always saying ' Dear, darling mamma ' 
 twenty times a day that's what I ought to do, but I can't." 
 
 "How, can't?" 
 
 " I don't know. I can think it, but not say it. I am not 
 really stiff, but I shall get so," she sobbed piteously. 
 
 He comforted her. " You will soon be grown up, and then 
 you will go away, and afterwards marry some splendid, clever 
 man." 
 
 " I haven't ever told anyone, only you, because you have 
 been so good to me, and say now that I shall marry. I wish 
 it would come soon. I can't get on at all with mother and 
 Hett." 
 
 He was touched by her affectionate confidence. " We shall 
 always be friends. Let us shake hands upon it." 
 
 "Ah! you are always good to me. You are the only one
 
 HOLYLAND 141 
 
 who is." Her eyes sparkling with tears as she looked seriously 
 up at him, she shook his hand, and then ran off into the house. 
 
 His offer of friendship was genuinely meant, but the tall, 
 fair child hardly knew what she was doing. She used to go 
 out into the fields these summer months and pick a spray here 
 and a flower there on the paths and along the hedgerows, mak- 
 ing them, with exquisite, natural taste, into a nosegay as she 
 went along, wondering what to do with it, and dreaming of 
 how she should manage to give it to Kai Jans. She sank on her 
 knees by the wall, regarding the nosegay and picturing to her- 
 self his expression, his beautiful, true eyes: hearing the sound 
 of his voice. She got up and went on, still lost in thought. 
 On her way home through the meadows she became first 
 thoughtful and then gradually sad, till finally, sitting down 
 on the last stile, she picked out one flower after another and 
 threw them into the water, and so went silently home. 
 
 Kai Jans talked much with her, and enjoyed their intercourse 
 together; but his thoughts were with her elder sister. " Where 
 is Anna? " 
 
 " Away ! " said Heinke. 
 
 "Where?" 
 
 " At the tailoress's, with Anna Martens. She is learning 
 dressmaking, you know." 
 
 "Where is Anna?" 
 
 "Away!" 
 
 " Where ? This is not the time for her lessons, surely." 
 
 " She is playing hide-and-seek in the lane with the children." 
 
 What was Anna doing in the lane? 
 
 This year her life seemed yet more and more desolate. One 
 day followed after another unmarked by any great event. Her 
 soul was already becoming disturbed and embittered yet 
 Anna had her joy a great, deep, secret joy. 
 
 This last year, every afternoon, as she worked in the kitchen, 
 she heard a little voice pipe out like a little sparrow, " Antje 
 Boje?" 
 
 Then she would step out, with her graceful, swinging move- 
 ments, into the garden in her big cooking-apron. There they 
 were, the two children, in the waterway, and their father be- 
 hind. The mother was always too sickly to come out with 
 them. Anna bent to talk to the children, and as she did so 
 " knack " went her knees. Whereupon they all three laughed.
 
 142 HOLYLAND 
 
 Then the elder child would say, while she held the younger in 
 her arms, " What have you had for dinner? " " Where have 
 you been?" "Do you like my dress?" "Just look at my 
 stockings!" And the little one would stroke her hair and 
 catch hold of her ear and say, " Ei! ei! what a white ear you've 
 got! and what shining hair! Mother's hair doesn't shine. 
 And what a red mouth ! " And then, pursing up its lips, it 
 kissed her. And Anna proud, silent Anna stroked the 
 child and pressed it to her breast with words of love. Then 
 she would get up and look up, all confusion, into the clever, 
 kindly face of the man, and exchange a few words with him. 
 At last, saying " I must go back to my work," she would press 
 the children's hands and be gone, turning round under the apple 
 tree to nod to them. What a beautiful picture it was to see 
 her standing with her fair hair and haughty figure under the 
 white blossoms or the ripe fruit on the tree! 
 
 What was Anna doing in the lane ? This this was her 
 pure, secret joy. But now, this summer this summer it was 
 rather different it was misery, it was bliss. 
 
 " Mother cares nothing for me. Heinke is still a child. 
 Hett thinks of no one but himself. Pete is far away. What 
 am I to do with my life? Crete Deeken married at nineteen, 
 Lisbeth Thaden at twenty. I am twenty-two, and he does 
 not come. I am deserted. Oh ! if only he were single he 
 who talks to me in the lane. He would want my love. Oh! 
 how good he is. How clever. What dear eyes." 
 
 She had known him since she was a child. 
 
 Was there no young man in Hilligenlei, then, with eyes to 
 see that the most beautiful thing in all the countryside was 
 this glorious, youthful strength, this hidden intelligence? To 
 take her by the hand and rejoice in the beauty of her body and 
 of her transparent soul, which should bring up a race of strong 
 and healthy children to cope with the evil of the world? 
 
 Oh the young men of Hilligenlei! One is diseased from a 
 youth of dissipation ; he should be a man but he drags himself 
 along the sea wall, gasping for breath. Two others, healthy- 
 minded young fellows enough, tramp about the. country with 
 great sticks in their hands and their eyes bent on the road, 
 learning to talk pompously about the management of the State 
 at an age when a man cannot see beyond the eyes of a girl and 
 his work.
 
 HOLYLAND 143 
 
 Other young folk of the middle classes get behind their 
 father's counter as soon as they come back from service, and 
 sit at their father's desk, and cast about them for a wife with 
 money-bags, by which means they win a helpmeet, who, think- 
 ing more of her portion than her person, keeps portion and keys 
 under her own control to prevent her spouse from doing any- 
 thing reckless. So they sit, in their poky little shops in the 
 poky little streets, with a view bounded by their neighbour's 
 wall, where they never hear the fresh wind blow or realize 
 that a clean, strong man of good courage is worth more than 
 ten thousand pounds. 
 
 Others, when their work is finished, go and sit over their 
 beer with the married men of the club. The old men tell 
 coarse stories and corrupt the young, until they are too cow- 
 ardly, too corrupt, for marriage and all that it involves. 
 
 No man thought of Anna Boje. 
 
 When she went past they would say, " That's a fine girl. 
 Look how she walks! " 
 
 Whereupon the others retorted, " Don't waste time in look- 
 ing at her. She hasn't got a penny, and she's waiting for a 
 
 prince 
 
 Such are the young folk of Hilligenlei, and therefore, at 
 two-and-twenty, Anna Boje's pure soul is tortured by a thought 
 from which no inward struggles avail to set her free. " Oh! 
 if he were single! and loved me! oh! what bliss that would 
 be!" 
 
 Kai Jans was far too young for her. Once he found her 
 alone in the kitchen. He went close up to her and implored 
 her, "Anna Anna, give me one kiss once only once in 
 my life." 
 
 She stepped back in anger. " I ask you to leave me alone," 
 she said. " I do not care for such jests. If you say anything 
 of the sort again, Kai, our friendship is at an end." 
 
 One evening a few days later she was going into the garden 
 to bring in some washing which she had put out to bleach, and 
 saw him standing in the lane with a tall, pretty farm girl, the 
 child of degraded parents, and herself a wanton. 
 
 When he came two days afterwards her scorn blazed out. 
 ' That's the company you choose ! You, who have always 
 talked so grandly about Hilligenlei! Did you go out into the 
 world to look for it, and now come back to go with her ! "
 
 144 HOLYLAND 
 
 He was angry in his turn. " It's your fault," he cried ; 
 " yes, yours. If you only loved me, I could believe in Hiili- 
 genlei still ; but now " 
 
 She was astonished. " That's very fine ! It's my fault, in- 
 deed ! I will tell you something the fault is in you yourself, 
 Kai Jans."
 
 CHAPTER XII. 
 
 AT the end of August Kai Jans passed his leaving examina- 
 tion. Three days later he came up chestnut avenue to say 
 goodbye. Anne gave him her hand with perfect composure. 
 Heinke gave his a quick, hard squeeze and ran out of the room 
 to cry. Kassen Wedderkop was to go with him to Hamburg, 
 then he was to go on to Heidelberg alone. 
 
 In the evening of the same day came a letter from Pete, 
 from Hamburg. " Anna is to come." He had always prom- 
 ised she should see Hamburg one day, and he should pay for 
 her. Now he was keeping his word. 
 
 Happy in his thought of her, and in this break in the endless 
 monotony of her existence, she surprised the two travellers by 
 appearing at the station early next morning and accompany- 
 ing them. She had never been out of Hilligenlei before, and 
 gazed in dumb astonishment out of the window as they passed 
 through the huge town in the train. 
 
 Pete was at the station. It was astonishing to see him there. 
 She had always seen him in Hilligenlei before, and now there 
 he stood, in this strange place, among strange people, and 
 glanced sharply at her and nodded. He had always been 
 like that from his childish days, and that was what she so 
 loved in him that manly determination. 
 
 " Well," said Kassen Wedderkop, " you be off and show 
 Anna Hamburg, but meet me this evening at seven in the 
 coffee-room of the ' Imperial ' at Altona. Sit so that you can 
 see into the bar. I shall bring two friends who were with 
 me in the East both natives of Hilligenlei. Off with you! " 
 
 They put Anna between them and went down to the Jung- 
 fernstieg. He showed her the post-office and the monument, 
 and the huge banks and hotels along the Alster; then they 
 went across the market down to the harbour where they took 
 steamer. 
 
 Her first excess of astonishment soon wore off. She looked 
 at everything with calm, rather wondering eyes, as much as 
 
 MS
 
 146 HOLYLAND 
 
 to say, " What is all this to me ? What have all these people, 
 all these buildings, to do with me? If there was only one 
 person who belonged to me! " Now and then, when she could 
 do so unobserved, she looked sideways at her brother and 
 thought of her childhood, till her heart warmed to him, and 
 she grieved that he was always so cool and curt towards her, 
 as she thought, " Kai Jans is not nearly so self-confident." 
 
 He in his turn looked at her unobserved, and thought, 
 " What a change ! She stood bare-footed on the shore in a 
 frock that only just reached down to her knees, and she had 
 cut her little foot on a mussel-shell, so that it bled. Now she 
 is a big, handsome girl ! " 
 
 Kai Jans looked straight in front of him, searching for the 
 Gude Wife among the forest of masts. 
 
 On board the Gude Wife steam was puffing, chains rattling, 
 voices shouting. Kai Jans went fore to see the fo'c'sle and the 
 men, but Pete and Anna went aft. In answer to her whis- 
 pered question, he showed her where he stood when he was on 
 duty, and she stood there gazing over the big ship and up into 
 the topmasts, trying to see, with the help of pictures she remem- 
 bered, what her brother saw in times of sunshine or of storm. 
 She took hold of his hand gently, without looking at him, and 
 then followed him down the companion. " This is where I 
 live, do you see ? " 
 
 "Dear me!" she cried in genuine surprise, "what a tiny 
 place!" 
 
 He laughed. 
 
 " Well, remember, the great Pe Ontjes had this room when 
 he was second." 
 
 " Where is he now? " she asked indifferently. 
 
 r< To-day he is in Hamburg. To-morrow he's going over 
 with the men to Glasgow to his ship. He means to do two 
 voyages on it and then come home to Hilligenlei and see if his 
 father's business can be expanded." 
 
 "Oh!" She had already heard as much in Hilligenlei. 
 
 " Weren't you surprised," he said, " at my getting a second 
 mate's berth so soon and on such a good ship ? " 
 
 " Yes, indeed. You can't think how delighted mother and 
 all of us were." 
 
 " Well, there's something more for you to tell her ! " After 
 some rummaging in his locker he produced a Shipbuilding
 
 HOLYLAND 14; 
 
 Journal, and, after showing her the title, opened it. " Look 
 here!" She read: "The Employment of Steam Engines or 
 Motors on Large Sailing Vessels," and underneath, " By Pete 
 Boje." 
 
 Pressing her hand to her breast, she looked at him with 
 sparkling eyes. " Oh, Pete ! " she said. 
 
 " I can tell you," said he, " I had a lot of trouble over it. 
 Not the matter, you know that I saw plainly enough 
 but expressing it. That was my difficulty. One is never sure 
 if one hasn't been to a high school. Well, I got the post on 
 that, you see. And at the same time I showed this model, this 
 one here, to our owner. Of course, you can't understand it, but 
 it shows how the carrying capacity can be increased. That's 
 it! Eyes open, ready, aye, ready, forwards! That's the thing, 
 and I am like that." 
 
 "What started you on such ideas originally?" 
 
 " Oh ! that was the old boy on the Clara do you remem- 
 ber? He put me on the track." 
 
 " What has happened to him ? " 
 
 " They said he died in hospital in Lisbon." 
 
 He spread the newspaper out once more, laughing happily. 
 " It was great fun doing it, I can tell you," he said, putting 
 it away again. 
 
 Anna leant across the table to look at the pictures nailed 
 against the wall. How strange to see, in this unfamiliar little 
 room, a picture of their parents taken soon after their marriage, 
 and the picture of Heinke and Hett taken when they were ten. 
 And there was her picture, at eighteen, her eyes full of con- 
 fusion because the photographer, a young man, had accidentally 
 touched her hair in putting her head in the position he wanted. 
 Who was that next to her, with a short, fair beard? Recog- 
 nizing Pe Ontjes Lau, she gave a sharp, suspicious look at the 
 picture and turned away. 
 
 When she had seen everything and admired the cabin, they 
 all three left the ship and spent the day in going about along 
 the Alster, to the picture galleries, up and down the principal 
 streets. 
 
 Towards evening they were sitting, it being warm enough, 
 under the glass roof in front of the Alster pavilion, when who 
 should come up but a tall, elegant gentleman with a round, 
 beardless face and large eyes shining with friendliness. In a
 
 148 HOLYLAND 
 
 word, Tjark Dusenschon. He bowed to Anna, tall hat in 
 hand, and said with a kind of friendliness, " With your per- 
 mission, ladies and gentlemen, I will sit near you. I generally 
 take a cup of coffee here," he said, " when business goes well, 
 and as that fortunately occurs frequently, I frequently take 
 coffee here." 
 
 The waiter came hurrying up and took his overcoat, his 
 white silk scarf, and his silver-mounted cane. He seated him- 
 self comfortably beside them. " I recognized you on your 
 entrance because I recognized Pete." 
 
 " Why do you never come to Hilligenlei," said Anna, in a 
 voice of suppressed anger, " when your grandmother lives 
 there?" 
 
 Tjark looked at her calmly and said, " I have no necessity 
 to go there, Miss Boje, and my grandmother earns her living 
 by her work. Why should I go to Hilligenlei? It is not as if 
 there were any business to be done there, and I have no time 
 to make excursions merely for pleasure." 
 
 " What are you doing now, then ? " asked Kai Jans. 
 
 " I have been head assistant for the last five years. At pres- 
 ent I am with a money-broker." 
 
 He looked at them all in turn, just as he had done once in 
 Jeff's smithy. 
 
 " A money-broker," said Anna. " What in the world's 
 that?" 
 
 " I will explain to you shortly, Miss Boje," said Tjark, 
 politely turning to her. " There are people who need money 
 for some undertaking or other, and there are other people who 
 have money which they wish to employ. Well, they don't 
 know of one another, do you see? My business is to bring 
 them together. Waiter! For example, if the waiter wants to 
 set up a hotel, but has no capital of his own, I can very pos- 
 sibly supply him with it. A cup of black, please, waiter." 
 
 The Hilligenlei children stared. Old Stiena Dusenschon 
 was wont to stand in front of the long house, with her bonnet 
 strings flying, and tell wonderful stories of Tjark Tj-a-a-rk 
 and behold! it was all true ! How elegantly he was dressed, 
 and what an air of ease and respectability there was about him ! 
 
 "And you, Kai! What are you doing?" 
 
 " I'm going first to Heidelberg and then Berlin to study 
 theology and modern languages."
 
 HOLYLAND 149 
 
 "Theology! I'm glad of that," said Tjark, thoughtfully. 
 " The masses need clergymen ; they are their natural leaders. 
 You, as a workman's son, will understand the people. And 
 you, Miss Boje! Are you still at home?" 
 
 " There is enough to do there," said Anna. 
 
 " If you should ever think of a situation in Hamburg, please 
 write to me. I have connections with several very good fam- 
 ilies, and could probably secure you something suitable." 
 
 " I should rather like to go now," said Anna. " I have been 
 walking about all day, and should be glad to rest a little." 
 
 " I shall remain here for a while," said Tjark, getting up 
 and politely helping Anna on with her jacket. 
 
 " I cannot bear that man," said Anna when they were on 
 their way. " Everything about him is false, from his round, 
 shining face and his worldly wisdom upwards." 
 
 Pete and Kai were silent. Tjark had impressed them. 
 
 By eight o'clock they were at the Imperial Hotel in Altona, 
 and, asking rather shyly for the coffee-room, they sat down. 
 When the waiter came up they ordered a bottle of wine, for 
 the first time in their lives. Pete ordered it, and none of them 
 ever forgot the occasion a bottle of the lightest Moselle. 
 They then ventured to look about them. They became more 
 sure of themselves, and began to feel comfortable when they 
 saw that the groups at the other tables were continuing their 
 usual conversation. Anna soon observed a solitary guest sitting 
 sideways at a little table with a bottle of claret in front of him, 
 who kept looking across to them without moving. His dress, 
 of dark-grey cloth, seemed to indicate that he belonged to the 
 well-to-do tradesman class; there was nothing remarkable 
 about his broad head or the fat, white hands folded together 
 on the table; and yet there was something about him that made 
 her anxious to see his face more distinctly. 
 
 She forced herself to look away, only to look again after a 
 brief space of time. 
 
 He was looking with a dull, fixed stare at them from under 
 his heavy, pendulous eyelids. She became uncomfortable, and 
 turning right away, leaned against the table. Kai Jans, having 
 cast a cheerful glance round the room, now turned to her with 
 lifted glass. At that moment he caught sight of the stranger 
 behind her with an immediate sensation of discomfort. He 
 turned so as not to see him any longer, and drawing a deep
 
 150 HOLYLAND 
 
 breath, said, " Now, over the Elbe and out into the world ! " 
 With a friendly nod to the other two, he drank. 
 
 At that moment Kassen Wedderkop appeared, limping 
 slightly, but in a good humour for all that, and behind him 
 his two friends a short man with red hair, and a tall man 
 with fair hair, all three portly, comfortable-looking men about 
 fifty. 
 
 "Hallo!" said the little red-haired man. "Are we to sit 
 with these young folk?" 
 
 " You behave! " said Kassen Wedderkop. " It's a long time 
 since you sat with anyone so young and charming. Look at 
 Anna Boje. Have you had a good day, child?" 
 
 The tall fair-haired man sat down next to Anna. 
 
 Fresh wine was put on the table. 
 
 " Have I ever told you," he said to Wedderkop, " how I 
 spent a week with a beautiful young girl? A long time ago. 
 It's a story that goes with wine, and one that can be told in 
 a young lady's presence." 
 
 He looked at Anna with an expression of friendly politeness. 
 
 "Would you like to hear it? You two old fellow-travellers 
 know that I spent my childhood in Hilligenlei, my boyhood in 
 Itzehoe. There were two of us my brother and myself; 
 we had no sister. We never left the town. We shared the 
 society of our parents very stiff, very respectable, for our 
 parents were very proper in their views. We only knew young 
 girls so far as dancing with them in black coats and white 
 gloves at balls, or bowing politely when we passed them in 
 the streets. We were like our parents. We went on in this 
 way until I was twenty-seven and my brother twenty-five. He 
 also was in business. 
 
 " One day, out of sheer boredom and idle curiosity, my 
 brother made a little expedition to visit a distant cousin of 
 ours a clergyman who lived under a thatched roof in a 
 remote country village in our district. Just as he had sat 
 down to tea between his cousin and his wife in came a tall, 
 beautiful girl, the daughter of a neighbouring landowner, who 
 was staying with them at the time. After tea he seized the 
 opportunity of walking in the garden with her for an hour. 
 
 " A week later he went aeain. A fortnight later they met 
 secretly for the third time. Then they were engaged, and soon 
 afterwards she came to stay with us at home for a week.
 
 HOLYLAND 151 
 
 " This week was the most beautiful and memorable time in 
 my whole life. In those days we two good, stupid young men 
 learnt to know something the very existence of which we had 
 not suspected something more wonderful than we had 
 dreamed that the world contained for we learned in those 
 days to know a beautiful young girl, sound in mind and body, 
 as innocent, as natural as if only created yesterday by the hand 
 of God. We had learned in school the different kinds of 
 rhinoceros that are to be found in Africa. We had learned 
 what an opera was, the meaning of foreign trade, and how to 
 open an oyster. But this was a creature such as we had never 
 come across. We had no knowledge of it, subjective or objec- 
 tive. Now, suddenly, we learnt to know it. 
 
 " I can give you no idea of how wonderful it all was 
 how unspeakably happy that week was for us. My brother and 
 I were lost in wonder at this piece of creation. It was sum- 
 mer. She lay, in all her beauty, on the grass in our garden, 
 clad in a loose garment, my brother at her head, and I at her 
 feet. For you must remember that it never occurred to me to 
 torture myself, because her young beauty and purity did not be- 
 long to me. No; my heart was full of nothing but joy. I 
 rejoiced in her as in a beautiful sister who had just come to me. 
 And it was not that I had never seen beauty before. There 
 were many pretty girls in the neighbourhood. No ; the wonder 
 of it all was the exquisite un-self-consciousness with which she 
 permitted us to see the loveliness of her body and her mind. 
 Every movement of her limbs, every word that she uttered, 
 roused my admiration. She moved with the grace with which 
 a younger, tender wood bends and sways under the breath of 
 the rustling wind. Her words were the speech of a blossoming 
 lime tree. Our eyes followed every movement of her lips. 
 
 ' The week passed by. I had to go to Hamburg, and soon 
 afterwards to China." He looked thoughtfully into his glass. 
 " Whether that week has kept me always single, I don't know. 
 It was the most beautiful time in my life, that I do know." 
 
 Taking up his glass and turning to Anna Boje, he pledged 
 her, " It is your fault that I told the story." 
 
 The others bowed to her. Kai Jans looked at the delicate 
 flush on her face, and thought, " How beautiful she is! " 
 
 Kassen Wedderkop refilled their glasses, and for a time 
 they sat chatting and looking at the people sitting at the tables
 
 152 HOLYLAND 
 
 or going to and fro. Anna turned to Pete and said to him in 
 a low voice, " Look at the stout man in grey behind me 
 rather to the side." Pete leaned so as to look past his sister, 
 and saw the man still sitting behind his bottle of claret. There 
 was something unnatural in his stolid immobility and the fixed 
 stare of his goggle eyes, still directed to their table, which sug- 
 gested that his mind was elsewhere something of the un- 
 canny feeling of an empty house. Pete turned quickly away. 
 " One of the claret-bibbing Hamburg Philistines, the sort that 
 lets other people do the working and thinking for them. What 
 does he matter to us?" 
 
 Wedderkop turned to the short, red-haired man. " There's 
 something I want to ask you about. Do you remember the 
 voyage we three went together from Vladivostock to San Fran- 
 cisco on the Russian steamer? I never experienced anything 
 like it in my life. We held on our course, driving, day after 
 day, through grey waves that were like mountains, through the 
 icy, driving mist, through snowstorms that raged from morning 
 until night, on, though the engines were rotten, and there was 
 no navigation worth the name and no look-out of any 
 sort. We three, the only Germans among a pack of Russians, 
 drinking and cursing in front of their icons. We two, that 
 tall fellow there and myself, were in a tremendous state of 
 mind, for we seemed at any moment likely to be charging down 
 the Milky Way into eternity. But you seemed quite detached. 
 What was it? " 
 
 The little man looked thoughtfully at his friend out of his 
 intelligent eyes, and then jovially towards Anna, and began: 
 " I, too, can tell a story that goes well with wine and is fit 
 for a pretty girl to hear. As you know, I was born in the par- 
 sonage at Hilligenlei. The house is just the same as it was 
 then. My father was rather a stiff, narrow-minded man too 
 busy to trouble much about his children. My mother I do 
 not like to speak of it before others, and I do not know how 
 far she was to blame and how far my father ; but however that 
 may be she ran away. She is dead now. We children had 
 a hard time father cold and hard, mother always with bitter 
 words on her lips. Then afterwards only father. The result 
 was that when we came to be confirmed, I, the parson's son, 
 scoffed at the words my father spoke from the pulpit more bit- 
 terly than any of the others, I was just the same when I was
 
 HOLYLAND 153 
 
 an apprentice in Hamburg a sophisticated cynic. A few 
 years later, when I was two-and-twenty, I went to Hongkong. 
 
 " I had been there about two years when I was introduced 
 to a young married couple. He was English, she the daughter 
 of a Hamburg merchant. She must have been about thirty at 
 the time, blooming with the health and happiness of wife and 
 mother, and she soon saw how distorted and unnatural my 
 point of view was. Pitying me she began to help me. Her un- 
 derstanding was marvellous. She used to let me prate and 
 criticise, and mock and almost acquiesce, but whenever I cast 
 anything down in the mud and trampled on it she used to pick 
 it up and put it away in some clean place, just like a mother 
 carefully putting aw r ay a stiff, old-fashioned dress which has 
 been the grandmother's pride. And so my hardness was grad- 
 ually melted. 
 
 " Although she was still quite young, she harl been all over 
 the world with her husband. She had seen Catholicism in its 
 severest form in South America. She had stood by the sick-bed 
 of a heathen sage in Japan. She had a Catholic friend in Hong- 
 kong who had none but Latin books upon his shelves, and she 
 had read widely. She knew Plato and Marcus Aurelius, and, 
 above all, Goethe. She never attacked anything or anyone. 
 She was always ready to yield. But from her quiet and gentle 
 talk I came to see the humble reverence for that mysterious 
 power that transcends human comprehension which formed the 
 sound basis of her soul ; and, as I saw, my nature became puri- 
 fied of the falsehood that had penetrated it, and developed into 
 a quiet sincerity. 
 
 " Of course, I fell desperately in love with her, and thought 
 I could not live apart from her so good, so beautiful, so 
 clever. One day I realized that if I were not to be ruined I 
 must go. I went. 
 
 " My going was made a little easier by a secret hope. When 
 I was at their home I used, with her permission, to look at the 
 pictures about the rooms, and among them I kept coming upon 
 one of her younger sister, who was twenty-one, and very like 
 her, and lived in Hamburg with her parents. So, I thought, 
 ' I shall go to Hamburg and marry the sister, her double.' 
 
 " I got leave of absence, came to Hamburg, visited the par- 
 ents with messages from their daughter, and saw her sister. 
 She was just like my beloved exactly alike in appearance,
 
 154 HOLYLAND 
 
 with the same friendly gaiety in her brown eyes. She was 
 clever, too, and knew Marcus Aurelius and Goethe, and she 
 was kind to me. But something was wanting. Her soul had 
 not the depths, the still blue depths, the reverence for the eter- 
 nal mysteries. She could jest at religion." 
 
 He gazed thoughtfully in front of him. 
 
 " I could not marry her," he said. " My thoughts went back 
 to the other, living in happiness in Hongkong. They still go 
 there. Those two years in Hongkong were the happiest of my 
 life." 
 
 Raising his head, he looked at Anna. 
 
 " It's your fault that I told this story. Those dear, calm 
 eyes of yours say, ' Tell something true.' They remind me of 
 her eyes, though yours are light they ask for truth." 
 
 Raising his glass, he drank to her. 
 
 When they had all drunk, they sat thoughtful for a time. 
 The ruddy light shone down on their heads. Round them blue 
 smoke lay wreathed. Anna's hair shone bright. The pale- 
 faced waiter looked at the pleasant little party, watching the 
 movements of the second old man's grey head. 
 
 The stranger sat still in his place, his glass in front of him 
 and his hands folded round it, staring with his expressionless, 
 round grey eyes at the old and young children from Hilligenlei. 
 
 They ordered more wine, and drank gaily. Kai Jans, with 
 his father's roguish look in his eyes, looked at Anna. " Our 
 healths, Anna! I shall come home in May! " 
 
 Anna looked at him with friendly eyes and laughed. 
 
 Then the tall man, who had sat at the foot of the farmer's 
 daughter in the Itzehoe garden while his brother sat at her 
 head, said, " Your story, Wedderkop, took place not far from 
 here, I know, on the other side of the Alster." 
 
 " I don't think you know much about it," said Kassen, " but 
 I do not mind telling you. It's short enough, and, like the 
 others, it goes with wine, and will do for a girl to hear. 
 
 " That time, when I came home with you two from San 
 Francisco, though only a simple youth, I succeeded in gaining 
 the good opinion of one of the most prominent business men. 
 I got to know him in my chief's office, and pleased him so much 
 that I was invited to his fine house on the other side of the 
 Alster, where I spent five happy weeks. 
 
 " He was an excellent man of business, and still has a high
 
 HOLYLAND 155 
 
 reputation, but with all his keen sense for business and business 
 advantage, he never lost sight of the inner ideal side of the 
 profession of a merchant. Of those men of business who re- 
 garded the making of money, and yet more money, as the sole 
 aim of life, he spoke with a bitter yet reasoned scorn, rising to 
 lofty enthusiasm in his description of the kingdom of the true 
 merchant, whose aim is to see that nothing is lost or wasted 
 in the world, but everything distributed to the best advantage 
 all over its surface, and put at the service of those who fight 
 against the evils and increase the joys of life. Many an hour 
 would he spend walking up and down his garden with me sug- 
 gesting thoughts to me which deepened my nature and widened 
 my outlook upon life. And when we walked thus his youngest 
 daughter nearly always came with us. If by any chance she 
 was not there he would call her. Whether he brought us to- 
 gether with any secret intention I don't know. I do know 
 that he was fond of me. Anyhow, she was young and beautiful, 
 and wore her simple, elegant dress as a young birch its leafy 
 crown. The garden was full of glorious flowers and trees, the 
 house as full of valuable old possessions as it was of goodness. 
 And so five weeks went by. 
 
 " Then the lady of the house came home from a visit to her 
 married children. She was quite unlike her husband and her 
 youngest child. Before them she did not show her true self, 
 but she was an arrogant, ambitious woman. She did not like 
 me, and saw that I did not come again. 
 
 " So I went back to China and stayed fifteen years there. 
 Why I remained single I hardly know. Was it because I 
 thought of the beautiful child in the simple, elegant dress, with 
 whom I had walked in the lovely garden by the side of that 
 good, gifted man? I don't know. Certainly, I felt I must not 
 fall below that ideal. 
 
 " After I had been away for fifteen years I was hit by a 
 Korean bullet up-country. I returned to Hamburg, and after 
 depositing my little capital with some friends, retired to Hilli- 
 genlei. Now I busy myself with the thoughts of which he 
 spoke to me in that beautiful, sunny garden thoughts of the 
 great, royal merchant and even now the thing that gives me 
 the greatest pleasure of all others is any little mark of recogni- 
 tion which he sends me. He is an old man now. I know 
 nothing of his child."
 
 156 HOLYLAND 
 
 Lifting his glass to Anna Boje, he pledged her. 
 " Well," said the tall man, " I should now like to know 
 what youth thinks of the three old bachelors ! " 
 
 " Fire away, Pete," said Wedderkop. " Give us your 
 
 opinion 
 
 " You are like sailors, all three," said Pete, laughing. " Go- 
 ing to sea and going to China comes to the same thing. If you 
 had stayed in Hamburg you would have all got married." 
 
 This judgment annoyed the three, and they refused to ac- 
 cept it, saying, " He's decrying us! It's not true. We won't 
 drink with him! " 
 
 " Now then, Anna! Speak your mind freely. Have we re- 
 mained single without any reason at all ? " 
 
 " It seems to me," said Anna, graciously, " that you all three 
 wanted the very best, and remained single because you were 
 unable to attain it. A girl can understand and respect such a 
 feeling. Your bachelordom does you all three credit." 
 
 They were much pleased, and toasted her, laughing. 
 
 " Now," said the tall man, " now for the third. I have all 
 the time regarded him with suspicion. His eyes are too deep- 
 set for one to see them. Your opinion, sir." 
 
 " I agree with Anna Boje," said Kai Jans, his eyes sparkling. 
 " You all wanted something pure, something holy, and that is 
 why you are single. You were right, because so you have kept 
 your purity." 
 
 The three looked rather shamefacedly into their glasses. 
 Then the tall man looked up and said seriously, " I don't like 
 to lead the young into such an error. Once, indeed, in our 
 youth we have seen holiness; but, alas! that has not prevented 
 us from becoming sinners afterwards." 
 
 Kai Jans shrank back, and his face grew deadly pale. He 
 tried to rise. As he did so the stranger, with his dark, empty 
 eyes fixed upon him, rose also. But Kai sat down again, and 
 stared silently at the table. 
 
 " We must go," said Wedderkop in a depressed tone. " Shall 
 you stay a little? " 
 
 " Yes," said Pete, calmly, " we'll wait a little." 
 
 The three went away. 
 
 They were hardly outside when Kai smote the table with 
 his hand, and cried in bitter scorn, " Do you see? That's how 
 it is! Hilligenlei, indeed! " He gave a mocking laugh.
 
 HOLYLAND 157 
 
 He was still laughing when the stranger came up to their 
 table, and, sitting down opposite to him, said in his dull voice, 
 raising his eyes heavily to his face, " I heard their stories, and 
 foresaw how it would all turn out." 
 
 Anna Boje cast a quick, timid glance at him. His eyes were 
 dull and bleared, like the eyes of a fish. Her heart seemed in 
 her throat with fright. She tried in vain to turn to Pete. 
 
 Kai Jans leaned forward heavily. " I am the sort of per- 
 son, you know," he said, " have been from my childhood, who 
 takes everything fearfully seriously, oh! so seriously. Yes; 
 don't you know, once I really thought why, yes once I 
 went all through the world because because I always thought 
 that somehow the world must be holy; but latterly " he 
 laughed again, a mirthless laugh. " Now the old people come 
 with their stories, and they must know they are old. Oh ! 
 I feel so strange. Yes, I believe I have for some time come 
 to the conclusion that everything everything is indifferent 
 nothing matters. Who are you, pray? " 
 
 Anna turned anxiously to Pete, and said, " Shall we go? " 
 
 " I wanted to wait a little," said Pete, casting a quick 
 glance round him. 
 
 "Who for?" 
 
 " I met Pe Ontjes yesterday," he said in a low tone, " and 
 told him you were coming, and he promised to come at a certain 
 time. He hasn't much time. But I thought he would have 
 been here by now." 
 
 " I could have told you he wouldn't come," she said sharply. 
 
 At that moment Kai Jans sprang to his feet and cried out, 
 smiting the table, " I tell you what, you two Bojes. You seek 
 for Hilligenlei. Yes, you seek for it. And tell the others 
 tell big Pe Ontjes Lau and little Heinke she will be more 
 beautiful than you one day, Antje and tell Tjark Dusen- 
 schon, the princely fool! Why should I always torture mv- 
 self ! Do you go and seek for Hilligenlei. I tell you. I shall 
 look out for some other land." 
 
 Anna stood up, quite pale. " Come," she said. " He is 
 drunk. How awful! Everyone is looking at us. Come 
 Pete." 
 
 The stranger stood beside Kai. " Walk a bit of the way 
 with me," he said. 
 
 The waiter came and helped Anna on with her coat.
 
 158 HOLYLAND 
 
 "Who is that?" said Pete, pointing after the two going 
 towards the passage, " that man in grey? " 
 
 " We don't know who he is," said the waiter. " He comes 
 here sometimes and drinks claret, and always manages to make 
 up to some party generally young people. And then the 
 fun is always at an end." 
 
 He looked at their darkened faces. 
 
 " The rascal! " said Pete. " I wonder who he is? " 
 
 Anna sobbed, anxious and ashamed. "Go after Kai Jans! 
 Oh! I am so ashamed of having been seen by everybody." 
 
 "Go after him!" said Pete, scornfully. "No, thank you. 
 He may go where he pleases. It is just as well that his folly 
 is at an end at last. Seek for Hilligenlei, indeed! The crea- 
 ture is quite off his head. We seek for Hilligenlei, forsooth! " 
 He took her arm and went on with her, leaving her at her 
 hotel. 
 
 Anna went upstairs, undressed, went to bed, and dreamed a 
 marvellous dream. 
 
 She heard her name called, clear and shrill, " Anna Boje," 
 and knew that the voice of God was calling her. " Yes, Lord ? " 
 
 " Kai Jans has begun to seek for Hilligenlei," said God, 
 " and now you must seek for it. You know, someone in your 
 town must seek and find it." 
 
 " Oh, Lord God ! " she said. " We Bojes we'll never find 
 it, and Pe Ontjes Lau hasn't learnt nearly enough." 
 
 "What am I to do, then?" said God. 
 
 " Oh, Lord," she said, " you can be quite sure that Kai Jans 
 will begin to look for it again. Do you suppose he will even 
 stay for a year with that staring, grey care-for-nothing? He 
 will soon be on fire again he is like that. And if he begins 
 again I have a younger sister called Heinke, more beautiful and 
 more holy than I am, who will help him to find it." 
 
 God raised His finger and said, " You are to seek for it, 
 too." 
 
 She shrank back. " Lord," she cried, " I cannot. I am such 
 an unhappy, restless mortal." 
 
 God spoke seriously to her and disappeared. 
 
 Next morning she went back to Hilligenlei, tioubled and 
 disturbed.
 
 CHAPTER XIII. 
 
 AND when Anna got home Heinke told her that the three 
 from the lane had gone with the invalid mother, who was to 
 undergo a prolonged treatment somewhere. The return of the 
 others depended on her condition. Heinke said it was by no 
 means impossible that they would give up their house here and 
 go south, somewhere on the Rhine, on her account. 
 
 Anna pressed her red lips together. " Indeed ! " she said. 
 
 Now she was quite alone. No one cared for her, no one 
 asked after her, no one troubled about her. She would grad- 
 ually wither and fade away. She laughed in wild and bitter 
 pain. 
 
 Her dumb suffering lasted for a week. Then came the 
 ninth of September. 
 
 As long as she lives Anna will never forget that hot, sunny 
 ninth of September, not though she lives to ninety, nor think 
 that any sin was committed on that day by herself or by another. 
 Any sin there was has indeed been expiated by bitter sorrow, 
 the love that can cover a multitude of sins. 
 
 On the ninth of September, soon after midday, a quite unusual 
 time, her three friends stood in the lane and knocked as usual 
 at the gate. Anna was standing by the grate, but she heard, 
 and came running out at once. Their eyes shone with pleasure 
 at seeing her again, and they cried, " How lovely to meet 
 again." 
 
 His eyes glistened with joy. He looked less tired than be- 
 fore, when he used to work hard every day. Excessive happi- 
 ness made her more confiding than she had ever been; it 
 seemed to unlock her heart. 
 
 " You dear, silly things," she cried, kneeling down in ex- 
 quisite confusion. " Knack " went her knees. 
 
 Then the three explained that in eight weeks they were to 
 leave Hilligenlei and go south to the mother; but as long as 
 they were there they wanted to see Anna every day every 
 single one ; and would she go to the wood with them this af ter-
 
 160 HOLYLAND 
 
 noon ? " There's an open space there," said the littlest one. 
 " We'll dance there." 
 
 " You must put on very few clothes," said the elder child, 
 " because it's very hot, and you are to dance." 
 
 It was a hot, breathless day, the ninth of September. 
 
 They found the short-grass plot at the edge of the wood, a 
 spot of sunshine hidden away in the dark cavernous circle of 
 the twenty-year-old pine trees. There she danced on the short 
 turf, first with the little child, then with the bigger one; and 
 then he asked her to dance alone; then to stay standing as she 
 was. And she did everything he asked her. He was so dear, 
 so playful with his children ; he asked her so gently, with such 
 goodness and happiness in his eyes, that her heart beat fast 
 under his gaze. 
 
 Suddenly he came up to her and said in a choking voice, 
 " Do you know that I can see your dear limbs through yoifr 
 dress?" 
 
 She looked at him in painful confusion. " It was so hot," 
 she said piteously. " I wanted to be able to have a good romp 
 with the children." 
 
 " Do you know you are the most beautiful girl in the 
 world?" 
 
 She stepped back toward the pine trees, looking at him with 
 timid entreaty in her eyes. 
 
 " I mustn't. I mustn't." 
 
 He didn't listen. He knew she loved him. 
 
 " You have loved me ever since your childhood. I have seen 
 it in your eyes." 
 
 " I didn't know," she murmured. " I never knew it, never. 
 I never thought of this." 
 
 He did not press her; he only spoke of his great joy. " Oh, 
 you! you are so brave, so noble. You are three-and-twenty, 
 and your wonderful soul and body are yours alone how won- 
 derful, you don't know. You dear, beautiful woman." He 
 seized her hands. She let him take both hands, looking at him 
 still with timid entreaty in her eyes. 
 
 " Oh," she said, breathing hard, " never shall I love anyone 
 as I love you." 
 
 They went through the wood, the hot sun penetrating; 
 obliquely through the trees, the children in front. Her head 
 was bent, his eyes and thoughts were all for her. When they
 
 HOLYLAND 161 
 
 came to the quiet house, the children went into the garden 
 with the maid. He put his arm round her and led her into his 
 room. She turned to him in sore distress, saying, " Dear, tell 
 me I am not doing wrong promise me that. Oh! I cannot 
 help it I cannot help it. I never knew before, but now I 
 see. For a long time I have loved you more than anything 
 in the world. To think that you you love me ! Now I 
 know. How I have longed for that. Oh! I have been so ter- 
 ribly lonely. Be good to me, help me. Oh! my darling! " 
 
 For seven weeks the glory lasted seven weeks of joy. 
 Unholy? No; holy. Seven weeks in the wonderland of faerie, 
 weeks of poignant joy and sorrow. For seven weeks Anna 
 Boje was a happy, unhappy woman. 
 
 She did not ask him, " Stay with me and let the other go." 
 She did not say, " I don't know how I am to live when you are 
 gone." Had she asked him this, he would have acquiesced, for 
 the wonder of it was as great for him as it was for her. 
 
 She did not ask him to do it. She would not have accepted 
 it had he offered. She could not have purchased her happiness 
 at the price of another's misery. She knew the day would 
 come, come soon, dark and terrible, when all her glory fell in 
 ruins around her the holy, ah ! not the unholy, glory. 
 
 At this time her mother said to Heinke, " What can have 
 come over Anna? She is affectionate with us, and talks in a 
 way she has not done for years." 
 
 " Yes," said Heinke. " I have noticed it, but I don't know 
 why it is." 
 
 And the girls whom she met from time to time said to one 
 another, " What has come over Anna Boje? She is so gay and 
 friendly, and how pretty she is! " 
 
 The day came. 
 
 The southern physician decided that the wife must stay there 
 in the warm valley. The North Sea air was too damp and 
 strong for her too cold and salt. 
 
 He drew a deep breath and looked at Anna. " Oh! the air 
 is fresh and bracing here, and you you are so dear, so beau- 
 tiful." 
 
 " You must go," said she, tears starting to her eyes. " You 
 must forget me. I must see what will become of me." 
 
 She got the children ready for the journey. She could see 
 the despair in his eyes as she felt, for the last time, the mad
 
 162 HOLYLAND 
 
 fever of his love. She saw them off at the station, shook him 
 by the hand, and said, grinding her teeth together: "Kind re- 
 gards to mother." 
 
 Then she went home alone, saying to herself " I shall never 
 see him again." 
 
 When she got home she found a postcard from Kai Jans 
 with a brief account of his doings. Across the corner in small 
 letters were the words: " Have you found Hilligenlei? I have 
 discovered something very like it." Underneath was a pair of 
 eyes drawn in blue ink. 
 
 " How funny of him to write to you," said Heinke; " he has 
 always written to me before. What does that mean in the 
 corner? " 
 
 " I expect he's in love with someone with blue eyes," said 
 Anna. 
 
 Heinke went silently out into the garden and wept under the 
 apple tree. 
 
 Hard times followed for the little house under the chest- 
 nuts. 
 
 Pete went on a distant voyage to Samoa, and his sister did 
 not know or share his hopes and plans. Hett went to an office 
 in Kiel. After eight weeks there he wrote for the first time 
 secretly to Anna, asking her for money. She sent him thirty 
 shillings from her savings. He did not even thank her. She 
 thought " The lot of the elder sister already ! Professor Ton- 
 ner's three daughters stayed at home toiling and moiling for the 
 two sons: that's how it will be! " 
 
 It was twenty-five years since Hella Boje had danced out 
 of her slippers at Ringerang's dance: she grew grey and ma- 
 tronly now, and her heart hardened as she grieved over the 
 absence of her two darlings. To Anna, who had returned to 
 her old reserve, she seldom spoke: for Heinke she had nothing 
 but hard words : she was obstinate, indolent, unkind ; and every- 
 thing she did only seemed to make it worse. Heinke, whose 
 only faults were the silent pride inherited from her mother 
 and the intellectual keenness of her father, wept many secret 
 tears, drying them to look at the picture postcards which Kai 
 Jans sent her from Heidelberg and the neighbourhood, and she 
 kept in order in her song-book. 
 
 At times Anna tried to pull herself together. She would try 
 to make a dress for herself or her sister, but the long sitting
 
 HOLYLAND 163 
 
 and the irritating work annoyed her so, that she ended by un- 
 doing all she had done and handing it over to the dressmaker. 
 In the evening she would sometimes secretly try to read her 
 father's books up in her own room ; but the lofty pictures they 
 conjured up did not thrill her: she soon let the book fall, un- 
 able to find the path to beauty, to look round the narrow little 
 room, fit background for her empty hopeless life. 
 
 In the winter she was invited to a girls' party, and forced 
 herself to go. Things went merrily enough. The younger 
 girls, up to about eighteen, among whom was Heinke, sat in 
 one room, telling harmless but silly stories, and laughing till 
 some of them could not sit upright. The elder girls, ranging 
 up to eight-and-twenty, sat in another room : they soon got upon 
 the subject of marriage. Those over five-and-twenty did most 
 of the talking, while the others listened. 
 
 ' To be married to a nice man that's the best there is." 
 
 " But there are not many nice men." 
 
 They began to discuss the possible young men, speaking with 
 bitter contempt of seven or eight who did not marry either be- 
 cause they were too self-indulgent and lazy, or because they 
 were incapable of it. , 
 
 One girl said harshly : " Young men now-a-days are all crip- 
 ples. Marriage gets more and more uncommon." 
 
 " Well," said another, " Frieda got married only the other 
 day. . . and Gertrud." 
 
 " Yes, but then Frieda had five hundred pounds, and Ger- 
 trud well, she was twenty-five, you know." 
 
 " Many are called but few chosen." 
 
 " I could bear not being married if it was because I was an 
 ugly little thing but simply because I have no money bags ! 
 that seems to me a scandal. Think of Frieda and her five 
 hundred pounds; she's a perfect skeleton! How could anyone 
 want to sleep with her? " 
 
 " Come, you are going rather too far." 
 
 "What of that? Don't the Socialists say that the accursed 
 property system is coming to an end? If people were only val- 
 ued for strength and beauty! I say, Anna then you would 
 get a prince and I an ear). No one can deny that I am tall and 
 strong, or that my nose is a good shape, and my hair long and 
 beautiful." She laughed, plunging both hands into her fair 
 hair.
 
 164 HOLYLAND 
 
 " After all, most of us do marry far the most. Some girls 
 don't want to marry it does not appeal to them." 
 
 One of the girls laughed " Children, I will tell you a de- 
 licious story you must keep it quiet, or I won't tell you a 
 word more. ... A few weeks ago Lena Bruhn and I went to 
 Bindorf : coming back we missed our train and had to walk 
 back to Hilligenlei. However, on the way we got frightened, 
 and went into Sothbier's inn you know, an old man with the 
 two daughters. Well, the two girls were good enough to give 
 us their rooms and go and sleep somewhere else. I went to 
 sleep Lena too ; but about midnight someone knocked at my 
 window knocked and knocked : and then a voice said ' Why 
 won't you let me in? Why not, girl? What has come into 
 your head all at once. Let me in, I say ! What's the matter 
 you've always let me; why won't you now, all of a sudden?' 
 . . . And so it went on for a whole hour; and it happened just 
 the same to Lena. 
 
 " Next morning early we went into the kitchen. The two 
 girls were standing by the fire making the coffee. ' Tell me 
 one thing,' said Lena ; ' would you marry if you could ? Come 
 now ? ' They looked at us quite shamefacedly and said ' We 
 don't think of marrying no. I don't expect we shall.' Yes, 
 that's how it is. Of course I want to get married everyone 
 does." 
 
 " I tell you what," said another, " if you really want to get 
 married you must look like the daughter of the Tonndorf clerk : 
 she was neither pretty nor rich, but she was sharp. She 
 thought ' If I stay " Miss " I will be an old maid.' So she 
 went to Hamburg as chambermaid in a very smart house and 
 married the gardener. Afterwards her sister got a baker in the 
 same way, and she has six children, and they live on the rolls 
 left over in the morning, and are all as hearty and healthy as 
 possible." 
 
 " You're making up again," they cried ; " you never keep to 
 the truth." 
 
 " Anyhow," said another, " I could only marry the right sort 
 of man good and clever." 
 
 " Oh, yes," they all cried ; " that's necessary." 
 
 "Nonsense," said another, bitterly; "better be unhappily 
 married than not married at all."
 
 HOLYLAND 165 
 
 The others disagreed. " Oh, no ! Think of ... and . . . 
 Ten thousand times better to be single." 
 
 " Yes, but she has children of her own." 
 
 " Children that is something! " 
 
 " To be an old maid, with no one to love, no one to care 
 for." 
 
 " Well, think of Hannah Behrens ! She is a happy old maid. 
 Yes, really there is no mistake about it. She is thoroughly 
 happy, although she is thirty-two and single really happy." 
 
 Some shrugged their shoulders. " Yes, there are some peo- 
 ple like that; but they have buttermilk in their veins, and had 
 much better not marry. We are not like that better dead 
 than live single. What do you think, Anna Boje? 
 
 " Anna takes things calmly an icy queen." 
 
 One among them, however, divined the passion latent in 
 Anna, and looked at her with deep interest. This was the 
 daughter of an official who, having from her childhood shown 
 a wonderful feeling for line and colour, and great deftness of 
 hand, had been sent, at her mother's encouragement, to the 
 Polytechnic at Kiel. Having then turned to photography she 
 was now, at twenty-four, manageress and part owner with an 
 art dealer in a big town, earning a good salary. Just now she 
 was paying a visit to her home and sitting among the friends of 
 her childhood. Her keen quiet eyes sought out Anna Boje. 
 
 Anna, who had always liked her because she was sincere and 
 natural, looked at her, saying: 
 
 " If one had a gift like yours ! " 
 
 " Yes," said the other, " if one had had an independent pro- 
 fession, like yours!" 
 
 The little artist looked at them, only saying: "Yes. . . . 
 yes." 
 
 Thereupon, the conversation was brought to an end by a girl 
 of twenty-eight, a clever, serious-minded girl, who spent her 
 time in nursing an invalid father: "Those who say that they 
 find complete satisfaction in a profession are either lying or 
 naturally unfitted for marriage. What good is a profession for 
 the rest of us? We don't want to look after other people's 
 children, to teach other people's children, attend to other peo- 
 ple's business, and nurse sick people whom we don't know: we 
 want to love, to care for, to suffer for, yes, and to die for what 
 belongs to us: that's our Hilligenlei."
 
 166 HOLYLAND 
 
 Thus they spoke openly of their need. Not one among them 
 was ugly. All, except one, who was a little queer, were fresh, 
 sweet-natured, healthy girls. 
 
 Silence fell upon them for a space. Then they began to talk 
 in twos and threes, and gradually grew merry, and laughed 
 again. 
 
 When Anna Boje got up to go, rather sooner than the 
 others, the little artist accompanied her. 
 
 " Can't you still become a teacher? " she said timidly. 
 
 "I can't manage it," said Anna, in a troubled voice; "I 
 lose my temper at once. I haven't a single gift of any sort." 
 
 " You are sure to get married," said the other comfortingly; 
 " you're only twenty-three, and tall and beautiful, and clever. 
 Who will get married if not you ? " 
 
 Anna shrugged her shoulders, and said bitterly : " No one 
 has asked me yet, not a single person " 
 
 "Tilda Peters is quite right," continued the other; a pro- 
 fession is not enough to make us happy. It may satisfy those 
 who are somehow weak and colourless, but those who are 
 strong long for a husband and children. It is true they say 
 one can suppress it. . . ." 
 
 "Suppress it!" cried Anna, scornfully; "I might as well 
 crush in my eyes and my bosom ! " 
 
 " It is terrible," said her little friend in a low tone ; " ter- 
 rible. Many suffer in silence and become dulled by pain. An- 
 guish drives others to steal secretly what they cannot get openly 
 and honourably. The power of the Church and respectability 
 used to be strong enough to say ' submit,' but now-a-days in 
 big towns who cares for the Church or respectability? They 
 say ' We cannot be deprived of hearth and cradle.' They take 
 their share, and so, what ought to be pure joy becomes a sin 
 and sorrow. It is terribly, terribly hard for thousands of girls 
 in our towns." 
 
 Anna looked shyly at the dark dainty face : " What do your 
 parents think of such ideas?" 
 
 She shrugged her shoulders. " My father goes to the club 
 every evening, hears licentious stories, and tells some of his 
 own ; mother was married at eighteen and does not understand 
 me. And that is perhaps the hardest of all. We, the children 
 of a new age, are orphans."
 
 HOLYLAND 167 
 
 Anna accompanied her to her home, and then pursued her 
 way through the dark streets in utter despair. 
 
 " I am not needed at home. I have no talent. Must I go 
 to a strange house, serve strange people, look on at their hap- 
 piness? or do some dull, monotonous work that leads to noth- 
 ing? Go I must. I am twenty-three, I can't stay at home any 
 longer. Heinke is too young to go I must." 
 
 As she went down the harbour street her misery grew more 
 poignant every moment, and roused the dark thoughts that 
 slumbered in the dim recesses of her mind, that slumber in 
 every heart. " If a letter came from him. ... a black-edged 
 letter ... if she were dead . . . Oh, how happy I should 
 be ! ... I should cry out for sheer happiness ! Think of the 
 waiting! . . . then, then we should see each other again. . . . 
 I should go and meet them at the station! . . . How happy I 
 shall make you three! How you shall laugh with me! I shall 
 be so sweet and good to you Oh, no she lives ; she is 
 getting better. . . . Oh, if she were to die! She has had ten 
 years of utter joy ten long, lovely years . . . give me ten 
 . . . three . . . one give me one year; then I will gladly 
 die oh, gladly. A year of joy without sin, without fear. 
 . . . Oh, if she were only to die ! " 
 
 She went down to the sluice, and stood there listening to 
 the gurgling water, listening to her own thoughts. " I am 
 wicked ... so wicked, that the best thing would be for me 
 to drown myself. I have no hope at all. Who would sorrow 
 for me, who would miss me? My children sleep within me, 
 no one wakes them. What I can do, and what I want to do 
 is to love someone, and to care for him ; but no one wants me. 
 ... I will wait a little while. ... I will." She looked 
 across to the long house. There was still a light in Rieke 
 Thomson's room. " I will know whether there is any hope 
 for me. I have mocked before cards, what can they tell ! 
 . . . But when one is in such need. . . ." 
 
 She looked in front of her once more, and listened to the 
 wind; then she rose and went up on to the dyke, and after 
 listening to hear whether the old dame were alone, went along 
 the passage and into the room. Rieke Thomson was sitting 
 in her big chair, and had just turned her head to look across 
 the bay for a light: she was stouter even than of old. 
 
 "What! Anna Boje?" said she, sharply; "what do you
 
 168 HOLYLAND 
 
 want of me? " Like most people, she could not bear the Bojes 
 because of the haughty air with which they carried their proud 
 heads. 
 
 " I want you to put out the cards for me. I have often 
 wanted to come before, but never had time," said Anna cheer- 
 fully. 
 
 " Everyone who comes says either ' Rieke, I want just to 
 see your hocus pocus,' or ' I have often wanted to come before, 
 but never had time.' As a matter-of-fact, everyone who comes 
 comes because they are in some trouble. An evening comes to 
 everyone who is young and in trouble, when they believe in my 
 art. I don't think there is a single girl or a single married 
 woman, gentle or simple, in Hilligenlei, that hasn't been to 
 me in the last thirty years. Give me the cards, please 
 there on the shelf no, further to the right on the Bible. 
 Give me the Bible at the same time: I must read the evening 
 lesson." 
 
 She shuffled the cards and placed them slowly in four rows 
 on top of one another, then slid her finger over them. " Not 
 much money," she said slowly, " but bread enough . . . there 
 is a fair man who is thinking of you, but cannot tell you so 
 . . . there is something in the way. . . . And also a dark 
 gentleman with a lady by his side." She looked up question- 
 ingly at the ripe loveliness by her side. ' That's all." 
 
 Then said Anna, in an unsteady voice, " We are troubled 
 about my brother ... he is far away at sea ... far away. 
 ... I wanted to know there is no no death ? " 
 
 Rieke Thomson looked up again and understood it all from 
 the hard glint in her eyes. This cruel courage pleased her, 
 but she shook her head and said honestly: "No, there is no 
 death there." 
 
 Anna stood up, laid sixpence on the table, and went away. 
 She went home and slept, got up, and went on from day to day 
 in deep depression of spirit. " In the autumn I leave home," 
 she said ; " I will find a situation in some family in Hamburg, 
 and get Hett to come to Hamburg too, and look after him. 
 I can see Pete there from time to time, and be his friend until 
 he marries that will be the end of it." 
 
 Spring came on apace: a lovely, sunny, joyous spring. Pe 
 Ontjes Lau came to Hilligenlei; his final removal delayed 
 because he kept accepting good berths when they were offered
 
 HOLYLAND 169 
 
 to him. He came to bring Mrs. Boje messages from Pete, who 
 had gone to Iquique on board the Gude Wife, and reported 
 that the improvement which Pete had invented had proved 
 excellent, and he would probably go over to naval engineering 
 when a good opening offered. He then went away, and did not 
 return. He was fully occupied in learning his father's business 
 and trying to discover whether anything could be made of it. 
 Until he had decided that point he must think of nothing else. 
 Anna had not been at home; afterwards she only very occa- 
 sionally met him in the street, and he merely bowed politely 
 and went on his way. She looked up shyly, thinking, " He 
 doesn't like me. That's a real man; but he doesn't like me; 
 he will marry a farmer's daughter with money." 
 
 It was a beautiful summer, but the dead weight of depression 
 lay heavy on her. Her mother and Heinke said little to her. 
 
 " In October I shall go to Hamburg," she thought. " I 
 can be the fly on the wheel somewhere: a telephone clerk or 
 something like that. I'm too stupid for anything else." 
 
 One day Anna Martens came with her husband and her 
 first child, able to walk by now. There was something calm 
 and dignified about her; her eyes glowed with inward happi- 
 ness. She followed Anna into the kitchen and said: 
 
 "What do you think of the great Mr. Lau? That's the 
 sort of man for you calm and splendid." 
 
 " Don't talk nonsense," said Anna, her eyes bent on her 
 work. 
 
 " Perhaps," said Anna, " he isn't good enough for you 
 you want a student ! " 
 
 " Oh," said Anna, looking at her friend in astonishment, 
 mingled with bitterness, " how little you know about it, Anna! 
 I want someone whom I can love, someone good and true and 
 strong that's all. What do I care for money, or Latin and 
 Greek?" 
 
 At that time there was in the town a young man of good 
 family who was in a position in a bank in Berlin and had come 
 home to be nursed back to health by his parents, having become 
 ill through dissipation, or, as he said, through work. After 
 a few days he became bored, and looked about him for amuse- 
 ment, which, being a handsome young man, and a lady-killer, 
 he had no difficulty in finding. It soon became matter of 
 common knowledge that several young girls had yielded them-
 
 i;o HOLYLAND 
 
 selves to him, although they knew that he had no thoughts of 
 marriage. Since the honourable young men were indolent or 
 prudent, their needs delivered them to his mercy. 
 
 One day he saw Anna Boje in the street. Recognising her 
 with some surprise, he addressed her, asked about Pete, and 
 formed in his own mind the resolution: " I will possess Anna 
 Boje; it will be wonderful to teach her the meaning of love." 
 
 Towards evening he walked up and down the lane, and, on 
 the third day, induced her to come out to him. She only 
 wanted a man to show her that she was desirable to him. She 
 did not go to meet him; but, walking round the houses, came 
 out under the lime-trees in the park. He stood there where 
 the paths diverged at the opening of the avenue, waiting for her. 
 It was very dark. 
 
 " Anna Boje! " said he, with a laugh, approaching her. She 
 turned round and pushed out her hands so as to send him 
 staggering back. Then, with a few words of burning indigna- 
 tion, she left him. 
 
 In the excitement of her feelings she went out of the town 
 up to the three paths. The evening was mild and beautiful. 
 Above the dark houses of Volkmersdorf to one side of the sum- 
 mit the moon rose calmly, casting her peaceful light over the 
 night. She walked slowly, still trembling in every limb. 
 " Oh, however much I long for it ... even if I had wanted 
 to ... I could not have done it. The others have done it. 
 I cannot. Ugh ! how he took hold of me ! " 
 
 In the deep grass stood the big red cows, slowly tearing the 
 grass as they ate. Under the second path the water glinted; 
 under the third it ran audibly down in the valley beneath. 
 Once more she came back to the perpetual subject of her 
 thoughts. "Why must I be lonely without love? Am I 
 to be lonely always ? " She began to brood over it, thinking 
 gloomily that the fault lay in her, that she was joyless because 
 her character was peculiar and disagreeable. Perhaps there 
 was something in her parents' past which caused people to 
 look upon her with secret contempt. She came to the bottom 
 of the ascent, and went slowly up. To the right and left of 
 her were the sheaves of rye; higher up the soil was broken up 
 for the new seed. The air was heavy with fruition. The bit- 
 terness in her soul rose up and darkened everything. " How 
 hateful all this growth and blossoming is, all this fruit bear-
 
 HOLYLAND 171 
 
 ing," she thought, " how repulsive. I won't blossom and bear 
 fruit no. I will be buried eight feet deep in the earth, so 
 that I can be no use even when I am dead or else a flower 
 or a tree might spring up out of me. Oh! the idea is hateful." 
 
 She came out on to the heath and walked upon the soft, 
 springing ground. Beneath her in the blue haze of a July 
 night lay the wide plain. She turned aside from the path, and 
 sat down wearily on the wall, and, as she gazed over the beau- 
 tiful peace of the wide landscape stretched out before her, she 
 became more calm and gentle. Her thoughts flew back to the 
 hours of her wonderful, fearful happiness. " Once you have 
 been happy : a good and glorious man has loved you once. Oh, 
 yes, how he loved, how his eyes used to shine, how his words 
 glowed. What agony parting was to him: no, nothing in the 
 world can blot that out of my life." She began to go through 
 the different scenes in her mind: the beginning in the lane 
 . . . and so sat thinking and dreaming. She lost all sense of 
 reality, and fell into a kind of waking sleep. The heath 
 spread out dark and wide, and beyond and below the grey 
 darkness of the land stretched out to meet the sea. Across the 
 heath, from the wide, boundless distance, came a wondrous 
 being, like a bright-coloured, heavy cow, with beautiful curl- 
 ing horns and monstrous ears, and huge, moist shining eyes. 
 It stood before her and looked thoughtfully at her. And 
 she dreamed she was walking along the lane, and lost her 
 clothes, one after another, till she was quite naked ; and her 
 three friends stood there weeping to see her in such a state. 
 Then from a side road came the mayor, whom she hated since 
 she was a child, because he always looked at her as much as 
 to say: "The teacher's widow's poor daughter." And with 
 him came the man she had rebuffed, and they looked at her 
 and laughed, and their laughter terrified her so that she fell 
 down and lay as one dead. Then it was no longer in the 
 lane, but on the high road outside the town the town scav- 
 enger, Jochen Wenig, came from another side road to carry 
 her off into his hut. In her horror she cried out, and awoke. 
 
 Looking round her in terror she began confusedly to repeat 
 prayers and texts which she had learnt at school j and got up 
 stiffly to her feet. 
 
 A man came towards her, groaning and breathing heavily, 
 and said in a loud voice: "Who's here? What's the matter?
 
 172 HOLYLAND 
 
 Who's worrying herself in this way? You is it you, my 
 child ? " 
 
 " Yes, it's me, Uncle Wedderkop," said Anna. 
 
 " My child," he said, his voice suddenly becoming quite soft 
 and sympathetic; "why are you crying in this piteous way? 
 Has anyone hurt you in any way ? Come come, let's go 
 away together. Only don't cry so don't cry." 
 
 " I am so fearfully lonely," she cried, sobbing pitiably, " so 
 fearfully deserted." 
 
 For a time he walked by her side in silence. Then he said, 
 " Convention is the cause of your suffering. Conventional 
 respectability is a murderer: it is destroying your youth and 
 the youth of many of your sisters. Think if we lived under 
 natural conditions you would, from your childhood up, always 
 have been surrounded by young people of the other sex ; one 
 w r ould have been your friend, another would have honoured you 
 from a distance, a third would have played happily with you. 
 This sunny wind-swept height might have been the playground 
 of the young people of Hilligenlei. Three or four or more, 
 the best in all the country round, would have sued eagerly for 
 your love from the time you were twenty, because of your 
 beauty and your chastity, and, amid much wrangling and weep- 
 ing, playing and kissing, you would have become a woman. 
 And that's how it still is among the children of labourers and 
 artisans. A labourer's child, if she is chaste and beautiful, has 
 wooers enough. But, in the so-called educated classes, con- 
 vention has perverted and destroyed what was naturally beauti- 
 ful. Convention says to a young girl : ' You mustn't go for 
 a walk alone with a young man; you mustn't call him by his 
 Christian name; you mustn't kiss him unless you are going 
 to marry him ; you must have so-and-so r^uch dowry.' And 
 it says to the young man : ' You mustn't marry without money 
 your income is too small. You must expend the flower of 
 your manhood on fallen women, and marry late. You will es- 
 cape responsibility if you remain single.' And so, wherever the 
 young men and women are, convention follows them like a 
 cantankerous old aunt, robbing you girls of the best time of 
 your lives, so that many never marry, and many don't marry 
 till too late. Little one, you are not despised ; no one despises 
 you you must never think that ; only, like thousands of 
 others, you are sacrificed to a cruel, pernicious convention,
 
 HOLYLAND 173 
 
 What help is there? One individual cannot do much. You 
 women must do it yourselves. One thing I say to you, my 
 dear girl, and don't forget it: if you marry and are happy in 
 your home, and in having someone to love and to care for, then 
 do not forget your dear sisters sitting alone as you are now, 
 longing for the fulfilment of their woman's destiny, a home to 
 love, filled with children's tears and laughter. Work in some 
 way to help the young women of our country." 
 
 Anna had listened attentively, and the kind words soothed 
 her. The moon looked down peacefully over the silent world. 
 
 " Years ago," she said softly, " I did something that is con- 
 sidered a sin; but I loved him beyond everything. I cannot 
 speak of it to anyone." 
 
 " Is it over now? " 
 
 "Yes, quite over; he is far away." 
 
 " Was he good to you ? " 
 
 " Oh, so good," she said. " But he could not help me or 
 himself ... he could not be false to an old bond, and I could 
 not be happy at the cost of someone else's misery." 
 
 " Nature is stronger than convention," he said. " Thank 
 God for that; and love is mightier than death, for which 
 thank Him too." 
 
 " God ? " she said in a low sad tone ; " when I was a child 
 I remember being dreadfully distressed because I had left one 
 person of the Trinity out of my evening prayers . . . now the 
 Trinity means nothing to me nothing. I have no faith, and 
 that is sad." 
 
 " Yes," said he, reflectively, " it is sad. But I cannot help 
 you there. I have none either. I also have no Hilligenlei, no 
 Holyland for my soul. I cannot accept the faith of the Church 
 or find another of my own." 
 
 She drew a deep breath and said: 
 
 " You have done me good. Uncle Wedderkop. I have 
 longed so terribly, for such a long while, to hear a friendly 
 word." Then she added hesitatingly, in a low voice: "But 
 if I don't get married, I don't know what I shall do with my 
 life." 
 
 He looked at her sideways, with rather a roguish expres- 
 sion, and said: "Come, Antje; you're only twenty-three; 
 hasn't your mirror told you what you look like? It may be
 
 1/4 HOLYLAND 
 
 a year, or two, or even three, but the man will come, a fine, 
 serious man, who wants you." 
 
 " No one dares to come near me," she said, breathing quick 
 again. 
 
 He laughed. " No coward would venture ; but it would 
 be no good if he did. He will be a real man, and one who 
 knows his own worth. That's why you have to wait so long." 
 
 The streets were quiet; the moonlight lay upon them cold 
 and grey. " I will trust for a while then," she said. 
 
 "Yes," said he, "don't despair. Hope for Hilligenlei! "
 
 CHAPTER XIV. 
 
 BY autumn Pe Ontjes Lau was assured that his business was 
 going to be a success. He gave up managing the smacks him- 
 self, extended his shed, and built a vane on the top, which, in 
 spite of all his oiling, creaked unpleasantly all day long. As 
 soon as the news reached the club they cried : " It will go 
 wrong; it's sure to go wrong; such a thing is impossible in 
 Hilligenlei." 
 
 But Pe Ontjes knew that he had now got a business that 
 would make him happy and support a wife and children. So 
 he lifted up his head, and went to look for Anna Boje. Up 
 to now he had compelled his eyes to look at nothing but maize 
 and barley sacks, or the keen-eyed farmers; now he lifted up 
 his head and looked about him. And there is never any doubt 
 or hesitation when Peter Ontjes Lau, formerly the magnificent 
 mate of the Gude Wife, now corn-dealer, lifts his head. Well, 
 he lifted his head with its short fair beard, and looked about 
 him. Where is Anna Boje? 
 
 One misty evening in October her mother came into the 
 kitchen and said, " First mate Lau passed a minute ago and 
 knocked at the window to ask where you were; he had not 
 seen you for a long time." 
 
 Anna looked up from her work, saying crossly : " What is 
 Lau to me? " 
 
 "Child, what is the matter?" said her mother much 
 troubled. " There is nothing wrong in it." 
 
 " He never troubled about me before. What does he 
 want?" 
 
 But when she had washed up after supper a strange con- 
 fusion of feelings drove her out into the dark evening. Curi- 
 osity, ardent and joyful desire, restless anger, all had share in 
 it. She went out by the kitchen door along the lane up to the 
 long house on the dyke. He followed her. 
 
 " Hallo, Anna Boje! " he said, with all his old serenity of
 
 i;6 HOLYLAND 
 
 manner. " Well met ! I was going up to the pierhead to see 
 whether there are any signs of the smack." 
 
 She went with him, and he asked after Heinke and Hett. 
 She said how glad his mother must be to have him in Hilli- 
 genlei, and how her mother longed to have Pete safe on shore. 
 He inquired how she spent the day; she must have enough to 
 do, now that her mother sat all day at the machine. She said 
 that after the harvest festival she meant to look for a situation 
 in Hamburg, if possible. Such circumspect conversation 
 occupied them until they had reached the pier, and turned back 
 again. Then there came a silence. 
 
 " If you were agreeable " he began he tried, without 
 success, to say it offhand, but the tone of his voice was quite 
 changed " if you were agreeable, I should like to take a 
 walk like this another time with you. Will you ? " 
 
 There was an apple in her throat; she said slowly, in a 
 choking voice: "Why haven't you taken any notice of me all 
 this time? You never came that time in Hamburg, either." 
 
 " That time in Hamburg I couldn't come. Afterwards I 
 have always been thinking of the business. I am the sort of 
 man that likes to feel the ground firm beneath his feet before 
 doing anything new," he said with proud composure. 
 
 " Yes," said she angrily, " that's what you are, that's what 
 you have always been . . . you have always thought an eel, 
 or a rope, or a sack of maize more important than a living 
 human being." 
 
 "That's not true," he said, in some anger; "you have no 
 right to say that." 
 
 " If it were not so, you wouldn't have grudged me a friendly 
 word in all this time." 
 
 " It's a pity," said he, " that you are so touchy your own 
 mother complains of it." 
 
 " I am not touchy," she said, angrily; " everybody is unjust 
 in saying that and you, of course, would be one. You were 
 the first of all. When I was a tiny girl you were hard on me. 
 You are proud; yes, you are. You always want to keep me 
 down. You always want to show that you are somebody, you 
 have something, and I am nobody and have nothing, and ought 
 to be glad when the lord comes and drops me a word ! " 
 
 He laughed in some annoyance, without quite knowing what
 
 HOLYLAND 177 
 
 to say. She went a few steps further by his side, then hasten- 
 ing her pace disappeared into the darkness. 
 
 Reaching home she went straight up to her room and went 
 to bed, working herself up into a state of ever increasing anger 
 and despair. The west wind blew gently at the door and at 
 the window, and she lay listening to it. Soon she rose, and 
 with rapid fingers undid her yellow coils; then throwing 
 herself wildly down again, she buried her head in the waves. 
 " Oh, if he were to come! If he could see me now . . . and 
 it tortured him. I know I am beautiful and and I know I 
 can make a man happy." 
 
 The west wind pressed softly against the door. Now not 
 only the wind: the latch clicked. 
 
 " Anna," he said, calmly; " I would so gladly be friends with 
 you. Anna . . . speak kindly." 
 
 She lay still, only moving her white shoulders a little. 
 " What am I to say? I am proud, senselessly touchy I don't 
 even realize that I am a poor teacher's daughter, although 
 everyone knows it." 
 
 " You are mad," he said, standing up; " there is no use talk- 
 ing to you." 
 
 He was gone. 
 
 When her mother came into the kitchen next morning, and 
 saw her daughter's set, distorted face, she was troubled, and 
 said: "Can you not get on with Pe Ontjes? He is such a 
 fine good fellow. Oh, my .child, my child ! don't harden your 
 heart. Afterwards it will break like glass and you will suffer 
 when it is too late." 
 
 Anna roused herself from her gloomy dreams to say " Be 
 silent; I can't bear it." 
 
 In the afternoon, when her mother was sitting alone at the 
 machine Pe Ontjes came in and sat down beside her. " Aunt 
 Boje, Anna and I are fond of one another; but we cannot 
 manage to come to an agreement at all." 
 
 " Pe Ontjes," she said, " you know how glad I should be 
 if you could. Don't be angry with her. You might have asked 
 after her once all the time that you have been here; she has 
 always been fond of you." 
 
 " Yes," he said, thoughtfully. Then he raised his head and 
 said, " I don't think there's any way out of it except for us 
 to be yoked together like two recalcitrant calves, so that we
 
 1 78 HOLYLAND 
 
 are forced to talk things out, do you know, for six or ten hours 
 together. You can't go on quarrelling all that time; you can 
 talk things over properly then." 
 
 Hella Boje once more sadly shook her head. " I don't think 
 we can do that," she said. 
 
 " I thought of taking the old smack to Cuxhaven myself this 
 evening. I have sold it to a man there. She might come 
 too." 
 
 Hella Boje once more sadly shook her head. " I don't think 
 she will," she said. 
 
 " Well, then, I'll tell you what. Send her to the pier about 
 nine this evening with a parcel of washing or something for 
 Hett, or Pete the Gude Wife comes into Hamburg this 
 evening will you?" 
 
 " I'll see what I can do," she said. " Go now; I'll do what 
 I can." 
 
 Very fortunately Anna spent Monday in Friestadt with 
 Anna Martens, her only friend, and confessed to her the whole 
 of her intercourse with Mate Lau, secretly hoping to be 
 scolded, in which she was not disappointed. 
 
 Anna Marten had said, " I have three things to say to you, 
 Anna. Firstly, if he wants you for his wife he can't think 
 very ill of your character. Secondly, you are proud and 
 touchy, Anna. Thirdly, if you do not come to an understand- 
 ing with him you will turn to ice, for you love him terribly." 
 Therefore when Anna came home, after supper, about eight 
 o'clock, her mind had been illuminated by this very plain 
 speaking on the part of Anna Martens. 
 
 Her mother said, " Pe Ontjes Lau has been here, dear. He's 
 sailing for Cuxhaven in the smack about nine, and offered to 
 take anything I had for the boys. I have wrapped up some 
 cakes for Hett, he's so fond of them and Pe Ontjes said it 
 would be best if you would take the parcel aboard yourself. I 
 expect he would like to take you to Cuxhaven." 
 
 She said no more, but shut the door softly thinking, " Now 
 she must do as she pleases ; may God help her ! " 
 
 Anna went up to her room, sat down on the edge of her bed, 
 and drew a deep breath. " I will go with him. I will go with 
 him. Oh, how glad I am that he is not angry! how glad. If 
 he is good to me I shall be unspeakably glad; so glad that he 
 will wonder at me. But if I see that we cannot manage it,
 
 HOLYLAND 179 
 
 then there is nothing in the world for me." She got up, 
 looked about her, and thought, " I will wash." 
 
 She fetched the shallow wooden tub that leant against the 
 wall outside into her room, and poured three pailfuls of water 
 into it; shut the door, drew down the blind, and, taking off 
 all her clothes, knelt down in front of the tub and began to 
 wash herself with a serious face. As she washed her neck and 
 her beautiful shoulders she thought " The mud stuck there 
 which they threw at me under his eyes on the sandbank. I 
 was a child then. What has become of my shoulders and of 
 my soul since then ? Will he put his arms round the big 
 horrid boy." 
 
 She washed her plump white arms, thinking " Would you 
 rather play with the waves or with Pe Ontjes Lau? Oh, Pe 
 Ontjes Lau rather! " 
 
 A faint smile crossed her face as she wondered what he 
 would be like, whether he would keep that serene calm, that 
 cool condescension of manner a smile like the passage of a 
 light cloud above a dark pinewood, lighting up its dark recesses. 
 She washed her beautiful soft body, without a mark or a crease, 
 for it had never been tightly laced. " No one has seen my 
 body since the last time my mother bathed me. I have always 
 bathed alone since at the edge of the meadow. No one has 
 seen it no one. Whom does it concern ? Does it concern 
 Pe Ontjes Lau? I am not answerable to anyone for what I 
 do with my body I am free, full grown. Have I ever de- 
 based it? ever made it unclean? ever done anything impure 
 or unnatural? No; I have nothing to reproach myself with." 
 
 She washed her beautiful straight legs down to the knees, 
 looking thoughtfully at a white scar on the inside curve above 
 the knee. Once, when she was between twelve and thirteen, 
 she had had a childish passion for a merry, good-looking young 
 fellow on neighbour Marten's farm, and when he was working 
 with the horses in the field she used to make him get off and 
 mount her straddle-legs on the horse. One day, at the time 
 of the wheat harvest, the four-year-old mare on which she was 
 mounted refused to pull ; a thunder-storm was threatening, 
 and the man in angry impatience tried to strike at it with his 
 pitchfork. As he was in the act, however, the mare swerved, 
 and one prong of the fork went right into the child's leg 
 through her clothes. Terrified he examined the place, staunched
 
 i8o HOLYLAND 
 
 the blood with his lips, and fetched water from the ditch, shak- 
 ing his head and saying " Poor little pet, poor little pet." 
 When her mother discovered the bloodstains on her garments, 
 and inquired after the cause, she said she had fallen on a nail, 
 so as not to betray him. Something of the old feeling came 
 back as she looked at the scar and thought, " I have never told 
 anyone that little tale; how lovely to have a good man as a 
 real friend." Her face softened and her eyes shone. " How 
 lovely to be close to him and show him the scar; and he will 
 stroke it and laugh, and tease me how wonderful! " Last of 
 all she washed her feet, finely set on slender ankles, neither too 
 large nor too small. " When I was a child they ran far out 
 into the shallows, sometimes we would stop and look at the 
 print they made, every toe and every curve so clearly marked 
 in the soft sand. Yes, then you ran off on all sorts of childish 
 pleasures, away from Pe Ontjes; now you are running back 
 to him poor runners ; you've got to do what I want ! " 
 Again she laughed softly, and a wave of blood overspread her 
 face. " Don't tell . . . but I want to run to Pe Ontjes. Oh, 
 I think I am too happy." She went and knelt down in front 
 of the chest of drawers singing softly ; out of tune for none 
 of the Bojes could sing but it pleased her. First of all she 
 took out and put on a soft woollen chemise, then the linen one 
 from the very bottom of the drawer. Three years ago, when 
 she was twenty-one, her mother had made it of fine linen with 
 her own hands, and made a delicate edging of lace round the 
 neck. She had not said a word about it, but one day when 
 Anna was arranging her chest she found it, and knowing at 
 once for what her mother had intended it, she had put it away 
 right at the bottom and not said a word about it. Now she 
 took it and put it on while she knelt, buttoning it on the left 
 shoulder, and smoothing it down in front. Then she did her 
 hair. First she unpinned and uncoiled it, and let it fall so that 
 it shone like a golden thatch; then combed and plaited it, 
 glancing from time to time in the mirror, regarding the work 
 of her hands with that mixture of doubt and satisfaction with 
 which the female fox watches its children at play in the morn- 
 ing. She coiled the plaits round back of her head, drew her 
 hair a little down over her temples in front, and nodded her 
 head twice, " Ready." Then she drew on her tight-fitting 
 bodice of white linen, and buttoned on to it two pairs of
 
 HOLYLAND 181 
 
 knickerbockers, one of thin white cotton, the other of soft, 
 warm wool it being November, and cold and over all her 
 dress the only pretty one she possessed blue, quite plain, 
 except for a slight fulness in front, and made in one piece with 
 a belt at the waist. It was so loose that when she raised her 
 shoulders she lifted all her garments. Next she put on her hat, 
 a fairly large, brown felt with a wavy brim, prettily trimmed 
 with brown velvet ribbon, and her loose, grey jacket. Then, 
 last of all she took down the big cloak which Anna Martens 
 had left hanging in her room. It really belonged to her hus- 
 band, but Anna wore it sometimes when she drove to Hilligen- 
 lei in cold or wet weather. Anna put it on now, smiling. 
 " Well, Anna Martens, when I come back you can ask your 
 coat to tell you its experiences." 
 
 She stood at the door, in her vigorous beauty, to look back 
 once. Then, going down, took the parcel from the table, and 
 calling out in the passage " I'm off! " went out. 
 
 When she came to the pier, there in the darkness stood a 
 tallish man in seafaring clothes with oilskins over his arm, 
 waiting. Thinking he was Pe Ontjes, she cried out from afar 
 off, " I am bringing the parcel." But it was Kai Jans. 
 " Where have you sprung from? " said she. 
 
 " From Berlin," he said. " I came yesterday. I am going 
 to sail to Cuxhaven with my old mate Pe Ontjes. W 7 hat else 
 am I to do with the time? " 
 
 " Well," said she, " you can take this parcel for Hett. He 
 is in Hamburg now." 
 
 He shrugged his shoulders and said, like a spoiled child, " I 
 don't like that. You must do it yourself. Come, I'll bring 
 you on board." 
 
 "You'll bring me back immediately?" 
 
 " Of course," he said, taking hold of the oars. " What do 
 you suppose? I am no buccaneer, like Wieben Peters." 
 
 It made her happy to know that these two big men made 
 much of her, and told such quaint lies for her sake. She said, 
 " You wrote to Heinke that you were not working very hard 
 in Berlin. And you're not a student. What do you do, 
 then?" 
 
 " I devour life." 
 
 " What do you mean ? " she said jestingly. 
 
 " For the last three years I've put away all my brooding.
 
 182 HOLYLAND 
 
 I live and see. It's a huge thing, don't you know, to have 
 come from the narrow life on the ship, from the stuffy books 
 in Hilligenlei, out into the big, bright, moving world! My 
 eyes go like saucers." 
 
 "And work?" 
 
 " Oh ! " he said. " I haven't done very much yet, but when 
 once I do begin it will go all right. I shall pass my examina- 
 tion, never fear, when the time comes. I should do that for 
 the old man's sake, anyhow," he continued in a more serious 
 tone. 
 
 " I don't know," she said, " but it seems to me you're not 
 the right kind of a person to be a clergyman. You're much 
 too light-headed and cheerful for it." 
 
 " You don't understand, child. It is just cheerful people 
 that are wanted now." 
 
 "By whom?" 
 
 " By God." 
 
 "Oh, how you talk!" 
 
 " Never mind. Give me your hand. The great mate isn't 
 there yet." 
 
 At that moment, however, he came aft. She drew back the 
 hand she had given to Kai Jans and said in her clear voice, 
 " Will you both promise to be good and polite to me, because 
 then I will come to Cuxhaven with you." 
 
 " Girl," cried Pe Ontjes Lau, " come here quickly. Bo'sun, 
 up with the mainsail." 
 
 Kai Jans went quickly forward. 
 
 " Anna," said Pe Ontjes in a low voice, " this is sweet of 
 you! Put on your coat, now. It's cold enough, and raining 
 into the bargain. Are you warmly clad ? I've brought 
 mother's wrapper with me." He fastened the coat in front for 
 her, and, taking her by both arms, pushed her down into a 
 seat by the rudder. " So ! Sit there and hold the rudder for 
 a moment." 
 
 He went to Kai and the boy, and they soon got up the sails. 
 The boat sailed slowly down stream. Then he came back, 
 Kai Jans remaining forward with the boy. 
 
 " The Gude Wife is signalled," he said, taking hold of the 
 tiller. " She comes into the Elbe to-day or to-morrow." 
 
 "Oh! how lovely!" she said. "Perhaps I can meet him 
 and go home with him."
 
 HOLYLAND 183 
 
 "And me!" said he. 
 
 " Yes," she said, not unkindly, though her lips trembled, 
 " if you care to go with a person like me." 
 
 He laid his hand quickly upon her two, which lay in her lap, 
 pressed them and let them go. " I have told father to let your 
 mother know about the Gude Wife this evening." 
 
 ' That is nice of you very." 
 
 " Tell me, is Heinke like you in character as well ? She is 
 like you to look at, except that her hair and eyes are rather 
 darker a pretty, slender girl. She writes to Kai Jans 
 beginning early." 
 
 " It's only play," said she. " Kai is always so much inter- 
 ested in individuals that's what it is. She is a clever girl, 
 that's why he likes her. By the bye, I don't think your boat- 
 swain works very hard." 
 
 "Oh! that doesn't matter. You're rather worried about 
 Hett, aren't you? " 
 
 " Oh, no! " she said, calmly. " He is getting on well." 
 
 They were all worried about Hett mother, Anna, Pete, 
 even Heinke; but the Bojes were far too proud to confess as 
 much to others, even to the great Pe Ontjes. 
 
 " Well," he said quickly, " one would expect that. The boy 
 ought to be decent, with such parents and such brothers and 
 sisters! You're all magnificent, but the best and most beauti- 
 ful of all the Boje children is the eldest." 
 
 She was silent. 
 
 He went on, hesitatingly, " If we come to Pe Ontjes, he 
 considers himself a good, honest fellow, take it all in all, but 
 he thinks he could be far better, far cleverer, far more useful 
 if he had you for his wife that's how it is." 
 
 " Pe Ontjes! " she said with breathless agitation. " I want 
 nothing in the world so much as that you should be good to 
 me." 
 
 ' Then hand over your heart," he said aloud, seizing her 
 hands stretched out to take his. 
 
 " I love you," she said ; " you must know that." 
 
 " Thank God for that," he said, holding her hands tight. 
 
 " But, Pe Ontjes, we are so poor! " 
 
 " Oh, yes," he said. " I am marrying your tables and chairs, 
 I suppose! Woman, I want your courage and your shining 
 eyes. To-day I bought Bartel's house. It isn't big, but it is
 
 184 HOLYLAND 
 
 snug and comfortable, and then we can live together. My 
 mother will provide a table, your mother a bed so there ! 
 Oh, to think of living with you ! " 
 
 " When I love anyone," she said softly, " then I love him, 
 oh! fearfully much. I think only of him and what concerns 
 him, and care nothing for the whole wide world beyond." 
 Raising her eyes, she looked at him. " I have loved you for a 
 long while," she said. 
 
 " And I you, Anna," said he, putting his free arm round her 
 neck. 
 
 ^'Kai Jans will see " 
 
 " No ! He said ... he would sit behind the mainsail 
 until I called him. Kai, come here." 
 
 Kai Jans stepped down from the poop. 
 
 " Kai, we are engaged. The wedding will be in six weeks at 
 most." 
 
 " Oh ! " said Kai, " I am glad. Now we shall have a 
 delightful voyage." ' He shook hands with Anna. " Yes ; I am 
 very glad, believe me." He was thinking of an evening in 
 May three years ago. 
 
 ' Thank you, Kai." 
 
 " We have passed the sandbank." He pointed to a dark 
 line to the north. " Do you remember, Anna, you called him 
 the eel-eater? And now tastes change!" 
 
 " Good Heavens ! " she said. " I never thought of that. 
 No," she said, with a low laugh, " I can never kiss you! " She 
 pressed his hand hard. 
 
 They glided past the lightship. A brief word was exchanged 
 across the night. When its light had disappeared behind them 
 they saw the Heligoland light in front of them. They flew 
 over the sea, the swell driving them gradually further and 
 further out into the open. 
 
 " Now we are going from Holyland to Holyland," said Kai 
 Jans. " It's the same word, Heligoland and Hilligenlei." 
 
 He was going forward again, but she said, " Stay with us, 
 Kai." 
 
 " I shall only be in the way, child," he said thoughtfully. 
 
 " Not at all. Come and sit down by us. There is nothing 
 to do till you get to Heligoland. If you don't want to sleep, 
 come and talk to us." 
 
 " For a little while, then," said hcj sitting down beside Anna
 
 HOLYLAND 185 
 
 and spreading out his oilskin so that the wind could not blow 
 between them. Then he was silent. 
 
 " Well," said Pe Ontjes. 
 
 "Well," said Kai, "I don't know. I can only talk of 
 things which seem to me important." 
 
 " Talk of them, then," said Anna. " Your examination, I 
 suppose ? " 
 
 He laughed. " No! " he said. " Wieben Peters." 
 
 " Is the story of Wieben Peters important? " said Pe Ontjes. 
 
 " We all know that story every child in Hilligenlei knows 
 it," said Anna. 
 
 " No," said he, " no one knows it. You can't think how I 
 have thought and thought about it, to find the truth." 
 
 " Tell it us, then," said Pe Ontjes.
 
 CHAPTER XV. 
 
 THE light south-south-westerly wind filled the sails; the 
 fine rain fell slanting on the deck; the water rushed, swishing 
 round the ship; the Heligoland light burned clear in the grey, 
 starless night. 
 
 " About four hundred years ago Wieben Peters, of Dit- 
 marsh, made the same voyage that we are making now not 
 in peace as we three, but in burning anger because he thought 
 that his people had put him in the wrong where he was right. 
 This was the case. But the real cause of the dissension lay in 
 the fact that his was a despotic nature, for whom the little 
 farming state had no place. There they were all masters, all 
 equally great. ' What a despotic eye he has ! Look ! he walks 
 as if he were Count Rantzau at least! How sharply his words 
 ring out! I say, where did he get a coat of that cut? Just 
 look at his long, yellow beard ! Let's annoy him ! ' He ended 
 by roaring like a bull. 
 
 " He went to sea with fifteen wild, turbulent fellows on 
 board. The beach was lit up by the flaming houses of his op- 
 ponents. The people shouted imprecations after the enemy of 
 his country. 
 
 " At that time Heligoland was inhabited by a miserable race 
 the degenerate lees of the brave people that had crossed the 
 sea to England. They lived on the scanty herrings they 
 caught, and on rough nights they would light a fire on the 
 tower in the hope that some ship might run aground on the 
 sands or against the cliffs. In this they were seldom gratified, 
 although the parson, at whose feet they sat to a man every 
 Sunday, and whose ministrations were reserved for them, prayed 
 fervently that God would bless their shores with wreckage. 
 
 " When Wieben Peters ran into their bay with a fresh 
 south-easter and on to the beach, they ran away and hid in the 
 gorges and declivities of the lower part of the island, leaving 
 Wieben Peters with his fifteen followers master of Heligo- 
 land. 
 
 1 86
 
 HOLYLAND 187 
 
 " He dwelt in the mighty old tower built by the earlier, 
 valiant inhabitants, and went down and levied contributions 
 from his native land. Every time he sallied forth either a Dit- 
 marsh cutter laden with gun-metal from Hamburg was raided 
 or a farm set on fire. On his return he would rejoice, laugh 
 to himself, and play with his long beard, tying knots in it and 
 then untying them. He fed his soul on fierce hatred, and 
 pretended that he was satisfied and content; but he suffered 
 sore. 
 
 " One day he went north with six men on board for the 
 sheer joy of sailing, till he came to the Bergen heights, and 
 there he sailed up to see whether there were any ships from 
 Ditmarsh lying there. He inquired up and down the German 
 quay. There was not one. Then, in an ill-humour, he went 
 into one of the warehouses to buy provisions for the return. 
 
 " Now, in this foreign country the German merchants lived 
 in their warehouses on the quay. All the time they were closely 
 watched and made to feel that their position was not that of 
 masters, but of tolerated guests. For example, they were not 
 allowed to have their wives with them a prohibition which 
 they evaded by cutting holes in the wall into which their beds 
 were built, and admitting the wives, who dwelt in the town, 
 at nights. 
 
 "It was dark when Wieben Peters entered the Hamburg 
 merchant's room, and, not finding him there, he walked up and 
 down, thinking. While he was doing so the little door behind 
 the bed opened and the Hamburger's wife crept in. Still on 
 her knees, she saw a strange man, and followed him with her 
 eyes. He gave one rapid glance in her direction and then paid 
 her no further attention, but began to play with his beard. 
 Now, although the day was already far advanced, one long ray 
 of bright sunshine shone right across the dark little room, 
 striking it at about the height of a man's head, and this flick- 
 ering, belated light played upon his beard from time to time. 
 The beard was so yellow that it seemed to cast off a reflected 
 light of its own, which played over the kneeling woman's face 
 like so many little sprites warming their feet on her glowing 
 eyes and cheeks. 
 
 "At last the woman said in a slow, difficult voice, ' How 
 many knots can you tie in your beard ? '
 
 i88 HOLYLAND 
 
 " He loosened the knife that hung in his belt and said, going 
 up to the bed, ' How many can you make ? ' 
 
 " Raising herself a little on her knees, she plunged both her 
 hands in his beard and began playing with it, then looked up 
 at him with an embarrassed laugh. Letting her hands sink, 
 she murmured, ' Ah ! you you are a man ! ' 
 
 " ' Where is the Hamburger? ' said he. 
 
 " ' Oh, the shell-fish ! ' said she, letting her hands slip down 
 his body and then hold him fast. She loved him so. 
 
 " Then he cried wildly, breathing hard, ' Come to the end 
 of the quay to-night. I will wait for you.' 
 
 " So that very night she ran away from the Hamburg mer- 
 chant, leapt on board ship, and sailed with him to Heligo- 
 land. 
 
 " Winter came ; the wild west wind tore and raged round 
 the island, and the love which his great, passionate heart lav- 
 ished on the woman was as strong and unruly as the wind. 
 Summer came: gentle winds breathed soft and low round the 
 ruddy cliffs; and the love of his great, deep heart for the 
 woman was as gentle and tender as the breeze. 
 
 " So he lived, summer and winter, for four years. Now 
 and then he sailed away, and those who stayed behind would 
 see the vivid glow of fire shining in the eastern sky, over from 
 Ditmarsh. Verily his native land paid the penalty of its sins! 
 When he returned he would go up to her bed and rejoice as 
 he gazed upon her, tying and untying knots in his long beard 
 the while. 
 
 " So he fed his heart on passionate love, and pretended that 
 he was satisfied and content. But often he would stand, look- 
 ing with sombre eyes across to Ditmarsh, and suffering sore. 
 
 " When he returned one day with his companions from Dit- 
 marsh, after having lightened the load of a cutter at Bruns- 
 buttel, and emptied two farmyards, the little parson; who still 
 lived with the wretched remnant of the people living under 
 the cliffs, happened to slink past, and, as usual, some of the 
 men, having no respect for the Church or its gifts, began to 
 throw dead fish at the stout little man's head. Wieben Peters 
 stopped them sharply and severely. A priest was not a fit sub- 
 ject for mockery, he said. 
 
 ' They looked at one another in astonishment. 
 
 " The next Sunday the little priest clambered up to the
 
 HOLYLAND 189 
 
 heights to hold a service for the wild horde there. Wieben 
 Peters and the woman . from Bergen and his children by her, 
 the men and the women they had with them, sat at the lee side 
 of the tower, shyly imitating Wieben Peters' actions, folding 
 their hard hands when he did, murmuring the prayers they 
 could not comprehend. When the service was at an end they 
 stepped aside and said to one another between their teeth, in 
 toneless voices and without moving their lips, ' He'll go down 
 hill now. He's become holy. It's all up ! ' 
 
 " Nevertheless they made some raids of the good old sort 
 over to Ditmarsh and brought rich booty home, and so things 
 went on for a time. 
 
 " But one day Wieben Peters took the parson aside, and, 
 looking at him as if he wanted to penetrate behind his eyes to 
 the inside of his head, said, ' It isn't enough. You must know 
 what more I must do.' 
 
 " At first the priest was terrified, but then he gave the ac- 
 cursed counsel, ' Give half the gold and silver you have stolen 
 to the cathedral in Hamburg that will bring you peace.' 
 
 " So it was done. Again they made a raid to Ditmarsh and 
 brought rich booty home, and things went on smoothly for a 
 time. Yet he was not cheerful. He felt no inclination to 
 play with his beard and tie knots in it. So a few months later 
 he again took the priest aside and said to him what he had said 
 before. The parson went down to the lower part of the island 
 and sat a whole day pondering in the rotten old boat in which 
 he dwelt. He could not understand a man of this sort. Then 
 he went up again, shaking his head and groaning, and this time 
 he had to give the real answer. ' You must give up all that 
 you possess and earn your bread by the work of your hands, 
 live a pure, sinless life, begging God for forgiveness of your 
 transgressions.' 
 
 " And it had to be done. All their goods were secretly des- 
 patched to Ditmarsh. The women were married or dismissed. 
 There were to be no hard deeds, no rough words, no raids over 
 the sea. Every man was to fish all day long. Morning and 
 evening fervent prayer, ' God have mercy, Lord have mercy.' 
 That was the order of the day. 
 
 " Next night the best of his comrades filled the best cutter 
 with the best treasures, and were for sailing away. But the 
 woman intervened, and begged them to stand by him. She
 
 HOLYLAND 
 
 would see that their goods were not sent away at once. They 
 retrained. 
 
 " Some, it must be admitted, did really come to God. Into 
 their eyes there came an expression at once serious and beauti- 
 ful. From morning to night they were eager to help others, 
 and their laughter was like the innocent laughter of a child. 
 Most of them, however, hung round the walls of the tower in 
 gloomy silence, staring dully across the sea. 
 
 "And Wieben? No! he did not come to God. He went 
 about with a dark look on his face, staring eastwards, towards 
 Ditmarsh. There was no deep, beautiful expression in his 
 eyes. He suffered sore. 
 
 " Then the woman saw the only way to help him the way 
 she had long foreseen. She loved him as passionately as on 
 that first evening when she knelt on the Hamburg merchant's 
 bed. She loved him with the whole force and intensity of her 
 nature with a love that thought only of him and nothing of 
 self. Therefore she sent a trusty messenger over to Ditmarsh 
 to say, ' Wieben Peters is going mad because you do not come ! 
 Come!' 
 
 " Thirty men of the best families took counsel together, 
 stocked a boat with beer and bacon enough, and sailed for the 
 island with a favourable breeze. 
 
 " As so often Wieben Peters stood on the tower with his 
 wife by his side, gazing eastwards, and he saw the boat and all 
 the men beneath the two big sails, and recognised the Ditmarsh 
 standard aloft. Then he rejoiced rejoiced so that his eyes 
 shone with joy. And his joy grew as he recognised the men, 
 one by one, and saw that they belonged to the best families. 
 He laughed, and began to knot his beard. Three knots in each 
 strand, says the chronicle. Then he sent his wife and children 
 and all the other women to the extreme end of the cliff, 
 where he had built them a shelter, and armed himself for 
 defence. 
 
 " His aim was to prevent the men from Ditmarsh from 
 climbing into the upper part of the island, but the .wretched 
 folk below showed them a secret way, and he with his twenty 
 companions had to retire to the tower. Three or four of the 
 assailants fell. The others drove in the door, killed some, and 
 took the rest prisoners. Wieben Peters himself sped alone up 
 the staircase, shutting the trap door behind him. With the
 
 HOLYLAND 191 
 
 great bows they shot from below through the planks till all 
 was quiet overhead and blood dripped down. 
 
 " Then they went up the steps, but no one was anxious to go 
 forward, thinking that the first man to put his head through 
 the trap door would get a blow that would last him all his life. 
 At last Watt, of Dreisprung, a great, tall fellow his long- 
 legged descendants are all over the countryside to-day 
 plucked up courage and opened the door. 
 
 " There, on his back, lay Wieben Peters, stretched out all 
 his length, gasping heavily. 'Come on!' he said, looking at 
 them in turn as they came through the trap door with eyes 
 from which even imminent death had not chased the joyful in- 
 terest, whispering the name and family of each. They stayed 
 by with him all evening. Most of them, indeed, sat below, 
 round the beer cask, but all the time some sat upstairs with him, 
 each relating to him what had happened in his family and in the 
 other important families, the deaths and births, the quarrels, 
 the feasts, the marriages, he listening greedily with unblinking 
 eyes, greedy of looking into their faces. 
 
 " And they had much to ask him in their turn. They wanted 
 details of this raid and that, rejoicing in his success, and say- 
 ing, ' You were a thorn in our side ! You're a great man.' 
 
 "His eyes laughed. 'Tell me,' he said softly; 'why did 
 you not come before? I longed for you to come! It was scan- 
 dalous the way you put up with everything! You're a set of 
 mealbags ! ' 
 
 ' Don't you see, we decided to let you really get together 
 a lot of booty, so as to make it worth while to come.' 
 
 " His eyes still laughed. 
 
 ' It was fearfully stupid of you,' they said, ' to let such 
 a lot of good stuff go to the fat Hamburgers. You might have 
 known we should come and fetch it back ! ' 
 
 " His eyes laughed more. Towards midnight they shouted 
 up from below, ' Wieben, we've got hold of a parson. Do you 
 want him ? ' 
 
 " He shook his head. ' Everything is in order,' he said. 
 1 ' So we think,' said they. 
 
 " So they talked and told stories and drank. When he could 
 no longer take a share, and began to breathe hard and rattle 
 in his throat, they all went below and drank, one coming up 
 from time to time to see how he did. When the morning rose
 
 I 9 2 HOLYLAND 
 
 across the sea, to the east, above his native land, grey at first 
 and pale as a new-born babe, then, gradually growing bright 
 and laughing, he died. 
 
 " The woman from Bergen, who came from Friesland by 
 birth, remained upon the island, cast the parson and his 
 wretched folk into the sea, and brought up her tall children 
 a new race to people the land, brave and strong and prudent. 
 All the people with curious names on the island, Hunken, 
 Haien, etc., are descended from her. Their faces look as if 
 they had been carved by a rather unskilful carpenter driven 
 mad by this evil world." 
 
 The wind had got up, and the rain fell more steadily; the 
 light shone clear to the right of the mainsail, gleaming high 
 and wide over the sounding darkness. 
 
 "Yes," said Kai Jans; "the parson's last counsel was right. 
 One must renounce all, suffer all, live a pure life in poverty. 
 Only so can one come before God pure as a child. It says so 
 plainly in the Sermon on the Mount. But he could not do it. 
 And I I can't do it, either. I hardly believe that the Saviour 
 Himself could. Why? There is something in human nature, 
 and something good, too, that fights against it. That kind of 
 holiness of life is worthless. There is something wrong in it." 
 
 " So," said Anna, " that's what you brood about in Berlin 
 Wieben Peters, and that sort of thing! " 
 
 " Oh," he said, " you're not to imagine that I'm a dreamer 
 a sentimentalist! I am looking on at life there." 
 
 " Especially the girls ! " said Anna. 
 
 " It's almost dangerous to confess as much, but I do not deny 
 it. If I were to say I prize nothing so much as a good dinner, 
 or I think nothing so important as a properly starched collar, 
 I should be considered a person of sense ; but if I say I don't 
 think there is anything better than a pretty young girl, I am 
 looked upon as a doubtful character. And yet, is there any- 
 thing in nature so beautiful, so glorious? Do you know, Pe 
 Ontjes, I go sometimes to the museum or the national gallery, 
 and I'm happy enough there; but I can tell you if I see a pretty 
 graceful girl standing in front of one of the pictures everything 
 on the walls and round about is nothing to me in comparison." 
 
 " I quite agree with you," said Pe Ontjes, " and I am sure 
 Anna has nothing to say against it. What else do you find 
 interesting in Berlin ? "
 
 HOLYLAND 193 
 
 " Oh ! the streets, the crowd, the buildings, the soldiers, the 
 theatre ; but far the most of all, people individuals." 
 
 " How do you mean? " said Pe Ontjes. 
 
 " Well, I cannot help watching them, to try to find out how 
 they live and what they think about. I can walk up and down 
 the streets for hours not only Unter den Linden, but in the 
 north, where I live thinking about the people I see, picturing 
 their past to myself, and their way of life and their feelings. 
 I know ever so many of the workmen's families among whom I 
 live the men and their wives and children too." 
 
 " So that's how you occupy yourself," said Anna, " with 
 girls in picture galleries, and people on the street, and work- 
 men's families! You went to Berlin for rather a different 
 purpose, you must admit. Honestly now one must confess 
 it." 
 
 " You mean, to study theology," said Kai, looking thought- 
 fully out to sea. " Well, I do study theology, and I shall pass 
 my examination soon, when the time comes, and creditably 
 enough, too. But I will tell you something that is rather 
 strange. Mark, Anna. You know our people are more and 
 more falling away from the old belief. Science is undermining 
 Catholicism and Protestantism alike. Something new must, 
 and will, come. The question is, am I not doing right in get- 
 ting to know what men are nowadays? Think! The alder- 
 man has no religion, or one not worth calling by that name. 
 No more has the baker's boy. And certainly the workman's 
 wife has none at all. You would be right to blame me if I 
 were simply lounging about Berlin out of idleness or ennui; 
 but what I do is to stand in the stream of humanity, listening 
 to its roar, hearing in that roar the old question, ' Whence came 
 ye, whither go ye, children of men? ' And I can hear this ques- 
 tion more clearly, more profoundly than other men. I am 
 more troubled by it than other men." 
 
 " Yes," said Anna, " I see. That's the cause of it all. Three 
 and a half years ago, at the restaurant, you gave it all up. 
 Now you have begun again to look for Hilligenlei." 
 
 "Well, suppose I have; what have you to say against 
 it?" 
 
 " Nothing at all ! " they cried earnestly. " Nothing. Seek 
 on." 
 
 " Now, Anna," said Pe Ontjes, " you must go to the cabin.
 
 194 HOLYLAND 
 
 Come, I'll show you the sleeping accommodation. We must 
 reef up afterwards, Kai." 
 
 " Don't be too long," said Kai. " The wind is veering to the 
 west, and there is more swell on. We may have a bad time 
 yet." 
 
 When they came into the cramped little room he struck a 
 light and then sat down on the locker, saying, " Well, is there 
 perfect peace between us now? Come here! " 
 
 He drew her on to his knee. She played shyly with the 
 lapels of his coat, looking up at him with a clear, affectionate 
 gaze and saying with a deep thrill in her voice, " How sweet 
 it is to have someone belonging to one ! " 
 
 Lost in happy wonder, he feasted his eyes on her beauty and 
 her gentleness, lifting his free hand slowly to stroke her fair 
 hair, again and again, in tender silence. Then gradually he 
 drew her close and closer to him. 
 
 " Your breath is so sweet, like the morning wind," he said. 
 
 " Of course, you silly boy, when one is young and clean ! " 
 
 " And your lips taste of salt." 
 
 " And yours too that's the sea wind," she said. 
 
 " Oh ! your beautiful eyes ! how they shine ! and your breath 
 is sweet dear little girl! " 
 
 " You are so dear to me," she said in a difficult voice. 
 
 " Darling, I never dreamed you were so passionate. Oh ! 
 darling!" 
 
 " Oh ! do you mind ? " she cried in a strangled voice. " I 
 can't help it ! I am like that ! " 
 
 " You dear, darling baby ! Don't you know I would throw 
 you overboard if you weren't like that! " He drew her closer 
 to him and kissed her. 
 
 "Oh! Pe Ontjes!" said she softly, hiding her face in his 
 shoulder. "Your yellow beard! how I love it! If you had 
 been a shellfish, a solitary, ah! what a wretched look-out had 
 that been for me! Oh! dear, dear one! " 
 
 He laughed and drew her to him again. " You dare to 
 talk to me of shellfish ! " he said. " There ! now I must go up 
 and you to sleep." 
 
 " Oh ! stay a little. You must show me how to arrange here. 
 I will only take off my dress and lie down." She did so, laugh- 
 ing. " There there is a good deal of swell, but I shall go 
 to sleep. Stay just a little with me. Oh! what a lovely day
 
 HOLYLAND 195 
 
 to-morrow will be, Pe! I'm not grateful you mustn't im- 
 agine that I am. I am worth as much as you are. But I am 
 happy through you, and I think you are happy through me. . . . 
 Suppose we meet Pete in the morning? How glad mother will 
 be! She has not had much to be glad about in the last few 
 years. And your parents they will be glad, too, I know, al- 
 though I have no money. And we shall live in Reimer's 
 house?" 
 
 They began to talk about the house, and could not enough 
 discuss how it should be arranged, and they live in it, holding 
 one another's hands the while, with their eyes gazing into one 
 another's faces by the dim light of the lamp. 
 
 " I really must go on deck now, and you must go to sleep," 
 said he. He took her in his arms and kissed her. It was bliss 
 to be in his arms. 
 
 " I wonder so that you are so dear to me! " she said. " I 
 have always thought about it. I was afraid you could only 
 care for a sack of maize or the Gude Wife" 
 
 " Dear, I am like other men no different. To have the 
 one you love in your arms, and know she loves you that sets 
 a man on fire! " He kissed her passionately. " I never want 
 to leave you." 
 
 She embraced him, saying, " Oh, Pe Ontjes, I love you ter- 
 ribly much, and I would go through fire for anyone I love. 
 But, Pe Ontjes I must always, always be able to be proud 
 of you." 
 
 Their passion was ready to leap into flame again, but all at 
 once the vessel began to roll heavily from side to side, and he 
 had to leave her to go on deck. 
 
 When he looked about him he saw Kai Jans and the boy 
 at work on the sails. The light was high above them in the 
 sky, to the starboard side, the wind had grown stronger and 
 veered to the west. The heavy swell tossed the light vessel 
 from side to side. With Pe Ontjes' aid they got her safely be- 
 fore the wind. 
 
 'There!" said Kai, sitting down at the helm beside Pe. 
 " We shall be in Cuxhaven in five hours, sha'n't we? " 
 
 ' With luck," said Pe Ontjes, looking to the south-west. 
 
 ;< The storm is abating." 
 
 They sat side by side, saying little, the wind driving between 
 them. Squalls of driving rain came on, getting more violent
 
 196 HOLYLAND 
 
 as the morning broke. They watched until the grey of dawn, 
 their lives in their hands. 
 
 Just as day was breaking and the vessel had come through a 
 violent squall, Anna Boje appeared at the hatchway, red with 
 sleep, looking anxiously about her. " Oh ! I have slept so 
 sound," she said. " I don't know how I could. The noise just 
 now waked me up." They did not catch what she said, but 
 Kai sprang to his feet, helped her up, shut down the hatchway, 
 and led her to the helm. 
 
 " She will get wet through," said Pe. 
 
 " I don't mind so long as I am with you both." 
 
 They wrapped her up in an old wet oilskin, and she sat still, 
 rather cramped, looking with her direct, serious gaze over the 
 dawning sky and the sea as it came roaring past from the far 
 distance in long lines of mountainous white surf. 
 
 " Do you see that light? " said Pe. " That's Neuwerk, and 
 the next is Cuxhaven." 
 
 When they passed their old love two hours later the signal 
 ran outside the pilot house, " Storm from the S. W., turning 
 to the right." That was about nine o'clock. 
 
 Three hours later, about twelve o'clock, the Grimmershorn 
 cannons thundered over the roaring sea. The storm had turned 
 to the north-west. It was a wild, dark November day.
 
 CHAPTER XVI. 
 
 IT was on this same fearful, grey day in November that the 
 beautiful Bremen three-rnast barque, coming from Iquique with 
 a cargo of saltpetre, failed to hold her course outside Texel, 
 and was driven on to the breakers, where she lay for six hours 
 with the mad, white seadogs leaping round her. Thousands of 
 them leapt up, barking and roaring, only to fall back again. 
 Thousands bit at her sides, howling. Thousands more gnawed 
 among the sand at her hold, and it was they who caused her 
 death. She sank deeper, deeper, ever deeper in. The men tried 
 to leave the ship ten in one boat, ten in the other. One 
 boatload made its way safely through the surf ; the other, sucked 
 back irresistibly, was washed against the walls of the ship and 
 smashed. Nothing more was seen of the boat, nothing more 
 of its crew. The white dogs howled all night long. 
 
 It was on this same fearful grey day that the twelve Finken- 
 warder fishing-boats were torn from their moorings and driven 
 south of Heligoland. On that very morning the passengers on 
 board the Deutschland had admired them as they stood out to 
 the north, their beautiful brown sails defined against the dark 
 grey of the sea and the blue-grey of the sky behind. In the 
 blue-grey that covered the whole span of the heavens there 
 stood great white sails, stretched out, upright, reaching from 
 the earth to the highest arch of heaven, set for the world to 
 sail with. About ten o'clock a heavy cloud rose, low down, on 
 the sea, that came on swiftly, blindly, like some huge grey owl 
 pale-yellow flecks, like the yellow-whites of evil, ancient 
 eyes. It came on, the white spray spattering it. 
 
 They looked up from their work, and now they hastened 
 indeed. How they flew with their brown wings, the little 
 seagulls, so close to the grey, foaming waters ! Bend now, little 
 ones; the great, old sea bird is just above you. Listen to the 
 rustle of his mighty wings. He comes! 
 
 They drew in their wings. They bent down. He smote 
 
 197
 
 198 HOLYLAND 
 
 twice, below, with a wild onset. Four beautiful brown wings 
 floated on the waves. 
 
 It was a dark, grey November day. The last clear patch 
 had disappeared by midday. The sea was a tortured mass of 
 grey-green water, the air above torn by the howling winds, 
 crossed by icy rain and snow. The squalls followed faster and 
 faster on each other's heels. 
 
 Six torpedo boats, long and black, with their curved decks 
 of steel, struggled to fight their way through the wildly rolling 
 sea to the mouth of the Elbe. It was of the first necessity that 
 they should reach it before the powerful ebb tide turned the 
 surf against them. On the first boat stood the commander, 
 the funnel behind him, the low conning tower castle in front, 
 clad in his shabby, yellow oilskins, a stout English scarf round 
 his nee';, an ancient cap on his head, with storm flaps under his 
 chin, ais keen eyes following every motion of the sea. Beside 
 him stood the first officer with his hand on the signal. Six 
 men, in diving suits, held on to the railing, covered every now 
 and then up to their knees by the white foam. About ten 
 o'clock a man had let go of the railing on the neighbouring 
 boat to let a comrade pass him. In less than the twinkling of 
 an eye a wave had dashed over him and drawn him down. 
 About eleven, just as the commander was bending down to give 
 an order to the man at the wheel, a vast sea swept right over 
 the first boat, striking her dead aft, and, lifting the hatches 
 and the ship itself, cast her down again so that she yawed off. 
 Then, indeed, what an impact! Head over heels, driven on 
 like a dead fish, five men hanging to the bulwarks, five being 
 madly dashed about by the waves, all fished out, however. 
 Something like fishing, that ! But six went to the bottom with 
 the capsized boat. 
 
 There they lay in the hideous darkness, in the overturned 
 boat, up to their shoulders in the water, driven hither and 
 thither by the waves. 
 
 The young commander met his fate without a murmur. 
 With calm courage he faced the loss of life and all that makes 
 it precious mother and brothers, the green of the woods, 
 honour and renown among his fellow's satisfied to be giving 
 his life for his country. 
 
 "Boys," he said to the others, "let us pray: 'Father, take
 
 HOLYLAND 199 
 
 our souls to Thyself in Heaven, and grant us a quick and 
 speedy death.' " 
 
 He lies in peace in the cathedral at Schwerin, just as they 
 found him in his ragged oilskins and long, rubber boots. 
 
 It was a dark, grey day, a morning of struggle and sorrow. 
 All over the wide grey sea was there nothing to make glad the 
 heart? Look! With what proud grace she comes on, bowing 
 and rising before the wind, her sails furled to meet it, the 
 waves surging over her knighthead! Look how she cleaves 
 her distant way through cloud and rain and hail, over the wild, 
 grey waters the Gude Wife! 
 
 Last evening they had left the canal, the south-wester filling 
 their sails, and about five in the morning, when they were above 
 Texel, the second mate, Pete Boje of Hilligenlei, was about to 
 steer an easterly course. But Jan Deeken came on deck, and, 
 after snuffing the breeze, he went down below and actually 
 came up again with his woollen cap ! 
 
 Once more they all said, " He's mistaken this time, thank 
 Heaven! He's mistaken!" 
 
 He stamped up and down between the taffrail and the helm 
 with his hands in his pockets, looking up to spit now and then. 
 Half an hour later he said in passing to Pete Boje, " Head her 
 north, mate." He nodded vaguely towards the north. Pete 
 did as he was told, not without a secret shake of the head. 
 
 By ten o'clock a gale was blowing from the south-west with 
 a tendency to turn north, which made it in the highest degree 
 advisable to keep as far as possible from the confounded Frisian 
 shallows, and proved to the mate that the old man's withered 
 little nose had not yet begun to play him false. He pointed 
 with his thumb to a sailing-vessel towards the north. " Did 
 you see her, mate? That craft is the Gude Man!" The Gude 
 Man was the Gude Wife's brother, and belonged to the same 
 firm. " Captain Winckel was once mate under me ; but there 
 was no confidence between us. He always knew best!" He 
 looked at Pete from under his eyes. 
 
 " Seeing is better than believing, I think," said Pete. 
 ' That's a sound rule on the whole," said the captain. 
 
 An hour later the gale had turned to the north-west, and 
 the two proud ships, not a mile distant from one another, rode 
 side by side through the raging sea to Heligoland, their sails 
 full to bursting; the wind whistling and howling in the rig-
 
 200 HOLYLAND 
 
 ging, while squalls of wind and rain following one another in 
 quick succession made it impossible to see far ahead. 
 
 An hour later, when it cleared up, the Gude Wife had ported 
 her helm still more, and all her men were on deck. Soon after- 
 wards the pilot-boat appeared, and first the Gude Man and 
 then the Gude Wife took the pilot on board with considerable 
 difficulty, the Gude Wife wearing round. A new squall arose, 
 tearing wildly over the sea. The heavy hail beat and rattled 
 on the deck. Heavy seas dashed amidship. The men were 
 huddled together aft. The air was so thick with hail, so dark- 
 ened by storm clouds that concealed the sun, that they could 
 only see as far as where the foaming water was jumping up 
 against the cabin. And so it went on for an hour. Then the 
 sky cleared a little, and the storm abated, and they could look 
 about them. 
 
 There lay the Gude Man, on her beam ends, all the forward 
 rigging apparently broken down. Behind the dismembered ves- 
 sel the cliffs of Heligoland were shadowed forth. The captain 
 expectorated, his eyes fixed on her : " Keep up ! That looks 
 bad ! " he said. 
 
 Slowly the Gude Wife came alongside. Every man was on 
 the qui vive. Pete's eyes seemed ready to dart out of his head. 
 
 The captain handed him his binocular. " Look across! " he 
 said. 
 
 " They've no captain," said Pete, " and no mate. They're 
 short of men, captain ! " 
 
 " It's lucky we're just by Heligoland," said the captain 
 drily. 
 
 At that moment came a gust of wind. " Look! the sharks! " 
 cried the first mate, as a number of close-reefed boats from 
 Heligoland appeared to the left of the Gude Man. 
 
 Jan Deeken stared across with a muttered oath. The Gude 
 Wife lay along the port side of the Gude Man. " Is there 
 water enough, pilot?" 
 
 "^All right, captain." 
 
 Pete Boje cast a rapid glance at the boat on the hatchway. 
 "Captain?" 
 
 " I can't take the responsibility," said Deeken, shaking his 
 head. 
 
 "Impossible," said the first mate, and the grey-bearded pilot 
 shook his head.
 
 HOLYLAND 201 
 
 Pete's eyes flew from the Gude Man to Deeken's rugged 
 face and back. The Gude Man's deck was a mass of splin- 
 tered yards and tangled rigging. 
 
 " Captain? " he almost screamed. 
 
 Deeken shook his head. " No good ! " 
 
 Pete tore off his oilskins and his coat. " Captain, I I 
 must ! " He struck his chest again and again. 
 
 "Why?" said the skipper, expectorating. 
 
 "I must!" 
 
 ' Then do it, if you can't help," said the skipper sourly. 
 
 "Out with the boat! Who's coming with me?" 
 
 Deeken did not turn his head. " Back tops'l ! " 
 
 The boat was launched. In sprang Pete and two others. 
 The men stood crowded together by the taffrail, a mass of 
 glistening oilskins and sou'westers, to stare at the boat, bobbing 
 up and down like a cork. 
 
 " Boy, boy, it is no good ! Good Heavens ! what a mad 
 fellow! He is quite cracked! It's all right, though! she's still 
 afloat. And there a Heligolander at the stern he can help 
 them!" 
 
 i( They're a damned mad lot! " 
 
 " I say! look at the Heligolander! do you see? " 
 
 "He's got them!" 
 
 ;< There's one ; the other two are gone drowned." 
 
 Jan Deeken had not looked. When he heard what the men 
 were saying he said in his dry voice, " East, south-east," his eyes 
 fixed on the chart. 
 
 A quarter of an hour later, when Pete and the two Heligo- 
 landers climbed on to the deck of the Gude Man, a new squall, 
 rising once more, covered the ship with the awful rush of hun- 
 gry water. 
 
 The eldest of the sailors ran up to him. " The captain is 
 deadly sick. The mate and four men are gone under." 
 
 "Is the helm all right?" 
 
 " Yes." 
 
 "Any leakage?" 
 
 " No." 
 
 "To the pumps!" 
 
 "Cargo?" 
 
 " Wool washed away." 
 
 " I, mate of the Gude Wife, am in command."
 
 202 HOLYLAND 
 
 The sailor came up to Pete. "Two feet of water in the 
 well!" 
 
 " Pilot, make for the Elbe." 
 
 Up came Hunke Heine, or Heine Hunke, or whatever his 
 name was, biting his lips till there was nothing of them to 
 be seen, and said, " Mate! that's no good! we must put 
 ashore! " 
 
 Then Pete laughed all over his face. 
 
 " Larboard watch and four Heligolanders to the pumps! 
 Starboard watch, clear the decks ! " The others he sent down 
 into the hold. They thought, " If we had only left the damned 
 fellow to drown! " and went about their duty in silence, doing 
 it like men. 
 
 For four hours they stood on the precipitous deck, the sea 
 washing over it, and worked for their lives, with their eyes 
 open and their hands alert. The mate of the Gude Wife stood 
 by the helmsman, glass in hand, in his dripping clothes, stiff 
 with cold, looking out for help. 
 
 Then, when evening came, and it was almost dark, two 
 tow-boats appeared by the Scharhorn heights, sent from the 
 shipowner. 
 
 A few hours later Anna Boje came running up, having 
 heard at the house where she was lodging that the Gude Wife 
 had come in. She had rushed past the signal-house in the wind 
 and the driving rain, wrapped in Anna Marten's heavy coat 
 and on her head a bright handkerchief, lent her by the land- 
 lady, down to the quay. There she saw the dismantled ship. 
 Three men in oilskins were standing, talking together, by one 
 of the boats. She went up and asked them. Hearing the 
 voice, the youngest turned round, and they recognised one 
 another. 
 
 At first he was astonished by her appearance. " Mother 
 isn't ill, is she?" 
 
 She looked at him with laughing eyes. " No ; they're all 
 well." 
 
 He walked a few steps aside with her and said, " What is 
 it, Anna? You're very strange! " 
 
 So she told him what had happened. He was delighted, 
 and asked all sorts of questions. " It's lovely," he said, " that 
 you're to get married so easily and smoothly. It's always un- 
 certain with a girl."
 
 HOLYLAND 203 
 
 "What do you mean?" 
 
 "Well," he said, "one is wanton; another suffers from 
 hopeless love ; a third becomes an old maid, and queer at that. 
 But you've come easily and smoothly into harbour, and I am 
 ever so glad ! " 
 
 " You don't know, Pete," she said gravely, " whether it has 
 been so smooth and easy. You've been far away all the time. 
 Even if you'd sat by my bed every evening you'd never have 
 seen. What does a brother know of his sister? But who's 
 that? Your dear brother-in-law? " 
 
 On the same evening, while the storm rose still higher and 
 men struggled desperately for their lives upon the sea, Pete 
 Boje was talking to the shipowner, who had come to Cux- 
 haven in his anxiety for the fate of his two splendid ships. 
 
 " What I consider of most importance," said the quiet 
 elderly man, " is not your invention of improvements which 
 seem to work well, or your having performed an action to-day 
 which, though it has brought in a considerable sum of money 
 to me and to yourself, could have been accomplished by a man 
 whose ability was not accompanied by any steadfastness of 
 purpose; but rather that I feel certain that you would carry 
 out anything you undertook with that ability, thoroughness, 
 and constant attention which comes from devotion to a thing 
 for its own sake. Such men are rare, and they are of great 
 value to the head of a big undertaking:. It is on that account 
 that I purpose, if you agree, to send you at once to Gateshead 
 to examine the three-master that is now in the yard there. I 
 am sending some one who knows how to use his eyes. ... I 
 should be glad not to have any more ships built there." 
 
 On the same evening, while the storm howled, making 
 more than one young wife a widow, Anna Boje found rest, 
 Anna whose heart beat so passionately behind the quiet nobility 
 of her face, the shy purity of her eyes. After they had sat 
 together some time in the coffee-room he took her up to her 
 room, and was going away. 
 
 " Good-night, gude wife," he said, kissing her. 
 
 " Good-night, gude man," said she, accepting the kiss. 
 
 But they could not let each other go; a flame burned up 
 within them in whose happy glow they sat blissfully together 
 far into the night; and as they sat Anna thought: " Kai Jans 
 would never have done for me think how he broods and tor-
 
 204 HOLYLAND 
 
 tures himself. No, I am in the Holyland now! " she laughed 
 softly. 
 
 Next evening they went by train to Hilligenlei, arriving 
 in the dark. Pe and Anna walked on in front: Pete and Kai 
 behind. When they reached the turning from the station road 
 into the harbour street Kai broke the long silence by saying 
 "Tell me what did you think of when you jumped over- 
 board yesterday afternoon? I want so much to know?" 
 
 " What do you mean ? " said Pete in his quick fashion. 
 "What did I think of? Money, of course. That jump 
 earned me at least two hundred and fifty pounds. Money 
 and advancement, that's what I thought of." 
 
 " You did not think of anything else? I mean, the parlous 
 plight of the men ... ? " 
 
 " No," said Pete in some astonishment. " No, I didn't think 
 about that. By sailing away from Heligoland in that leaky 
 ship I put them in a much more dangerous plight. No, I 
 thought of the value of the ship and the cargo. I thought of 
 myself, that is to say." 
 
 " What about those two men who were drowned ? Those 
 two boys are being tossed up and down by the waves now." 
 
 "What has that got to do with me?" said Pete in angry 
 surprise. "They chose to come!" 
 
 " Yes, because they trusted you." 
 
 ' Trusted me ! Nonsense. They wanted the money." 
 
 " Indeed," said Kai, turning away. 
 
 At that moment a man came up to them whom neither of 
 them recognized in the darkness. 
 
 " Have you heard about the death of the young Mecklen- 
 burger ? The sixth man who went down at the same time 
 told us. He said ' Boys, let us pray,' and then he recommended 
 his soul to God, and begged for a speedy death. Here in Hilli- 
 genlei one hears such a lot of bosh about ' Holyland,' ever- 
 lastingly ' Holyland ' : seriously in church and jestingly on 
 the skittle ground ; but this . . . this seemed to me a real 
 leap out of darkness and terror right into the ' Holyland.' " 
 With these words the man went on his way. 
 
 " That was good ! " cried Kai Jans aloud. " Oh, that was 
 good." And from the sound of his voice it was audible that 
 the lump in his throat had gone. He went down the harbour 
 street without a word to Pete.
 
 HOLYLAND 205 
 
 Pe Ontjes and Anna had gone on ahead; they found the 
 mother sitting at the machine. 
 
 " Here we are," said Pe. " We've made peace, and the 
 wedding is to be in four weeks, mother! " 
 
 Anna took her mother's hand, and, holding it fast in her 
 own, said in a gentle and affectionate voice: "We would 
 stay with you, mother, but there is someone outside who wants 
 you: whom you haven't seen these two years. So we are 
 going across to Uncle Lau's." They went out by the kitchen 
 door. 
 
 "Someone for me?" said Hella Boje; "someone who has 
 come with you ? " With trembling knees she went along the 
 passage, and, finding no one there, opened the door and looked 
 out into the darkness. She was about middle height, bent 
 already by anxiety about her children, and by sitting at the 
 machine. On the damp, windy street lay the last leaves from 
 the chestnuts. " Pete ! " she said. He came to her across the 
 street, put his arm round her, and went in with her, stroking 
 her hair. She wept with joy. " Oh, my boy ! To think of 
 having you again ! " 
 
 " Yes, mother and just think. . . ." He told her of his 
 good fortune, saying nothing about his leap into the sea. She 
 rejoiced indeed. " Oh," she cried, " now you will be often on 
 shore." 
 
 " I shall come to Hilligenlei twice a year at least. You 
 shall have some satisfaction from your eldest ! " 
 
 " Oh, Pete, I've always had that always." 
 
 ' Now, then, have you sat at the machine all day?" 
 
 " Oh, no ; not all the time." 
 
 " I'm not so sure," said he; " you're worn out and look any- 
 thing but well. Anna is as good as married. I'll look after 
 Hett. Heinke is a clever girl, and will earn her living yet. 
 . . . I'll tell you what . . . there's room in the loft, isn't 
 there?" And, before she knew what he was about, he had 
 seized on the heavy machine, lifted it up, and carried it out 
 of the room and up the stairs, calling out " Your day is over 
 you've done your work ! " 
 
 In her joy Hella Boje did not know whether to laugh or cry; 
 hot tears sprang to her eyes. 
 
 When he came down again, and was going into the kitchen 
 with his mother, a silvery voice rang out as the door blew
 
 206 HOLYLAND 
 
 open : " Oh, mother, Kai Jans has been home from Berlin 
 since the day before yesterday, and he went to Cuxhaven with 
 Anna and Pe Ontjes! And Anna is engaged to Pe and I 
 knew nothing of it all. And now there's something else 
 . . . but nobody tells me anything." 
 
 As he came out of the dark passage to meet her she stood 
 in the bright light of the door. He saw how she drew up her 
 tall figure as she looked at the strange man with the shy awk- 
 wardness of sixteen in her grey eyes. 
 
 "Heinke!" he said. 
 
 Then she recognised and threw her arms round his neck 
 with a cry of joy, pressing close up to him. He stroked her 
 hair and drew her into the room, shutting the door behind 
 him. She looked at him shyly, passing her hand softly over his 
 sleeve. " How different you look! and a beard! Oh, where's 
 the machine ? " 
 
 He told her of his good fortune, and how their mother was 
 not to work at the machine any more. 
 
 " Really! And the great Pe Ontjes is to be my brother-in- 
 law! Think! brother-in-law!" She laughed. "It's a good 
 thing I have always called him by his Christian name, or it 
 would be awkward to begin now. Really! And when are 
 they to be married?" 
 
 " In four weeks." 
 
 " In four weeks? " She lost herself in thought. " Do you 
 know," she said, " Kai will have his examination soon now. 
 He is going to be a clergyman ; and that's right, I think." 
 
 " You are friends, aren't you ? " 
 
 " Yes," she said, with a gentle seriousness in her tone. " He 
 has always been very good to me. I have had heaps of letters 
 and postcards from him. We find an extraordinary pleasure 
 in talking to one another." 
 
 " But what do you think of his search for the sanctuary, or 
 what is it he calls it? the Holyland?" 
 
 She drew her eyebrows together, and looked pensively at 
 the ground. "Yes, what can one say? I'll tell you what I 
 think. I think he is a good and clever man, and that's 
 enough." 
 
 " Well, go and say ' How do you do? ' to him, then." She 
 went. 
 
 He remained alone in the room for some time. He looked
 
 HOLYLAND 207 
 
 around and found everything in its accustomed place; then 
 a sensation of weariness after all that he had gone through 
 came over him. He began to think of the ship he was to 
 inspect, seeing in his mind's eye the partly built craft and him- 
 self going all over it, asking questions, examining the hold. 
 And as he stood there, watching the work, he heard a sound 
 of clicking and pushing overhead. "What can that be?" 
 he thought; "what sort of new engine have they got on 
 deck?" 
 
 He got up, remembered where he was, opened the door, 
 and shook his head in great perplexity . . . then with three 
 steps he was upstairs. His mother stood working the machine 
 in the dim light of the little kitchen lamp, lost in thought. 
 She looked up at him in confusion. " You took it away so 
 suddenly, before I had time to understand. I don't believe 
 I can think now unless I am sitting at the machine. ... I 
 have always thought of your father and you all as I worked at 
 it." She rubbed its shining top and burst into loud sobs. 
 
 "Cheer up, mummy," he said; "no, don't cry . . . you 
 shall sit at it two or three hours a day but not more. 
 Come, now." But she stayed where she was. 
 
 " Pete ... I have worried so fearfully over you all. Every 
 day I have been afraid that you might die like your father 
 . . . and Anna, Anna has gone through a great deal, Pete; 
 and Heinke is so quiet and reserved ; and, Pete, I have never 
 talked to the girls about it, but you must know, in case I were 
 suddenly to die. I love Hett so ... he was the last child 
 I had by him . . . but now, I am so terribly afraid ... he 
 is not true like you others are." 
 
 " I know," he said, and his eyes darkened. " Anna wrote 
 to me about it. But now that I know it will be all right. I 
 shall be in Hamburg and can keep an eye upon him. The boy 
 will turn out all right, trust me for that! He comes of a 
 good enough stock. Come, be of good heart! Think of what 
 I have done already. I shall do more yet. I am going to 
 make tremendous efforts. Forward, forward ! ever ahead ! " 
 
 " Ah, Pete," said she thoughtfully, " do you think you will 
 find peace so? " 
 
 " Peace! " said he; " what is peace? Don't talk to me like 
 Kai Jans ! Come, now 1 "
 
 CHAPTER XVII. 
 
 MRS. BOJE was indeed blessed in her children. Things 
 became much brighter in the little gabled house under the 
 chestnuts. 
 
 Anna Boje was a happy wife, with no thoughts save for 
 her husband and the daily round of household duties. In the 
 second year she began to grieve that no child came to her. 
 
 She had much to do in her home, but two or three times 
 a week she would go down to the chestnut avenue towards 
 evening and sit in her old place, rather more stately than of 
 old, and with a new and beautiful peace in her clear, open 
 face. Her mother sat opposite her, sewing, while Heinke was 
 busy in the kitchen. 
 
 Now and then the mother would shyly throw out a brief 
 question over this and that, and give a brief word of womanly 
 counsel. The young wife made no reply, or turned aside her 
 fair head as if to say, " I don't want to talk of that." And 
 yet the mother knew that not a word was lost upon her 
 daughter. When she went home, and stretching up her erect 
 figure felt the blood course swiftly through her veins as she 
 stepped out like a lioness, as Pe Ontjes said, she thought, 
 " Who is to have children if not I ? " 
 
 One evening, when they had been married nearly two years, 
 her mother began again, without looking up from her knitting, 
 " Tell me, my child I think so much about it ! I will never 
 say another word on the subject but, children are part of a 
 true marriage. Tell me, you love one another? " 
 
 " Mother! " said Anna. " What do you think? Of course 
 we love one another! " 
 
 "That is right," said Hella Boje; "but you know it is 
 possible to love one another too much." She bent over the 
 work in her lap. " Your father was a man of quick, passionate 
 nature, like Pete; but when he took me in his arms he was 
 as calm as a king." 
 
 208
 
 HOLY LAND 209 
 
 Anna said nothing, and pretended not to hear. But in the 
 evening, however, she was alone with her husband, and as she 
 lifted up her arms and dropped them again in undoing and 
 spreading out her long, smooth hair, he came up to her and 
 began to play with her hair. Then, looking earnestly at him, 
 she said, " Wieben Peters! You think that it is all right if 
 your beard is yellow and your heart is warm, but if you love 
 your wife you must be peaceful and glorious, like a king! " 
 
 "Indeed!" said he. "And what must you be like?" 
 
 She cast a distrustful glance sideways in the mirror, as she 
 often did, and said, laughing and shaking her long fair mane, 
 "Oh, I am peaceful!" 
 
 So Anna's life went on. She thought only of her beloved, 
 and her desire for a child of his, and her household duties, and 
 had no thoughts beyond not even for her own people. Her 
 sister was almost a stranger to her. 
 
 Heinke was eighteen, and looked after the house. Since 
 the house was emptier, and they wanted more work, they took 
 in two grammar-school boys from Friestadt, of course. 
 They slept in the room with the gable, and fared as if at 
 home. Mrs. Boje's motherly eyes spied out missing buttons 
 and worn-out trousers. Heinke encouraged their studies with 
 alternate scoldings and sisterly assistance. And she saw that 
 they were well fed, for her appetite was excellent: she was 
 hungry and strong, and possessed plenty of self-esteem, al- 
 though she was not so bad in this respect as the other Bojes. 
 
 At this time she had one secret joy. Kai Jans, having suc- 
 cessfully passed his examination, had come to assist the parson 
 at Hindorf, only two hours away from Hilligenlei. Kai Jans! 
 
 For fourteen days he helped the sick parson in his lofty 
 duties: he baptised and betrothed, and visited the sick, and 
 spoke over graves, and helped people in all the relations of 
 life. Then on Sunday afternoon he came to Hilligenlei. 
 
 First he went to his parents. They still lived in the long 
 house, and Thomas, vigorous in spite of his sixty years, still 
 went daily to his digging. Mala, with her smooth hair and 
 clean apron, still waited in Ringerang's kitchen when the 
 farmers had a dinner and the young folk a dance. On Sun- 
 days he would sit comfortably by the window, his eyeglasses 
 perched on his Roman nose, reading the Bible or the Labour 
 Leader, while she sat opposite with her gentle, intelligent face,
 
 2IO HOLYLAND 
 
 reading peacefully the stories in the Itzehoe paper about Lady 
 Alice and Lord Pancook. 
 
 The Labour Party, of which he was now the doyen, met 
 in the hall, and from time to time speakers came from Ham- 
 burg to address them. He attended regularly, but did not 
 believe all that he heard. To his slow-moving mind their judg- 
 ments seemed too hasty. He accepted their criticisms of the 
 clergy and their condemnation of the existing condition of the 
 Church, for as far as he could see the Church had always been 
 on the side of the well-to-do. But when they wanted to 
 abolish not only the Church, but religion, he could not follow 
 them. His own experience and his knowledge of the lives of 
 others taught him the secret sway of holy and eternal powers 
 over and about us. 
 
 When Kai Jans came, his little mother asked after his socks 
 and shirts, and how he fed at the rectory. His father laid his 
 glasses on the table, and, drumming softly with his fingers on 
 the window ledge, said, " I don't like my glasses on when I 
 look at people," and asked about affairs in Hindorf. He knew 
 most of the people whom his son mentioned, and would re- 
 count what he knew of the lives of those whom his son buried, 
 and of the ancestors of those whom he baptised, not recounting 
 mere incidents, but searching for the causes of events. Father 
 and son resembled each other so much that these experiences 
 sank in and gave to the son the outlook upon life and the world 
 of a man of sixty years. He would sit there for hours listening 
 to his father, his eyes fixed thoughtfully on the ground, on 
 the intelligent face of his father, or gazing out to sea across 
 the harbour stream. He said little and seldom passed any 
 judgment: he used his eyes and his ears. 
 
 At a time when most young men thump the table and cry 
 " We're ready ; examinations and pondering over things are 
 over for us! " Kai Jans was beginning to feel that it was all 
 a riddle, himself, the world, life in general. At a time when 
 all his friends were started in life, when Pe Ontjes Lau 
 well, the great Pe Ontjes Lau was really started in life at ten 
 years of age, when he began to wear the Jutlander's woollen 
 cap! when Anna Boje at twenty-six was a self-reliant, full- 
 developed character, when Pete Boje knew exactly what he 
 wanted, when Tjark Dusenschon had been going for years 
 through the streets of Hamburg with perfect self-assurance,
 
 HOLYLAND 211 
 
 Kai Jans, like the oak, which is the last of all the trees of the 
 forest to don its green, because its wood is the hardest of all, 
 Kai Jans was just beginning to put from him the wild, un- 
 disciplined enthusiasms, the exuberant caprices of a youthful 
 intellect, in order, with the calm reflection that brings furrows 
 to the brow, to listen for the murmurs that stir up among 
 the tree tops and down in the brushwood of the mighty forest. 
 And at this time when he was growing to manhood, his best 
 helper was the old navvy, Thomas Jans. He gave him the 
 best inheritance that any man may inherit in the experience 
 of a long and earnest life. But while his father stirred the 
 deepest mysteries of the soul in hasty, tentative phrases, Kai 
 Jans, with the shy embarrassment of youth not yet confident of 
 itself, was silent, unable to argue with the elder man. 
 
 On leaving the long house, he went, still lost in thought, 
 straight to the little gabled house under the chestnuts. And 
 here he became merry; he would sit cosily in the chair by the 
 window and chat with Mrs. Boje and Heinke, looking out into 
 the street, and making jokes at the expense of the passers-by, 
 and this and that in Hilligenlei, telling them about Hindorf 
 and the good rector, and hearing news of his old friends. 
 
 " Pete was here last week," said Heinke. " He came in the 
 morning and sat down in that chair that you are sitting in now, 
 saying it was so gloriously quiet and cosy here that he would 
 stay for three days. He was going to see you in Hindorf, or 
 take me with you. But when he saw that things were all 
 right here, and after he had talked with Pe Ontjes about the 
 price of corn, he said about three o'clock in the afternoon, ' I 
 think, mother, I had better get back to-morrow morning early; 
 we have got our hands full with a new schooner.' So I went 
 with him to the station about five o'clock. Do you know, the 
 one who is getting on the fastest of all of you is Tjark Dusen- 
 schon! Pete says he has a fortune already, and none of you 
 have anything." She laughed in merry mockery. 
 
 Kai Jans and Mrs. Boje began to speak of his childish days. 
 She tried to join in. 
 
 " You be quiet," he said, " you were a baby at that time, 
 no bigger than the leg of this chair! " 
 
 11 That's a lie." 
 
 " A lie, indeed ? I saw you when you were only twelve days 
 old!"
 
 212 HOLYLAND 
 
 ' That's not true, it's only your boasting. You always talk 
 as if I were your grandchild ; there are only eight years between 
 us, after all." 
 
 He laughed, enjoying her scorn. She tried to be really 
 angry, but casting a rapid glance at his face and seeing how 
 full of merry roguishness it was, she laughed softly and said 
 gaily, " You cannot make me angry." 
 
 " Nor you me," said he, looking at her with genuine affec- 
 tion in his serious eyes. She nodded to him and bent again 
 over her work to hide the confusion in her eyes. 
 
 When he got up to go he said, " Will you come with me to 
 Anna's?" 
 
 It being Sunday she had time to come: rejoicing every time 
 they met anyone on the road who could see her with him, 
 thinking that everyone must rate him as high as she had done 
 from her childhood's days. 
 
 After sitting with Anna and Pe Ontjes for an hour or so, 
 she went with him out of the town on to the heights. Here 
 the calm, gentle peace of evening on the way to the quiet of his 
 village, and the presence of this pure young creature by his 
 side, called forth from his soul all his secret thoughts and as- 
 pirations. 
 
 " There is no one else to whom I can talk about these things: 
 you are too young perhaps, but even if you don't understand 
 everything you listen so sweetly, and you are so dear and so 
 full of worldly wisdom far more so than I shall ever be- 
 come. . . . Heinke, I don't know, I really don't know where 
 I am. ... I am afraid you have always been right in saying 
 that I am unfit to be a clergyman I think I shall have to 
 give it up altogether. . . ." 
 
 She was silent for a space. Then, " You don't believe what 
 you have to say in your sermons ? " 
 
 " Ah, child, it is not so simple as that. I will tell you. I 
 certainly do not believe the faith one is taught first in school 
 and then in church, that as far as I can remember I have never 
 believed ; no conscientious man with any intelligence can be- 
 lieve it." 
 
 " What do you preach then? " 
 
 " Ah, child, at first that was a great trouble to me. For a 
 time I thought that because I could no longer accept the faith 
 of the Church I must give up Christianity altogether. I was
 
 HOLYLAND 213 
 
 in despair; the whole thing seemed nonsense to me. Then 
 about a year ago I had to bury quite a little child. A little 
 time before, an old woman in the village had told me she had 
 lost first her parents, then her husband, and then her elder 
 children, but the hardest of all had been the loss of a child 
 that was still at her breast. Thinking of this, I spoke to the 
 young mother by the side of the open grave, without any text, 
 without saying a word of the hard old faith, original sin, re- 
 demption by blood and the like, only seeking for some words 
 of consolation . . . and I found it, at last in this . . . ' Deliver 
 us from evil, For Thine is the Kingdom.' . . . And so I preach 
 now as much as I can in the Saviour's words, of the childlike, 
 tender, human elements in Christianity, of trust in God, cour- 
 age, love of our neighbours and eternal hope. That's what I 
 preach about. But I have no assurance, no sense of unity. I 
 am myself in a state of miserable uncertainty; the want of 
 clearness in my thought is a terrible pain." 
 
 "If you preach what is pure and lofty, that is enough," said 
 she. " You should be content." 
 
 " But I am not," he complained. " If I were only like other 
 men! They have their profession and their hobby and play 
 with their wife and children, while I torture myself about 
 questions which no human intellect can decide." 
 
 She looked at him with her clear, honest eyes. " You are 
 still young," she said, " you will find some certain good at 
 last." 
 
 He was utterly despondent. " 7 find ! I am not even fit to 
 be a village priest. I stand before the world like the ox before 
 the stall, wondering, wondering, able neither to go in nor to 
 come out. However I prick up my ears I cannot make music 
 out of life or the world." 
 
 " Shall I tell you what you must do ? " she said. " You 
 must go out into the world again. You must learn more and 
 see more; that is what you want, I think. If it does nothing 
 else, it will pass the years of restlessness away." 
 
 " Well," said he, " I have a friend in Berlin, a politician, 
 the son of well-to-do people. You and he are the only people 
 to whom' I talk about my troubles. Once a fortnight he writes 
 to me, ' Come back here for a few years. Three years ago we 
 were both too young and stupid, especially you. Come back 
 now and learn.' Sometimes I think it would be the best thing
 
 214 HOLYLAND 
 
 to do. Then I am afraid I am too simple-minded for scientific 
 studies. . . . Ah, child," he said, " my gloomy affairs will 
 make you sad let us talk of other things." 
 
 She shook her fair head and said in her soft, melodious voice, 
 " Tell me more, more ! You don't know how I love listening 
 to you. If I could only help you! " 
 
 On the. Volkersdorf summit she said goodbye and turned 
 homewards. The way seemed to be through a beautiful shining 
 haze in the happiness of the thought that the dearest, cleverest 
 man in all the world had walked by her side, laid in her hands 
 the deepest secrets of his soul. Her own was still shrouded in 
 the dreams of youth.
 
 CHAPTER XVIII. 
 
 ANOTHER year passed. 
 
 On a beautiful Sunday in October, a fresh wind blowing 
 from the west, Anna went one afternoon to see her mother, 
 as her custom was. Her mother heard her step as she passed 
 under the window, and recognising her daughter, saw with a 
 mother's sharp eyes that there was a difference in her carriage. 
 When her lovely visitor entered, however, she made no remark 
 but talked of other matters, how Pete had written, Hett had 
 sent home his washing, Heinke was with a friend. 
 
 Anna listened, looking now at her mother, now out of the 
 window, with something roguish in her eyes. 
 
 Her mother thought, " Two can play at this game," and 
 she went to the chest of drawers that stood to the right of 
 the door, and kneeling down took out a little bundle of linen, 
 then, seating herself again, she began to stitch a button on to 
 one of the tiny shirts. Anna sat opposite her, her sparkling 
 eyes wandering from her mother's work out to the street, cov- 
 ered with great red and yellow leaves, with great shining 
 brown fruits lying among them bursting out of their skins; 
 she sat quietly without saying a word. 
 
 Then Heinke came in from her walk, nodded her dainty 
 fair head, and saying abstractedly, " You there, Anna," went 
 up to her mother's sewing-basket to look for something. Seeing 
 her mother's work she went out again. Shortly afterwards, 
 when Anna went out into the passage on her way home, 
 Heinke, coming out of her room with a book in her hand, met 
 her. Anna took the book from her, and seeing that it was a 
 volume of Goethe, said in a depressed tone, " That is over my 
 head, and Pe Ontjes does not care for such things either. . . . 
 It is nice that you have Kai Jans for a friend ; he can help you." 
 She laid the book on the table. 
 
 Heinke left it there, saying, " I will walk home with you." 
 When they were outside, with a movement of shy tenderness, 
 
 215
 
 216 HOLYLAND 
 
 she put her arm through her sister's, a thing she never did, and 
 Anna took the hand that rested on her arm. The two tall, 
 beautiful women walked together in silence, striking their feet 
 as they walked against the ripe chestnuts on the ground. As 
 if to show her suppleness, Anna, without letting go her sister's 
 arm, bent down to pick up a burst chestnut, out of which the 
 shining brown fruit peeped: lost in thought she let Heinke's 
 hand go. A few great red leaves fell on either side of them ; the 
 autumn sky was clear and high above them. Anna's thoughts 
 oppressed her, and she began to weep softly. 
 
 " Heinke," she said, " I have never showed you that I love 
 you, but I do love you very dearly. . . . You must take your 
 soul in both hands . . . you don't know how fearful it is to 
 let a great love root itself in one's soul, and then have to rend 
 it out with one's own hands when it has grown there. . . . 
 Take care you do not grow to care so for Kai Jans." 
 
 Heinke let her fair head droop and said softly, " I know 
 he is fond of me . . . and -I am glad of it but I have no 
 further thoughts. I am only nineteen, Antje." 
 
 " I ought not to have said anything," said Anna. 
 
 " Oh, yes," said Heinke, " I am glad of it ; then I shall be 
 on my guard." 
 
 " You are like me in appearance," said Anna, " except that 
 your eyes are softer and your hair a shade darker; I expect 
 your nature will be like mine, and on such natures may fall an 
 agony, upon which may God have mercy ! " Her voice broke 
 and she wept. 
 
 Heinke understood that her sister spoke of an agony which 
 she herself had felt; she pressed her hand and said, "Don't 
 be afraid on my account. I am happy in my old friendship 
 with him and will try to keep an even more careful watch on 
 my actions than I have done. Oh, I have so many plans to 
 carry out ! " She laughed gaily. " What do I know of such 
 tremendous things as Love and Marriage? I am still quite 
 happy as I am." 
 
 Anna grew calm once more. But from this time there 
 was more confidence between Heinke and her sister; she came 
 to see her often and helped her, as her time grew near, in the 
 work of the house. As the year went on she grew into woman- 
 hood ; she stood in her shy, trembling purity like a young birch
 
 HOLYLAND 217 
 
 alone on the heath, stirred by no human hand, only by wind 
 and rain. 
 
 Kai Jans . . . Kai Jans did not stir her. Had he awakened 
 her, after one short moment of blissful confusion she would 
 have become his bride; she would have cried out rapturously, 
 " For years I have loved you beyond everything in the world." 
 
 But his thoughts were far, far away. Quite other things 
 occupied him. By painful and obscure conflict he won his 
 way to manhood, learning in the quiet loneliness of the village 
 from deep and scholarly books, and from the serious duties of 
 an office which set him in the heart of the movement of human 
 existence. Sensitive from childhood up to all that was natural, 
 genuine and true, looking even then with eyes like those of the 
 first man in astonishment at a world awry, now as a man he 
 found himself face to face with reality, and found its aspect 
 at each new examination more hideously unendurable. The 
 utter confusion in each individual existence, the pettiness and 
 falseness of society, the miserable failure of the State, the 
 wooden and unmeaning formulae of the Church, the slow, 
 bloodstained progress of humanity rose before him inexplicable 
 and meaningless. There was no answer to his question there. 
 In his need he walked over the heath and among the woods 
 around his home; he went to the Bible and studied more 
 learned books. But there was no answer there. 
 
 Silent, with thought-sick eyes in which the need of his soul 
 had hung out its signals of distress, he came down to Hilligen- 
 lei. He sat opposite to his father and listened to his experiences 
 without finding any cheer in them; it was all a strange con- 
 fusion. Then he went to Heinke Boje. He did not ask of her 
 to understand everything; he came to her as a big boy comes to 
 a dear, innocent friend when the world and the workings of 
 his conscience trouble him. And she found the right, although 
 she had no learning, by the insight of a sincere and sensitive 
 nature. 
 
 " Do not fear," she said ; " do as your friend asks accept 
 his help and spend a year or two in Berlin go, Kai ! We 
 can easily prove to your parents that it is wise; they will un- 
 derstand, they are intelligent." 
 
 " Yes," he said, " I think it would be the right thing for 
 me to go, else I am afraid lest the Church hold me fast in her 
 clutches. I want to see with my own eyes the state of my
 
 218 HOLYLAND 
 
 people in these disturbed times, to learn for myself what is 
 being and can be done to help them through." 
 
 One day, when she went up to the heights with him, he 
 saw that she was depressed. At first, when he asked her about 
 it, she denied it; then she admitted that her mother had been 
 scolding her again. 
 
 " I cannot get on with mother," she said ; " she is always 
 talking of my evil character." 
 
 He shook his head while her eyes filled with tears. 
 
 " When I was at church the other day the parson preached 
 about Hell and eternal damnation, and I felt in despair. I 
 don't know what to do with myself." Her head drooped and 
 she wept. 
 
 In the midst of his own trouble he was almost glad to have 
 an opportunity of helping her; he talked to her earnestly and 
 encouragingly. " Ah," he said, " you must not simply accept 
 it when the Church or your parents or anyone says, ' This is a 
 sin ; this is wickedness/ or * You are a wicked, extraordinary, 
 evil person.' I tell you the misery which leads many young 
 people to the verge and even to the actual commission of suicide 
 is very often caused by the way in which the hard and unsym- 
 pathetic judgment of parents and relations, of the Church, of 
 society, of those in authority over them make the young, and 
 especially the very best of them, distrustful of their own nature 
 and full of despairing hatred ef themselves, so that their very 
 existence seems meaningless, and they themselves are embittered 
 or compelled or actually driven to throw away their lives. 
 Hold your head high, Heinke Boje; dear child of the sunny 
 day, don't mind how the owls hoot at you! Have you not 
 good blood in your veins? Did not your father spring from 
 the ancient race of Todi and your mother from the tall, long- 
 limbed Viromandui? Oh, Heinke, be proud of your appear- 
 ance and of your nature; believe in it and develop it! Believe 
 that there is much in you that is good and noble that belief 
 is a hundred times better than the doctrine of the Church 
 which damns us with the fires of Hell. Dear Heinke, there 
 is no original sin! There is original good and original evil. 
 There is original evil in you. You are rather too sensitive, rather 
 too easy-going, and your nose is a shade too pointed ; but there 
 is more of original good in you oh, a mass of it, from your 
 long fair hair to your dainty ankles, to say nothing of your
 
 HOLYLAND 219 
 
 precious soul and your dear spirit! So please me by having 
 confidence in yourself. Think that the Saviour Himself says 
 of you in your youth, ' Let her pass, she is not far from the 
 Kingdom of Heaven.' w 
 
 A ray of brilliant happiness passed over Heinke's tender 
 face, and God gave dreaming youth the right word at the right 
 moment oh, Heinke, you were beautiful indeed at that mo- 
 ment as she said with laughing eyes, " Ah, if I come of a 
 good old stock and am to be satisfied with my character, let 
 your doubts and depressions go! Trust yourself too, rec- 
 reant!" 
 
 He looked at her in astonishment. " Ah, thank you," he 
 said. 
 
 " Go whither your will calls you; believe it shall be justified 
 by the end." 
 
 They parted. 
 
 One day, just after New Year, he came from his parents' 
 house through the rain and the wet snow to Mrs. Boje and 
 Heinke, and told them he was going to Berlin. He said 
 farewell. 
 
 And when Kai Jans left his room in the rectory at Hindorf, 
 Heinke Boje went there. He had asked them to allow this. 
 Shyly as a swallow visiting a strange place for the first time, 
 she entered the long house with the thatched roof. The first 
 thing she did was to break the mirror that hung to the left of 
 the door, when she tried to clean it; the next was to spatter 
 the clergyman's sermon with ink. 
 
 She began to feel at home with them when she found that 
 they could respect other people's nature and character, and even 
 found pleasure in their differences; and gradually as she be- 
 came more confident she allowed her true self to appear, and, 
 as Kai Jans had foretold, she began to find happiness in being 
 with them, and to find joy and peace in herself, and to venture 
 to put in a shrewd word or a jest now and then. She aston- 
 ished herself, and used to say to herself, " Now, Heinke Boje, 
 what a good, clever child you are. Take care, you're driving 
 your own team now, a young one so take care ! " 
 
 In the little room facing south-east, from which one can see 
 far and wide over the fens, she read the letters that Kai Jans 
 wrote to her, and answered them; and she read the beautiful
 
 220 HOLYLAND 
 
 great books that had once been her father's joy, and understood 
 them. And the clergyman helped her. 
 
 Anna Boje bore her first child about midnight in the begin- 
 ning of May in the south-west room looking out on the Dyke, 
 in the house which Pe Ontjes Lau had bought from Reimers, 
 after she had spent the day in seeing after all the cases of her 
 household. Only her mother stood by her bed and helped 
 with peaceful care. She would have nothing to do with Rieke 
 Thomson. 
 
 As her eyes wandered round the room in the time of stress 
 they rested on the ship which hung from the roof over the 
 chest of drawers, and she said to her mother, " If all goes 
 M'ell, Pe Ontjes must send the news to Torril Torrilsen, that 
 he may rejoice with us." 
 
 Ten days later, when for the first time she had the un- 
 speakable joy of tending her child herself, Heinke came over 
 from Hindorf on foot to see the baby. She had just sat down 
 after looking at it with shy, silent wonder, when Kassen Wed- 
 derkop came in. He considerately lowered his voice at first, 
 but soon forgot and shouted, suddenly lapsing again into a 
 whisper, like a boy falling on to a pile of soft straw. 
 
 Pe Ontjes, in spite of his young fatherhood, was in a state 
 of great irritation because a smack laden with barley for him 
 was stuck on the sandbank. " I wish I could sling up the 
 mayor and the fat alderman on to the smack and let them bob 
 up and down in the water." 
 
 " If so, sling up some more," said Wedderkop. " The mayor 
 is certainly a wretched creature, a kind of ducal edition of a 
 fool, so vain that he can never judge anything on its merits, 
 but always thinks what sort of figure he will cut. But the 
 real masters of Hillieenlei are not the mayor or aldermen, but 
 people like Heine Wulk and Birnbaum, the publican. They 
 teach the town and give it its opinions. Yes, the real rulers 
 of Hilligenlei are Heine Wulk, with his ill-conditioned news- 
 paper, and Birnbaum, who not only supplies beer, but distils 
 with it into the minds of those who go near him his low and 
 vulgar views on God and the world, and everything that is 
 good or lofty." 
 
 "Do you ever go to the club?" said Pe Ontjes bitterly. 
 
 " I was there the other day," said Wedderkop. " They 
 were talking about mice. Everyone present told his own mouse
 
 HOLYLAND 221 
 
 story, his peculiar property and pride ; the others leant forward, 
 gazing at the story-teller, not from any interest in the tale, 
 which they all knew already, but burning with eagerness to 
 tell their own story. Suddenly before the story-teller could 
 bring his mouse into safety, another leapt on to the stage, and 
 bit off its tail; and so it went round. Then they got on to 
 politics." 
 
 "What are their views there?" 
 
 " Do you know they look at things from the point of view 
 of 1875! Everything is dismissed as 'Bismarck's three great 
 mistakes.' And then there's a phrase, a kind of joke they are 
 always quoting. They say, ' Our future lies on the water? 
 No, mark, it lies in the water now!' This joke, unlike the 
 mouse stories, each of which is the property of a single mem- 
 ber, is common club property. When a new member or a 
 stranger comes to the club, someone is sure to tell him this bon 
 mot, looking at all the other members, his empty, arrogant 
 eyes meeting theirs, as empty and as arrogant as his own. 
 After that they told all sort of anecdotes, nearly all of them 
 of a risque description. I tell you, Pe Ontjes, these anecdotes 
 are a pest that corrupts far and wide; they rob work of its 
 serious meaning, and drive all sense of reverence out of life. 
 There they sit in the club, the old fathers of families, side by 
 side with the young unmarried men, laughing at vulgar jokes 
 and ruining not only their own character, but that of all who 
 listen to them." 
 
 " But the artisans," said Heinke intelligently ; " they are 
 sound." 
 
 "Oh! the artisans!" said Kassen. "Excuse me, Anna 
 those confounded Koreans ! Look here ! " he said in a whisper, 
 " I spent some time to-day in watching my carpenter standing 
 over his peas and trying to fasten a dead crow to a post to 
 frighten away the birds. He spent the whole morning in 
 doing it! If you order anything from him the most you can 
 hope for is to get something which is not what you wanted in 
 the course of a few months. The artisans are no good. They 
 haven't the least desire for progress. If they ever have a vague 
 idea of what a wretched, narrow existence they lead, all they do 
 is to call a meeting of their goose club or benefit society, at 
 which they are all at sixes and sevens, and do nothing but abuse 
 one another, and the president, Jenkner, the saddler, has to be
 
 222 HOLYLAND 
 
 escorted home in the evening. They look up to the fool of a 
 mayor or to some lazy fellow from the university as an author- 
 ity, without understanding that the power of honest work can 
 effect far more than indolent learning." 
 
 "Then there is no good in Hilligenlei! " said Heinke. 
 
 " Well, Heinke, there are still the labourers. There is the 
 most chance of finding good men and true among them. What- 
 ever one may think of details, they at least have a lofty ideal if 
 they would only keep to it, but they don't. They cannot agree 
 among themselves. There is more envy among workmen than 
 in any other class. Yes ; such are the citizens of Hilligenlei 
 a pack of fools and well-meaning sluggards! Good Heavens! 
 Pe Ontjes excuse me, Anna when I was a young fellow 
 of seventeen, although I was only the son of a small farmer, 
 how I strove to find some way of , raising myself! With what 
 eagerness I looked for my little talent and tried to make the 
 most of it when I had found it! And you, Pe, and Pete, how 
 you struggled ! I tell you what, Pe Daniel Peters' time of 
 office will be up in six years, and you must be mayor of Hilli- 
 genlei." 
 
 " I! " said Pe in horror. " I, mayor of Hilligenlei! I, the 
 gooseherd ! No, thank you. I am a fox ! " 
 
 "You a fox!" said Anna mockingly. "A lion, rather!" 
 
 This tone in her voice annoyed him. " I am too stupid for a 
 fox, I suppose! " 
 
 " Come! don't be angry! " said she. 
 
 At that moment Heinke, coming out of the room where she 
 had been sitting by the cradle, observed to Anna that she saw 
 the postman coming. Anna went out and returned with an 
 open letter in her hand, smiling as she read it. " It's from 
 Pete," she said. " He's sending baby its christening robe, and 
 
 no! Just listen to this! Tjark Dusenschon is coming here 
 
 to Hilligenlei. He has bought Dittmar's house and the big 
 shed behind, and no! he is going to start a factory a huge 
 sausage factory, Pete says! " 
 
 " Hullo ! " said Wedderkop. 
 
 "A factory!" said Heinke. 
 
 ' There's nothing surprising in that," said Pe Ontjes 
 calmly. " That's what one would expect from Tjark Dusen-* 
 schon. So he is to be a citizen of Hilligenlei, and a factory- 
 owner! "
 
 HOLYLAND 223 
 
 He leaned back reflectively in his chair. 
 
 Anna said, mockingly, " That will be a fine swindle, I can 
 tell you!" 
 
 "A swindle?" said Wedderkop. "Why a swindle?" 
 
 " Anna Boje is always ready with her judgments," said Pe 
 Ontjes. " Listen! they're at it already! " 
 
 A loud tramping noise, like the approach of an elephant, was 
 heard drawing near. Anna had only just time to push aside 
 the best chair and put a stronger one in its place and remove 
 the white table-cloth, when Jeff Buhmann stood in the door- 
 way, in all his sooty height. 
 
 " Tjark Dusenschon is there," he said, breathing hard and 
 casting his black cap on the ground. " I say no more! He 
 is a millionaire ! Everything is fulfilled ! " 
 
 "What?" cried Wedderkop, staring in astonishment at the 
 apparition. 
 
 " Everything that Rieke foretold how Tjark would make 
 Hilligenlei great. The customs to be removed, the harbour 
 will be regulated, the treasure-ship discovered! Everything! 
 He has been here in his new clothes, and has bought Dittmar's 
 place, and is staying now at Ringerang's, and has been to see 
 his grandmother. I can tell you, Stiena is simply dancing! 
 When he had come out of her house and was half-way up the 
 street, she ran out and shouted, 'Tja-ark! Tja-a-rk! come 
 back to your gran 'ma! ' I have talked with him. Everything 
 that Hule Beiderwand foretold will be fulfilled." 
 
 " Indeed ! " said Pe Ontjes, rising. " And you suppose that 
 if he comes, this factory owner, this Mr. Dusenschon, that 
 I ? I tell you, I will turn him out. I have had enough 
 trouble with the fellow in my youth." And the mighty Pe 
 Ontjes Lau went to his work.
 
 CHAPTER XIX. 
 
 OF course, there were people in Hilligenlei who mockingly 
 recalled the past who said "was not Tjark Dusenschon the 
 illegitimate grandson of that imbecile old woman who lived 
 in the long house and darned other people's stockings? " Was 
 it not Tjark who used to run out in shirt sleeves and slip- 
 pers to beg a supper from the clamfishers? Was it not Tjark, 
 that tall creature who had been clerk to Daniel Peters at a 
 shilling a day, and used to talk in such a curiously stiff fashion ? 
 So they talked, but only before they had seen Tjark Dusen- 
 schon. 
 
 His appearance banished any such thoughts instantb/. 
 There was no use in trying to recall them; they were gone, 
 never to return; such was the impression Mr. Dusenschon 
 produced. He would go his own way, this calm, serious gen- 
 tleman, always clad in the same well-cut suit of dark grey, 
 the broad pocket-lappets set well to the sides. His clean- 
 shaven face was thoughtful as he walked with measured gait, 
 his legs somewhat bent. The former Tjark had had perfectly 
 straight legs; now they were somewhat bent, and there was 
 something wonderfully respectable, something suggestive of 
 solidity, about those bent legs. 
 
 Who was going to mistrust Tjark Dusenschon? Daniel 
 Peters? The first day, after buying Dittmar's great empty 
 shed, he went to Daniel Peters' and met there the two fat old 
 aldermen. He spoke of his hard youth in beautiful, appealing 
 accents, his eyes glistening with coming tears, and, passing 
 rapidly over the three years which he had worked in that 
 house under Daniel Peters, he recounted how he had worked 
 his way up in Hamburg, and then, by speculating in landed 
 property with his modest capital, had acquired a considerable 
 fortune. Looking back now, from the summit of his career, so 
 to speak, on its poor beginning, he had conceived the idea of, 
 if possible, doing some service to his native town an idea 
 
 224
 
 HOLYLAND 225 
 
 in which he was encouraged by the fact that the affairs of 
 Hilligenlei were directed by men who could understand the 
 difficulties of a small town in these hard times. And so he 
 went on to develop his idea of a sausage manufactory. 
 
 Daniel Peters listened respectfully until it came to his own 
 praises. Then he listened no more, but began to stroke his 
 silky moustache and imagine the speech he should make when 
 the town gave their benefactors, himself, and Dusenschon a 
 torchlight procession. The torches shone, and he stood on the 
 steps of the town hall, " Gentlemen, it was a great hour in 
 the history of the good old town when Mr. Dusenschon ap- 
 peared upon its scene, and again a great hour when he entered 
 my office, and I, gifted with a mind able at once to appreciate 
 its greatness. ..." So, elaborating his speech the while, he 
 nodded to what Tjark Dusenschon said about insurance, first 
 and second mortgages, delivery contracts for the navy, etc. 
 
 Who was going to mistrust Tjark Dusenschon? The arti- 
 sans? He gave them employment. Their eyes were dazzled 
 when he drew out his big black pocket-book to make notes. 
 They were mad about him. When he said to Binstien, the 
 bricklayer, " Bring your bill with you to-morrow," or to 
 Sagebock, the carpenter, " Shall I pay yours also ? " they 
 laughed heartily. 
 
 " There's no hurry, Mr. Dusenschon. The money is safe 
 enough with you." And yet their clothes hung very loose upon 
 them, and their wives said, " You should get Dusenschon to 
 pay you. I have to get things on credit from the dealer." 
 But they would let themselves be pauperised. 
 
 Who was going to mistrust Tjark Dusenschon? The well- 
 to-do? In a single quarter he was unanimously elected to the 
 club the first time such a thing had happened. Other people 
 always had some opponents; Tjark Dusenschon had none. 
 He came to the club every evening at the same time, said little, 
 and drank less. When his new motor was put up in the shed 
 he gave a little champagne breakfast, laughing as usual in his 
 quiet, subdued fashion, and himself drinking least of all. His 
 behaviour was marked by such unvarying tact that he kept on 
 good terms even with Judge Drucker, with whom every single 
 member of the club quarrelled at least once a year because he 
 could never forget, all day long, morning till night, even in 
 his pyjamas, that he had been an officer in the militia. And
 
 226 HOLYLAND 
 
 he was, moreover, a man of mild, conservative views, which 
 he was fond of expressing with a reflective nod. " Any one 
 who has had to struggle as I have had to win a modest com- 
 petency and the respect of his fellows is opposed to headlong 
 advance." 
 
 Wild reports about his past spread from house to house. 
 
 Some said he had won half a million in a lottery; others 
 that he showed his Hamburg solicitor how to win an im- 
 mensely important suit; others that the royal family from 
 whom he sprang had pushed him on; others, again, that the 
 daughter of an admiral was in love with him, and had per- 
 suaded her father to give him the contracts for the marine; 
 and this last report, in different forms, gained great accept- 
 ance, and vastly strengthened Tjark Dusenschon's position. 
 
 He certainly was magnificent. For many a man in Hilli- 
 genlei it was the moment of his life when Tjark Dusenschon 
 showed him his motor, or the bacon-chopper, or the bone- 
 breaker, or let him peep into the great sausage-kettle. 
 
 These were fine days for many people. The independent 
 gentlemen living in Faul Street spent the whole summer lean- 
 ing over their garden gates, pipe in mouth, telling each other 
 the latest stories about Tjark Dusenschon. When there was 
 anything really special the introduction of a new machine, 
 or the use of twenty pigs instead of ten then, and on no 
 other occasion, they would tear themselves from their gates 
 to come and speak together. From five in the afternoon the 
 bars were crowded, ringing with talk of the splendid present 
 condition of Hilligenlei, and the possibilities of its future. 
 Nagel, the locksmith, and Sagebock, the carpenter, whom their 
 wives did not usually let out of the house, would pretend that 
 urgent work called them forth, and, sallying out, apron on and 
 tools in hand, would stand talking at street corners, since they 
 had no money to spend on drink. 
 
 At tea-time that's to say, from eight o'clock in the morn- 
 ing and at coffee-time from one o'clock in the afternoon 
 a perfect crowd of old women sat with Rieke Thomson, 
 Stiena Dusenschon in the midst, swaying on her chair to the 
 strains of a wondrous waltz, her bonnet-strings flying; and 
 Rieke said, as she sat in her big armchair and gazed, now into 
 the street, now across the bay, " When he was a little boy 
 a thing only a year old I used to say often he would be
 
 HOLYLAND 227 
 
 something remarkable. The other children that used to play 
 about here Lau and Jans and the Bojes were not to be 
 compared with him." 
 
 No one in Hilligenlei was so busy as Heine Wulk and Jeff 
 Buhmann. Their thoughts had always soared above those of 
 the ordinary Hilligenleier, and now more than ever. Not only 
 did Jeff get hold of a plan of the great slaughter-house at 
 Chicago and lecture Tjark Dusenschon half-round the bay 
 about the increase of his business on the strength of it, point- 
 ing wildly to the sky with the rusty blade of his knife, but he 
 expounded the idea that Tjark should employ some of his 
 wealth and machinery in assisting the slow demolition of the 
 sandbank. " If you put in five hundred you'll get two thou- 
 sand back." And, in the rather shy manner in which he always 
 approached his former friend, he suggested the plan. 
 
 It was received with a smile. Meantime, Heine Wulk 
 wrote a long private letter in his best style to the editor of 
 the geography used in the schools of the district requesting 
 him to insert in the next edition under Hilligenlei the words 
 " noted for its sausage manufactory," and in a flowery leading 
 article referred to the legend that a son of Hilligenlei was 
 " to make of the town a veritable Holyland." 
 
 It can easily be understood that resistance to one who 
 dressed and behaved like Tjark Dusenschon was not easy. 
 There is one, however one who has known him from child- 
 hood who tried once in vain to make an honest man of 
 him one who will resist him ! 
 
 When Tjark Dusenschon appeared, on the second day, on 
 the threshold of Pe Ontjes Lau's warehouse, Pe looked at him 
 questioningly, looked at his great pockets with their lappets, 
 and the serious, clean-shaven face, and, getting up slowly, 
 said, "Take a seat, Tjark I am glad of your success." 
 Then, with an awkward attempt at a jest, " Now you must 
 help me to have the harbour stream laid deeper ! " 
 
 A faint twinkle appeared in Tjark's eyes. ' That is what 
 I came to talk to you about." 
 
 After this he would come once a week towards evening to 
 Pe Ontjes' room and chat pleasantly of this and that, confiding 
 to him that business wasn't going very well yet the whole 
 thing was too small, too provisional. " At present I can't put 
 any more money into it," he said, " because the great part of
 
 228 HOLYLAND 
 
 my capital is invested in a cardboard factory in Berlin, and 
 brings me in very good interest." 
 
 Anna never appeared when Tjark was there. If she hap- 
 pened to be in the office or the warehouse when he came she 
 departed with a silent inclination of the head. In her calm, 
 clear voice she would say, " You and Kai have often told me 
 what he was like as a boy. People do not change." 
 
 Pe Ontjes looked at her a trifle mockingly. " What does 
 Mother Boje say of her children? Proud! proud! Tjark 
 Dusenschon went barefoot as a boy. Anna Boje cannot forget 
 that." 
 
 " Indeed ! " she said, holding her head high and fixing her 
 eyes upon him. "And what do the Bojes say to Kai Jans?" 
 
 "Oh, he's a student!" 
 
 "Really!" she mocked, and then turning, went into the 
 sitting-room and played with her child. 
 
 A few weeks later Pe came into the room where she sat 
 with her child and said, eagerly, " Do you know, dear, the 
 harbour is soon going to be deepened? Dusenschon will see 
 it through. Though he says very little about it, the Govern- 
 ment backs him up somehow or other. It is desirous of help- 
 ing our town, its natural position being so poor, and has there- 
 fore authorized the establishment of his manufactory, and 
 promised to give him army contracts. And, anyhow, I must 
 confess, after watching him pretty carefully, that there is noth- 
 ing of his former character left. The last fifteen years have 
 made a serious man of him." 
 
 Anna's expression was perfectly unmoved. " I have never 
 known a man really converted. You hear it in church every 
 Sunday, ' Whoso is not converted will go to hell,' but I have 
 never met any one who was converted. Some people are said 
 to have become pious and churchgoers, but all their wicked- 
 nesses are there, under the cloak of piety. I have seen men 
 change their coats, but never one change his nature." 
 
 " Good Heavens! " said Pe. " How old are you? Twenty- 
 seven! But you Bojes know everything, and can do every- 
 thing!" 
 
 Her beautiful eyes darkened with anger. The Bojes could 
 not endure any criticism of their family or character. " You're 
 a great, strong man," said she ; " but any one with a quicker 
 mind confuses you at once. I knew that frorp the first, and
 
 HOLYLAND 229 
 
 feared it." She shut the door behind her and remained 
 the rest of the day in the bedroom and kitchen. 
 
 So Tjark Dusenschon was a prince in Hilligenlei. When 
 all the other towns that lie scattered along the wide green 
 outline between Denmark and Hamburg Tondern and 
 Husum, Tonning and Meldorf, Wilster Krempe and Gliick- 
 stadt heard of the fortune 'of Hilligenlei they mocked at 
 first. They were always ready to mock at Hilligenlei for its 
 laziness, and say it would all come to nothing; so they said, 
 "So Hilligenlei, the Holyland, is to be made into sausages!" 
 
 But when they got to know Tjark Dusenschon, and it was 
 explained how he had the Government behind him, their mock- 
 ery was exchanged for green-eyed envy. This year, when a 
 man from Hilligenlei came to any one of these towns, his legs 
 were stiffer, and his shoulders higher, and his voice shriller 
 than ever before, and he laughed in a superior manner at 
 whatever the others said : even the Hamburgers, who are self- 
 satisfied enough. This autumn the Hilligenlei merchants who 
 came to buy in their stock a hundred pounds of currants, or 
 pig-iron, or whatever they wanted were too proud for words, 
 and when they sat in front of the Alster pavilion drinking 
 their coffee their legs stretched half-way down the Biirgerstieg. 
 
 Thus, after mouldering away for hundreds of years, Hilli- 
 genlei at last blossomed forth again. The glorious old legend 
 of the Holyland seemed at last to be gradually fulfilling itself 
 in the guise of Tjark Dusenschon's sausage manufactory. ' 
 
 And all this autumn the children played as their fancy led 
 them in the play-places of the moat, the harbour, or upon 
 the heights. Under the old lime-trees by the school the younger 
 boys ran after the elder, calling out the names of the girls 
 whom they worshipped, and doing everything else in their 
 power to irritate them, till the elders turned round, chased 
 them, burying anyone they caught in the great heaps of dry 
 lime-leaves. 
 
 And gradually a game began in the little gabled house under 
 the chestnuts the old sacred game that only two can play ; 
 a third spoils sport. 
 
 Heinke Boje's year of service was over, and she had come 
 home again. She stood over the cooking by the fire, looked 
 after the two schoolboys in the gabled room, and sat by the 
 window with her knitting or mending. She was a woman
 
 230 HOLYLAND 
 
 now, tall and stately in presence, quiet and gentle in her ways, 
 and missed the wider atmosphere of the rectory and her talks 
 with the good, eccentric clergyman. Looking thoughtfully out 
 over the dark water in the moat she read Kai Jans' letters and 
 wrote to him, then, shaking off her dreams, she would go to 
 her sister and say, " I want to play with baby a little." 
 She took the child into the sitting-room, and, kneeling down 
 to gaze at it, pressed it to her breast and cuddled it tenderly 
 as if she could never look enough at it. 
 
 Then she gave the child back to Anna and went home. On 
 the way home and at her work she became quiet and peaceful 
 again, and had anyone asked her, she would have replied, as 
 she had done two years ago, " I am quite happy." What made 
 her happy was the fact that Kai Jans was her friend, and that 
 unconsciously she cherished a sweet hope. 
 
 So every afternoon about four she sat at the window bend- 
 ing her head under its weight of light-brown hair just as 
 Anna had done. The sixth form boys glanced sideways in at 
 the window as they passed, but she took no notice. 
 
 She was sitting thus by the window one misty afternoon in 
 October, dreaming. Hearing the sound of boyish feet, she 
 looked up, for the bright young faces pleased her. But when 
 she raised her eyes she saw in the midst of the eager herd of 
 boys a strange young man with a bundle of books under his 
 arm; and as the boys looked in at the window and nodded 
 to her as usual, the young teacher, looking up also, saw the 
 proud face beneath the mass of shining hair, and gravely lifted 
 his cap. 
 
 A few days later, as she was going over to see her sister, 
 hatless and in her apron, just as she was, she met the young 
 teacher walking along, deep in thought, as became a scholar, 
 with his eyes on the ground. He was about her own height, 
 and a certain simplicity and goodness in his appearance and 
 bearing pleased her without her being conscious of it. Hear- 
 ing someone coming towards him, he lifted up his eyes, and 
 stood for the moment astounded by the lovely vision before 
 him. Recovering himself instantly, he made her a deep and 
 respectful bow. She looked at him with the calm simplicity 
 natural to her, thinking happily, " What nice, clever eyes he 
 has! and how serious he looks!" 
 
 As she was returning home after playing with Anna's child
 
 HOLYLAND 231 
 
 she met a little second form boy with whom she had one of 
 her somewhat quarrelsome friendships. Catching hold of him 
 by the neck of his coat, she asked how he was getting on and 
 whether he had anything to do with the new teacher. 
 
 "Which do you mean?" he said. "There are two new 
 ones one thin and the other stout; one black and the other 
 fair." 
 
 " I don't know, sir," she said. " I don't ask because I'm 
 interested in the teachers, but in you." 
 
 " They're both good nearly all the young teachers are. 
 The fair-haired one " 
 
 " He isn't fair at all " 
 
 " Well, he isn't dark, either." 
 
 " He has brown hair." 
 
 " That's Mr. Volquardsen. We call him Peter, because he's 
 good-tempered, and I think Peter is his name, really. He only 
 teaches German, history and English. The other day he 
 took three fellows in the fifth into his room and showed them 
 pictures. He's mad about pictures. The other, the black- 
 haired one " 
 
 " What do I care about your teachers? Run away now! " 
 
 In the next few weeks he saw nothing as he passed but the 
 shining plaits of fair hair that lay massed so sleek and neat on 
 her young head. She only saw his fine, silver watch chain, 
 the hand that grasped his books, and his loose-limbed walk. 
 " He's still quite a boy," she thought. " One could not pos- 
 sibly marry anyone like that. Compare him with Kai Jans 
 a real strong man ! " 
 
 So winter passed, and the first mild day of early spring came 
 with soft, cautious feet. All the morning she had felt a curi- 
 ous restlessness; strange thoughts passed through her mind 
 as she sang; she felt a desire to dance or run in the green 
 woods, or walk against the fresh, sunny breeze with Anna's 
 child jumping in her arms. 
 
 In the afternoon, when she had cleared away, she put on 
 her blue dress and a thin black summer jacket, and walked up 
 to the downs, her wonderful joyousness still with her in the 
 lovely sunshine that filled the landscape before her. 
 
 As she reached the heights a funeral passed on the high 
 road between Volkmersdorf and Hilligenlei. In front was the 
 coffin, on a heavy corn-waggon : behind, the seven or eight carts
 
 232 HOLYLAND 
 
 of which Volkmersdorf could boast: in the background the 
 dark line of the distant Holstein woods. As she stood looking 
 down she thought how beautiful it was to grow up in a quiet 
 village, never wandering elsewhere, but spending there the 
 days of an innocent and laborious existence to live and to 
 die there, and at last to be buried on just such a first day of 
 spring in the shadow of the venerable cathedral; and the 
 thought increased her cheerfulness. 
 
 On her way home, just before she came to the town, she 
 met a little girl, who had been wheeling her sister in a barrow, 
 and upset barrow and all in the road. She laughed as she 
 helped the child to put it all to rights again. 
 
 She met no one in the town. Alone in the world, disturbed 
 with the joy of elevated thoughts, she was in touch with the 
 eternal, and in her eyes shone the reflection of this inward 
 light. 
 
 As she turned into the park she met Dete Greve, a little girl 
 of ten years old, who smiled up at her, saying, " You look like 
 Ruth going out to her gleaning in the morning." 
 
 "What makes you think of that, child?" she said. 
 
 " There's a picture of her at school." 
 
 Heinke bent down, and, laying her hands on the little 
 maiden's shoulders, said, " I know nothing about Ruth ; but 
 never mind, there's a kiss for you." She was fond of the child 
 with her pretty, artless ways. 
 
 She had turned under the chestnuts, and was already near 
 home, when the young teacher came towards her. Lost in 
 thought, he did not see her, but just as he passed the house he 
 turned his head cautiously to see whether the fair head was at 
 the window. An expression of half-comic anger crossed his 
 face when he did not see her there, and, like a disappointed 
 hunter, he said, " Bah! " softly to himself, and raised his eyes 
 to find her just in front of him, smiling into his face, the joy- 
 ousness of her soul sparkling in her eyes and radiating from 
 her presence. 
 
 " Oh! " he said confusedly, " there you are! " and, biting his 
 lips and laughing in a rather embarrassed manner, he went on 
 his way. 
 
 As she went about her work his quaint expression and 
 sudden flush rose constantly before her. She felt now that 
 she knew not only his face, but something of his character
 
 HOLYLAND 233 
 
 at least that there was a roguish sense of humour mixed up 
 with his grave seriousness of purpose. And he had her smiling 
 beauty continually before him. 
 
 A week later the mathematical master, a good-tempered 
 but very punctilious man, took his young colleague aside one 
 day in the passage. " You must promise not to laugh at what 
 I am going to say." 
 
 He did so, although with a sinking heart. 
 
 The other continued : "I know that you come from a good 
 and very respectable family. I expect your mother has always 
 looked after her son's clothes and kept them mended herself, 
 whereas now you have had to trust to strangers. Well, for 
 the last fortnight there has been a piece of black lining hang- 
 ing out from the right-hand side of your jacket." 
 
 At first he drew himself up, and said stiffly he would send 
 down the fifth form. That was all he had to say. Then he 
 became angry and abused his landlady. Then he laughed and 
 asked the mathematical master whether he knew of any good 
 lodgings, and he sent him to the headmaster, who mentioned 
 several names, among them that of Mrs. Boje, the teacher's 
 widow, who lived in a little house near the park. " Their 
 gable room has been vacant since autumn: the woman is quiet 
 and cleanly." 
 
 The same evening he spent an hour walking up and down 
 in the dark. Nine times he paced up and down the whole 
 length of the chestnut avenue, deep in thought. He felt that 
 he was about to take a step which would affect the whole 
 course of his life. At last he shook himself and went in; the 
 sound of the bell terrified him, and he looked gloomily into 
 the passage. 
 
 The room door opened, and Heinke stood in the circle of 
 light, thinking, " He is playing some stupid trick." 
 
 She invited him to come in calmly, though with some inward 
 confusion. " Mother is not in," she said. 
 
 He came in and sat down in her mother's comfortable arm- 
 chair, and told her, with recovered spirits and twinkling eyes, 
 the unfortunate incident of his torn coat. She listened with 
 twitching lips and wide-open eyes, thinking, " What a man ! 
 he sits there and talks to me as if we had known each other 
 in pinafores but he's so natural and genuine one can't be 
 angry." She smiled at him. He had come now to ask whether
 
 234 HOLYLAND 
 
 Mrs. Boje would let him the gable room, and look after him 
 a little. That was all he wanted. He would have his meals 
 at a restaurant, and his washing was sent home. She thought, 
 " Of course he shall have the gable room. What a nice, funny 
 man ! To think of his being an M. A. and a teacher." 
 
 " We have only had schoolboys hitherto," she said, " never 
 a teacher. We are very simple in our ways." 
 
 " That suits me exactly," he said, looking round and finally 
 rising to take Pete's photograph from the dresser. After ex- 
 amining it calmly, he said, " There is a very strong likeness. 
 This is your brother Pete. I have heard all about your fam- 
 ily." Looking about him again, he said, " It reminds me very 
 much of my home, all this, except that the room there is about 
 three times as big as this. We have a farm at Liibeck. I like 
 this house very much. The gable is nice, and the shadows of 
 the chestnut leaves play on the wall in the afternoons." 
 
 "And the inhabitants?" said Heinke. 
 
 " Oh," said he, " I shall get on with your mother. I saw 
 her once at the window : that will be easy enough. You don't 
 know how I manage my mother! And you? I sha'n't quarrel 
 with you! " 
 
 " How do you know that? " 
 
 " Well, the other day when I made a face at your window, 
 another girl would have been shocked, or offended, or embar- 
 rassed ; but you did what your healthy mind suggested, exactly 
 the right thing you laughed at me. You're always natural, 
 and find pleasure in natural things." 
 
 " Yes," said she, " especially the stupidest and most trifling 
 things." 
 
 " There you are," he said, enjoying her raillery. 
 
 In the midst of the conversation Mrs. Boje came in, and 
 Heinke went out to get the supper ready. She heard him go 
 out, with a cheerful good-night, shortly afterwards. 
 
 He came next day with his box of books and the unfortunate 
 jacket, and moved into the gable room. He covered the walls 
 with his beloved pictures, and laid a number of grey portfolios 
 of them on the table. And on the third day he made honour- 
 able confession that when Heinke stood at his door in the 
 afternoon with the coffee, she was far, far more beautiful than 
 all the pictures he possessed. She saw that he was not one of 
 those connoisseurs who, in their admiration of an antique
 
 HOLYLAND 235 
 
 portico, forget the child on the threshold, and he rose in her 
 esteem. 
 
 Her mother said, " I am sure he would be just as glad to 
 come down and have his coffee with us." 
 
 " Oh, no," said she decisively, " he is a very peculiar person, 
 and says he can only drink his coffee among his pictures." 
 
 " Nonsense," said the mother. 
 
 " Yes," said she, " that's true, unfortunately. He's always 
 talking nonsense, but it's impossible to be angry with him." 
 
 He drank his coffee quickly, standing the while, while she 
 stood before one or other of his admirable little pictures, ex- 
 cellent reproductions of new and old masterpieces. He would 
 come up to her and explain the beauty of the pictures in well- 
 chosen words, telling her which of them he had seen, and re- 
 calling a trip which he had made as far as Palermo, as a 
 student, two years ago. She felt and understood what he told 
 her about the pictures, and found a wholly new and delight- 
 ful pleasure in it, seldom contradicting what he said. She 
 admired especially Lenbach's portrait of Bismarck, Diirer's 
 Knight with Death and the Devil behind him, Bocklin's por- 
 trait of himself, with Death in the background playing his 
 victim's funeral chant. An Italian princess whom he greatly 
 admired she did not like. " She has got herself up with her 
 coronet and necklace, and is quite good at present, but she 
 will bite very soon ! " 
 
 "Well," said he, "and what about you? One is afraid 
 when one looks at you ; now it's coming, one thinks." 
 
 " What is coming? " 
 
 ' There's something in you I don't know yet. ... I cannot 
 tell," he said thoughtfully. He looked at her with a scruti- 
 nizing gaze, as if she were one of his pictures ; her eyes met his, 
 serious and self-possessed as ever. They puzzled one another. 
 
 Later on he had a portfolio open on the table when she came, 
 and they both leaned over the table and examined it. He did 
 not mind at all whether the figures were nude or draped, and 
 she saw no harm in it either. With a serious and understand- 
 ing joy he showed her the beauties in which his trained eye 
 rejoiced, and she felt her soul expand, her cheeks flush, and her 
 breath come quickly, as she said, " Life is ever so much greater 
 and more beautiful when one can enjoy such things." 
 
 " Yes, indeed," he said. " And Nature most of all ; what
 
 236 HOLYLAND 
 
 joys she has for those who can appreciate her beauty. Some 
 day we must take a long walk alone together, and I will show 
 you everything I see." 
 
 She nodded thoughtfully. " Lovely," she said. 
 
 " We shall have splendid times, alone with you, Heinke." 
 
 "So," she said, "you've got to 'Heinke' already!" 
 
 " Oh," said he, " let me, when we are alone ; it is such a 
 wonderful thing to think that I can call the most beautiful 
 thing in nature by a Christian name! " 
 
 "What is the most beautiful thing?" she laughed. 
 
 "Heinke Boje! " 
 
 " So I imagined." 
 
 They bent once more over the portfolio, and he showed 
 her everything, tracing the pictures with his finger. He called 
 her Heinke, and she him, ' Peter ' or ' Peterkin,' but they 
 laughed every time. Sometimes when they sat together, he 
 would pass his arm through hers and hold her wrist ; sometimes 
 she thought, " He is a bold fellow, he does just what he likes! " 
 but she calmed herself with the thought that everything was 
 possible to a pure and innocent heart. He never forgot him- 
 self. He was always a kind, teasing brother, talking in jest 
 and earnest to a pretty sister. So their intercourse was free 
 and harmless, and she allowed herself to enjoy the good she 
 found in it; certainly she surprised him, often she contradicted 
 him, and it was no good his opening his eyes wide, and getting 
 annoyed and shaking her by the wrist. 
 
 She stayed exactly half an hour with him, then got up and 
 went. 
 
 So the ten weeks to Whitsuntide passed away, and she 
 thought, " My life has become quite rich and bright ; it is 
 lovely, being with him, with him it is always Sunday." 
 
 And to herself she thought " How funny that he does not 
 want to kiss me! He is only a boy, after all, and I ought not 
 to have such thoughts. If it were Kai Jans! He would treat 
 Heinke Boje rather differently! "
 
 CHAPTER XX. 
 
 ABOUT Whitsuntide an unwholesome breeze blew over the 
 land, and many people fell sick. It filled the coffins in the 
 little town of Hilligenlei, and one of them stood in the blue- 
 walled room in the long houses where Kai Jans had lived as 
 a schoolboy, and in it his mother. 
 
 She had not complained of much pain, but grew weaker and 
 weaker, and when she lay down on the sixth day she knew 
 that death was drawing near. While Thomas Jans ran to 
 fetch a dram from the chemist in the hope of its giving relief, 
 she commissioned Heinke to ask him to give her love to the 
 children ; she did not want her husband to know that the end 
 was already drawing near, and she felt she might not have the 
 strength left to say what she wanted later. So she told Heinke 
 also, that she wanted a certain old woman to wash her ; no one 
 else was to be present, not even her husband ; and if, at the time 
 of her death, the child of the new tenants of the long house were 
 asleep, it was to be wakened, so that no harm could come to it. 
 
 About midnight, feeling very weak, she said to her husband 
 in a low voice, " I have always had a difficult temper, and that 
 has made it hard for all of you, but I could not help it. Now 
 I don't know whether God will have any place for me." 
 
 Then, for the first time Thomas Jans realised that his wife 
 was leaving him, and he began to weep bitterly. When she 
 began to sink, and gradually to pass away to rest, she managed, 
 in a slow, difficult voice, to speak a few words about her son. 
 
 " He has no joy in the world. But don't be sad about it, 
 father; it's better than laughing a great deal . . . only I wish 
 he were near release from it, as I am now." 
 
 These were her last words. Immediately after they were 
 uttered the heavenly messenger bore away her soul on his broad 
 pinions. 
 
 Two days afterwards Heinke Boje went to meet Kai Jans 
 at the station, and told him about his mother's death. He
 
 238 HOLYLAND 
 
 walked in silence by her side, and she looked up at him shyly. 
 There was more dignity in his presence than of old, his gait 
 was less hurried, and his eyes were full of deep seriousness. 
 She realised that now he was a man; realised also that his 
 thoughts were far away. It was a year and a half since she 
 had seen him last. 
 
 When he turned from the open coffin to the window, his 
 father having gone into the kitchen to see about some supper 
 for him, she went timidly to his side, and said, " Does it grieve 
 you very much to have lost your mother? " 
 
 He shook his head. " No," he said, in a calm, expression- 
 less voice; "she was nearly seventy and had known anxiety 
 and hard work, but happiness also, and her death was happy. 
 Why should I be sad? She reached the end in peace; who 
 knows whether we shall do as much, Heinke? I often thought 
 while she lived, that some great misfortune might one day 
 come upon her, but now she is secure. If I am a little sad in 
 spite of it all, it is because she did not live to have any satisfac- 
 tion in her son." 
 
 " We did not understand everything that she said at the 
 last," said Heinke, " but we could see that she had confidence 
 in you. And all who know you have that, Kai, all of us. You 
 do not go along the level road like other people, but through 
 the thickets and over the pathless downs: but at the last you 
 will find, or make for yourself, a high and beautiful path." 
 
 "Ah," he said, stroking her hand, "dear little preacher! 
 You always help and comfort me." 
 
 He stayed three days, till after his mother's funeral, and 
 another day afterwards: and spent the last two in the gable 
 room in the little house under the chestnuts. It was just be- 
 fore Whitsunday, and Peter Volquardsen had gone home to 
 East Holstein. 
 
 On his return from the funeral he went up into his room, 
 and she soon came in with his coffee. Buried deep in thought 
 he did not notice her entrance, then, when 1 she called him 
 softly by his name he roused himself and said, looking up at 
 her, " You look even prouder than you used ! . . . Heinke, 
 your letters have been a great pleasure to me, especially in the 
 last three months ; they are full of colour, and intelligence, and 
 thought; the children's play place has grown to a wide coun- 
 try."
 
 HOLYLAND 239 
 
 A faint wave of pleasure mantled in her cheek. " You 
 helped me so much when you told me to trust my own nature ; 
 and the dear people of Hindorf helped me too. I have to 
 thank you for all that." 
 
 A sensation of burning love made her eyes dark and misty; 
 she would have said more, but she saw that he was already 
 occupied with other thoughts. 
 
 After a time he looked around the room and said, " The 
 man who lodges here seems to be a person of refinement." 
 
 She told him that he was a nice young fellow, very well 
 educated, and how they talked together evey day. 
 
 He looked at some of the pictures, and said, " I am very 
 fond of art in every form, but men interest me far more." 
 
 " Yes," she said, " you are like that. ... I am different," 
 she went on thoughtfully, " I am not much interested in strange 
 people, but I find great joy in nature and in art." 
 
 He looked at her thoughtfully. " And yet we are such good 
 friends." 
 
 " Just because we are so different, Kai. Man seeks his 
 opposite." 
 
 He did not listen, but said half to himself, " My own tem- 
 perament and my hard youth have made me difficult that's 
 what it is." 
 
 After a while she began again. 
 
 " How old are you now? " 
 
 ' Thirty-one," he said. 
 
 " Thirty-one," she repeated slowly, then hesitatingly added, 
 " I am going to be twenty-two." 
 
 " Yes," said he, " you could marry now." 
 
 She regarded him with the frank, open gaze that was pecul- 
 iar to her and her sister. " Watch now, my eyes ; here is a 
 man's soul bared before you," she seemed to think. 
 
 But he said no more. 
 
 A vague melancholy settled down upon her. ..." Now I 
 know, ... I shall never be his wife, . . . what then? . . . 
 All your thoughts are in Berlin," she said softly. 
 
 The word was like a call to arms. He woke up, and said 
 in a voice full of life and animation, 
 
 " You cannot imagine what a stir and confusion there is 
 nowadays, not only in Berlin, but all over the country. Think 
 of the extraordinary economic transformation that has taken
 
 240 HOLYLAND 
 
 place within the last thirty years! People are pouring from 
 the eastern Elbe districts over to Berlin, Hamburg and West- 
 phalia. Thousands of men, taking wives and children with 
 them, are leaving their homes beneath the open sky, where the 
 wind blows free across the wide green fields, because they are 
 miserable, oppressed and landless, and crowding into Berlin. 
 And the way they live there! If they look out of the win- 
 dows they see instead of the green chestnuts and shining water, 
 the miserable grey walls of other houses with their blank star- 
 ing windows. They played as children in the meadows and the 
 woods: their children play in slums, where the sun can never 
 penetrate. You may think from that how dreary and confused 
 their minds are; with what sort of feelings they regard the 
 landlords, for whom they have purchased, with the sweat of 
 their brow, the wide woods and meadows that were once their 
 homes: or the Church which sees them driven forth without 
 doing or saying anything to help them: or the rich, lead- 
 ing their vain, peacock existence, a few streets away from 
 them. 
 
 " The great economic change was followed hard by a most 
 tremendous religious upheaval. Scientific investigation has 
 undermined the very basis of the two great creeds. Now they 
 are mere lay figures decked out and propped up to look as if 
 they were alive; the great majority of the people know that 
 they are dead, and trouble no more about them. Men have 
 no religion now, and that robs them of happiness and peace 
 and leaves them hopeless, joyless and dejected, without any aim 
 or purpose in their lives. 
 
 " In every department of life, of custom, of morality, the 
 same vague search and questioning is going on. It is the same 
 in art, in education, in law, in society: everywhere the same. 
 . . . Every hundred years there comes a period of restlessness, 
 a fever rages, a fever that brings its own cure. The old cor- 
 ruptions will be cleansed from the fevered blood, and instead 
 there will come new blood, fresh and living. 
 
 " Once more our nation is convulsed by the need of a renas- 
 cence of the three great powers, to which itself gave birth, Au- 
 thority, Religion, Custom ; once more it is rent by the longing 
 to return to nature, to the beauty of religion, of social justice, 
 and a simple and genuine ideal of life. 
 
 " And Heinke, the renascence has begun already, new
 
 HOLYLAND 241 
 
 forces are already at work, thousands feel themselves already 
 in sight of the Holyland. There is such a searching of the Bible, 
 such a movement in the Government, such a waving of the 
 standards of labour, such new life in art and education! But 
 it is as yet an incoherent stirring and striving; disturbed every 
 now and then by the agonising dread that, after all, we may 
 fail to find the new road, and the new and lovely land of the 
 future, and, abandoning the search, remain imprisoned in our 
 own dead formulas. If that were to happen there would be an 
 end of us and of our future. 
 
 " Listen ; from my childish days the world about me has 
 seemed to me strange and incomprehensible. Wind and sea 
 I could understand, meadow and wood ; but there was much 
 that I failed to comprehend when I came to human institu- 
 tions, and the circumstances of human life. I carried about 
 with me a vision of another world, a humanity holy and free 
 from sin, and this made me reserved and isolated as a boy; 
 only sometimes I forgot, I laid bare my hidden soul and ex- 
 pressed my wonderment. Then people laughed, Heinke; ever 
 since I was a child I have seen mocking faces round me, as I 
 do still. Two or three only, Pe and Anna, and you, and my 
 friend in Berlin, did not laugh, and they helped me when I 
 was lonely and forsaken. 
 
 " I have felt sometimes in these last two years as if I were 
 working my way through the confused darkness to the light. 
 I begin to feel some faint self-confidence : to believe that perhaps 
 I, who have been so derided, may have been right after all; 
 that the great Dispenser has given me no barren gift, and that 
 in my strangeness is something that may bear good fruit, in 
 that to see the world with the eyes of a child is to see it more 
 clearly and more naturally. And so, following in the path in 
 which this new belief directs me, penetrating deeper into the 
 nature of things, reflecting on this confusion, this longing for 
 something beyond, I am resolved to show my people how life 
 seems to me who look at it with eyes that know the dykes, and 
 know the far-off seas ; to show them what seems to me evil, 
 because it is unnatural, senseless, out of date and dead, and 
 the way in which it seems to me good may be made to come 
 out of it. I should like to write a book on the German Re- 
 nascence." 
 
 " Oh, do it," she said eagerly, " it will give you pleasure.
 
 242 HOLYLAND 
 
 You brood too much; speak out your message, write it, un- 
 burden your full heart and you will be happy." / 
 
 The brilliancy of his eyes and the beauty of his serious face 
 made her marvel. His spirits had soon sunk again. 
 
 " Yes," he said, " but if they, seeing as I do the immense 
 complexity and confusion of things, and not knowing where to 
 begin, fail to find the root of the evil, then the old doubt comes 
 back what is the use of undertaking such a monstrous task? 
 Men will shrink from your harsh judgments, and refuse to 
 contemplate such drastic reformation. Is it likely that you, 
 from the Hilligenlei dyke, can see further than so many great 
 men of learning and authority? Leave reform to them! 
 
 " The idea of my name being in people's mouths terrifies 
 me. It is so hard to lay bare one's soul, and then stand by 
 while others mock at it." 
 
 Doubt and depression overcame him once more, like a man 
 who knows that even against his will he must do something 
 which is bound to bring suffering upon him. 
 
 On the evening of Whitsunday he went away again. He 
 asked her to look in upon his father from time to time and 
 greet his friends from him. 
 
 " We seldom see or hear from Pete," she said, " he is ab- 
 sorbed in his work, and has no time for us; he is bent on get- 
 ting on, and being made senior inspector, and thinks of nothing 
 else. I don't know," she continued thoughtfully, " whether 
 such a life is right or not, whether one gets the best out of life 
 so." 
 
 He made no reply. 
 
 On the way to the station, passing by the Immenhof, they 
 saw Tjark Dusenschon below, making his leisurely way to his 
 shed. " He doesn't think as you do," she went on. 
 
 He answered sadly, " And yet I have had no thoughts for my 
 old friends; hardly even for my mother, always for other 
 things." 
 
 At the station he pressed her hand hard. " Well, Heinke, 
 our friendship stands fast. If you are ever in any trouble send 
 for me, and I will do the same. Wish me a good journey and 
 a good year. Perhaps we may find a piece of Hilligenlei, 
 Heinke. I hope so." 
 
 These were his parting words.
 
 CHAPTER XXI. 
 
 THIS same Whitsun-eve, as Heinke came home, and dreanv- 
 ing still, began to take off her best jacket in the hall, she heard 
 a step she knew in the gable room. Her jacket still half on, 
 she listened in bewilderment. Then the door opened above, 
 and he cried gaily, " Here I am." 
 
 "What has brought you back so soon?" she replied, quite 
 dumbfounded. 
 
 " I have quarrelled with the old people," he said, sitting on 
 the top of the stairs. " They said finally, ' Get off to Hilli- 
 genlei again.' " 
 
 Her jacket still half on she stood there, and detecting a lie, 
 demanded an answer on " his word of honour." 
 
 He stuck to it that his parents had turned him out. " You 
 see, I was melancholy and dull, and they said, ' We don't want 
 such a visitor; go back to where you came from.' So I man- 
 aged just to get here in time for coffee." 
 
 She laughed. "You are talking utter nonsense! Be quiet 
 and I will bring the coffee." 
 
 She took off her jacket, and singing softly though she 
 had no idea of a tune got the coffee ready and brought it 
 up to him. And as she sat once more with him and his pic- 
 tures, the old sense of happy contentment came over her once 
 more, and she thought, " Kai Jans is a hero, the best of men, 
 a dear, splendid fellow, but he is cold and always in such 
 deadly earnest. If I were to live with him I should get 
 afraid and long to be released ; I should never be able to laugh, 
 I should always be thinking, ' What has he got in his head 
 now?' Our children would make me anxious till I should 
 know how far they were like him. . . . But the other is sweet 
 and serious, gay and thoughtful all in a breath, like a fresh 
 windy day in spring; he is just right for a grave serious person 
 like me." 
 
 243
 
 244 HOLYLAND 
 
 She began to laugh and tease him; they called each other by 
 Christian names again. 
 
 " If you don't behave better," she said, " you will be turned 
 out here too ! " 
 
 Then they arranged to take a walk together early next morn- 
 ing, the first day of Whitsuntide. " I have to be back by ten," 
 she said, " to cook the dinner." 
 
 " It doesn't matter where or how far we go; we'll stop 
 wherever we see a nice place, and be home by ten." 
 
 In the joy of planning, he took hold of her arm as usual, 
 and laid his hand on hers, and she, rejoicing in the precious 
 marks of friendship, turned her hand over so that he could 
 hold it properly, and said, " I am so glad you are back, Pe- 
 terkin." 
 
 He seized her hand and shook it quickly, as if to seal the 
 fair friendship. " It is lovely being with you." 
 
 She dropped her eyes. " You are so good to me," she said, 
 taking up a picture, only to lay it down again immediately 
 and say, without looking up, " I must spend all the evening 
 doing things in the house, so that my being away in the morn- 
 ing may not give mother anything to do. I must go now." 
 
 After working hard she went to bed, where she lay awake, 
 her thoughts busy with Kai Jans. " No," she thought, " fond 
 as I am of him, I do not want him for my husband ; he is too 
 serious, too restless, too strange altogether." But then, when 
 she thought that to-morrow the other would perhaps kiss her, 
 and it would be all over with the secret hope she had treasured 
 so long, that Kai Jans would one day make her his wife, she 
 threw herself on her side and wept bitterly. For an hour she 
 lay in misery, weeping and wrestling with her thoughts. The 
 other was dear and splendid, and she loved him very, very 
 dearly; but he was a boy, not a true man. She thought she 
 should never find happiness. 
 
 Before the morning grey appeared she rose, dressed rapidly, 
 and went softly upstairs to wake him. As she knocked he 
 threw open the door and said, " Wait a minute, dear. I am 
 just ready." It did not seem to trouble him in the least that 
 he was in his shirt-sleeves. She stayed on the threshold, watch- 
 ing with a smile how he, ordinarily so calm and orderly in his 
 movements, rushed restlessly about the room looking for one 
 thing after another.
 
 HOLYLAND 245 
 
 They went downstairs softly, not to wake her mother, and 
 so out. 
 
 It was still quite dark, the air quite still. The houses by the 
 park stood there silent, asleep. In front of them the tall chest- 
 nuts, clad in their green mantles, bearing aloft their white 
 candles, stood still to let the two young people pass by, in si- 
 lence, side by side, their eyes on the ground the man stepping 
 out calmly as if to meet a fair day and life of joyous activity, 
 the girl, womanlike, rather more thoughtful. Behind them 
 came the first breath of morning, stirring in the chestnut tops. 
 
 When they had left the town behind them and were walk- 
 ing in the impenetrable grey shadow of the thorn-edges on 
 either side of the way, he took her hand and swung it back- 
 wards and forwards, whistling as he went. When that became 
 monotonous he put his arm through hers, and they walked so, 
 he like a younger brother by his sister's side. 
 
 " How long have we known each other? " said he. " I feel 
 as if I had known you seven years at least." 
 
 " Even more, I think! " 
 
 " Look! let's go up this little path. It doesn't matter where 
 we go, does it? " 
 
 " Not in the least." 
 
 They went along the dark, narrow path in complete silence. 
 In front of them a little bird began to sing. After two or 
 three timid notes he was still again. 
 
 " Heinke! " he said, in a strangled voice, " say something! " 
 
 "What shall I say?" 
 
 " Something nice! I have said so many nice things to you; 
 dear Heinke, do." 
 
 " You're ten times as clever as I am, Peterkin. You have 
 told me so often. If you know anything, say it." 
 
 '* There is something I want to say, but I don't know how 
 to begin, and I don't know whether you want to hear it." 
 
 So they went on again, side by side, in silence, each full of 
 restless, fearful longing. From the heights the morning breeze 
 blew fresh towards them. At the summit, near the path, there 
 lay in the midst of the dusky meadow a mighty barrow. 
 
 " Look ! " said he. " From that barrow we could look east 
 and see the whole country before us. Shall we go up there and 
 wait for the sun ? Look ! there is a ray of light over by Volk- 
 mersdorf already."
 
 246 HOLYLAND 
 
 " I had rather go on and on for ever," said she. 
 
 " No! " said he. " Let us go up and wait for the sunrise 
 and look! you shall see him, suddenly, in all his glory 
 please, let me bind your eyes." 
 
 She did not want him to, and snatched the handkerchief out 
 of his hand, sorry to think that the joy of their being together 
 was to come to nothing but a stupid joke. He was only afraid 
 of her keen eyes. He implored her with such a serious air and 
 so charmingly that she had to give way, and he bandaged her 
 eyes and led her by the hand. 
 
 " My feet are getting wet through," she said ; " the grass is 
 so long and wet." 
 
 " Oh ! don't think of that ! " he said softly. 
 
 " What a curious voice you've got, Peterkin." 
 
 "That's no trifle!" said he. 
 
 "What is no trifle?" 
 
 " You should see what I see ! We have come too early. 
 This field still belongs to the dark night." 
 
 " Oh, my feet are wet through." 
 
 " Oh, Heinke Boje," said he softly, " don't talk of your feet, 
 but take care that you don't let your soul get cold." 
 
 " What a curious voice you've got, Peterkin." 
 
 "You should see what I see! To the right and to the left 
 of the old pagan barrow there stand stout men in ancient 
 brown tunics, and shoes of hide on their feet." 
 
 " Go on. I am not afraid. They are my ancestors. The 
 race I spring from has lived here for ages." 
 
 " One of them is coming near," he said softly, " a nice- 
 looking young fellow. Heinke, do you know, I think I 
 think he wants to kiss you, Heinke! " 
 
 She stood still and said, breathing hard, " Let him, if he is 
 young and good-looking." She felt a hand on her hair and 
 fresh lips on her mouth. 
 
 " We ought to have waited till it was daylight. Heinke, I 
 reproach myself for having let a stranger kiss you ! " 
 
 They went on in silence. When they reached the summit 
 he put his arm round her. ' There's another coming! " he 
 said softly. " Heinke, what am I to do? Am I to knock him 
 down, or let him kiss you ? " 
 
 " Is he well made? " she said, laughing softly. 
 
 " Rather slight, but strong enough."
 
 HOLYLAND 247 
 
 "Still rather boyish?" 
 
 " Oh, dear no! a proper man! " 
 
 " What kind of face has he ? still rather boyish ? " 
 
 " Oh, dear no! a splendid, manly face! " 
 
 " Then he may kiss me." Again she felt the quick, shy lips 
 on her mouth. 
 
 " Is it nice ? " he said softly ; his voice seemed choked. 
 
 " I am grieved, Peterkin," she said in a low, sorrowful tone, 
 " that you allow strangers to kiss me." 
 
 He caught her in his arms and, pressing his head against 
 her shoulders, said, " Heinke! Heinke! I love you so! " 
 
 Then she took off the bandage from her eyes. They let 
 each other go, and gazed in silence over the meadows to the 
 narrow line of wood in the distance with the bank of dark-blue 
 cloud behind, on which the still invisible sun had laid down his 
 weapons his long shining sword and longer spear. They lay 
 glistening in supernatural splendour on the dark blue of the 
 clouds, and as the sun began to rise the rim of his golden shield 
 appeared, and soon he stood above the wood in all his might, 
 light blazing forth from him, shining orange through the blue 
 mists up to the arch of heaven, and beneath, the wide land 
 sleeping in holy peace. 
 
 They stood still, looking across, then, still silent, went back 
 to the path, and, leaving the heights behind them, came down 
 to a wide green field bathed in the morning sunlight. They 
 went on in dreamy silence, avoiding each other's eyes, he gently 
 humming to himself, till after a good quarter of an hour's 
 walking they reached a little mound that stood up in the midst 
 of the low, green plain. 
 
 Hundreds of years ago, when the green plain had been a 
 bit of sea-fen, a log hut belonging to the lord had been built 
 by this mound, as a terror to the peasants round. After a fierce 
 struggle they had stormed and destroyed it by fire, and now 
 there was no trace of the fortress, only the soft green turf and 
 the young oak-trees standing round the mound, while fresh 
 spring flowers grew in the depression at one side that marked 
 the former site. 
 
 They sat down on the grassy slope in the sunshine. 
 
 Heinke Boje clasped her knee with her hand and gazed, with- 
 out moving, over the green field across to the low heights from 
 which they had come and the square-built tower of Hilligenlei
 
 248 HOLYLAND 
 
 just visible beyond. Peter Volquardsen plucked all the flowers 
 within his reach as he sat, and threw them into her lap, looking 
 questioningly into her face each time he did so. She did not 
 stir. This lasted some time. 
 
 Then, thinking that the silence had lasted long enough, she 
 took up one of the blossoms, as if still lost in thought, and, 
 pressing it against her mouth, looked up into the expanse of sky 
 around them and said, " Is my mouth quite yellow? " 
 
 " Quite yellow! " he said. 
 
 "Does it matter?" said she, throwing herself down full 
 length on the grass and shutting her eyes. 
 
 Then he plucked up his courage, and, creeping up, kissed 
 her. 
 
 At first she thought, " I will stay lying here." Then love 
 overcame her, and, opening her eyes, she put both hands on his 
 head with a gesture of exquisite tenderness. 
 
 And now their eyes met in a long gaze. 
 
 " How beautiful you are," he said, quite shaken. 
 
 " I cannot look at you enough," said she. 
 
 " Lie quite still, and don't say anything." 
 
 " Dear one! how dear you are! " 
 
 So they lay for a long time, gazing their fill, and kissing from 
 time to time with a shy and almost solemn rapture. 
 
 Then they rose and went home, hand in hand, dumb for the 
 most part, but now, as they went, they looked at each other 
 silently, and held each other's hands. And when they returned 
 to the lane he took her in his arms and kissed her. Her cheeks 
 were pink and her dark-grey eyes gleamed. 
 
 " You are a man, after all," she said, laughing happily. 
 " Don't be angry ; I have really known it all the time." 
 
 " Well, now you must let me go; people will pass." 
 
 They decided as they went on their way to keep their secret 
 until autumn, so that they could be together as before; they 
 would only confide in her mother and his parents. 
 
 When they reached the house she came with him to the 
 stairs. As he stood on the step she gave him her hand and said 
 with a deep seriousness of word and gesture, " Do you love 
 me, now? " 
 
 He replied only " Yes dear ! " but in his eyes there burned 
 such true love that she turned away, overcome with thrilling 
 happiness. Their hands were loth to separate.
 
 HOLYLAND 249 
 
 Then she went into the kitchen and thought as she got ready 
 the lunch, " If I had only told her as I came in," and hoped 
 that her mother might come in. It was so nice and dark in 
 the kitchen. But she did not. " He is troubled, too," she 
 thought; " he is writing to his parents." 
 
 At last she had to go in and lay the table. Her mother was 
 knitting winter stockings for Hett, and did not look up. She 
 might at least inquire how the walk had gone off. She began 
 to lay the table more noisily. 
 
 Her mother looked up. " What are you doing, child 
 you are laying three places! Who is coming?" 
 
 " Oh! " said she, " he begged so he wants to have lunch 
 with us to-day." 
 
 "Indeed! Have you got something special for him?" 
 
 "Oh! he won't mind about that. He he wants to have 
 meals with me always ! " 
 
 " Child ! " 
 
 " Yes, mother ! We he said to me Mother, why are 
 
 you crying 
 
 " Let me cry, childie. I don't know why." 
 
 " We sha'n't be married for a long time two years at least. 
 I want it so, too." 
 
 "Do his parents know?" 
 
 " No, they don't know, but they suspect. They have nothing 
 against it." 
 
 " Is it all right for him to stay on here, then? " 
 
 " Till autumn, at least. And, mother, I want no one to 
 know not even Anna ; and I want you to let me go up to 
 him every day, as I have done, for half an hour. We are 
 sensible people, and we know how to behave. I can't bear it 
 otherwise." 
 
 And so she brought him up his coffee as of old. But now 
 it was a different matter quite a different matter. The cof- 
 fee stood untouched and the pictures unregarded. Each found 
 the other more beautiful than any picture. 
 
 He sat at his desk and bent down to her as she knelt before 
 him, stroking her hair and kissing her, and saying again and 
 again how he loved her. She looked up to him with her clear 
 eyes and listened. Then he lifted her up, and she sat upon his 
 knee, and as she sat there she let him feel the beauty of her
 
 50 HOLYLAND 
 
 youthful body, and gainsaid him not, only saying softly, " You 
 must be good." 
 
 He joyed in the beauty and intelligence of the woman he 
 had won, and teased her, saying, " You and your sister you 
 are really such proud, magnificent girls; no one dares approach 
 you. Even the mighty Lau trembled in all his limbs when he 
 was wooing her yes, it's true; he told me himself. But I 
 playing with you! I, a mere boy! Peterkin, you are a 
 boy!"' 
 
 She threw herself on him. " You're no boy. You are my 
 darling husband." 
 
 This summer she troubled about nothing. 
 
 Tjark Dusenschon's fortunes seemed at their zenith. He 
 purchased the piece of land behind the sheds, and got estimates 
 submitted to him for the cost of construction of a huge factory. 
 Anna complained that Pe Ontjes was being more and more 
 drawn into the sphere of Dusenschon's activity, as he main- 
 tained that he knew for certain that the deepening of the har- 
 bour stream would be undertaken in three years at latest. 
 Anna's face grew dark and silent. 
 
 " Pe lets himself be talked over," she said, " and that is bad 
 for our future and our child's, but it's worst of all for me." 
 
 " How do you mean? " 
 
 Anna looked straight in front of her with a fixed stare. 
 " Because I cannot respect him any longer." 
 
 Kai Jans wrote from Berlin to say that he had actually begun 
 to work on his book, but was prevented from obtaining any 
 wide or happy outlook by all the individual misery that was 
 continually forced upon his notice. He should never accom- 
 plish anything. He did not know what would become of him. 
 At times he felt inclined to go with his friend to South Africa. 
 Perhaps, after years of travel in distant, sunny lands he might 
 return composed and mature. 
 
 She took the letter up into the gable room and showed it 
 to him as she had all the other letters. " Poor, dear man! " 
 she said, her eyes filling with tears. " He has always been so 
 good to me since I was quite a child. I owe him so much. 
 And now he has no joy in life, and I cannot help him! " 
 
 " Have you written to him that you are engaged? " 
 
 She shook her head. " No! I had rather tell him. I don't
 
 HOLYLAND 251 
 
 know how he will take it. Before yes, since I was quite a 
 child I have often secretly thought that I should be his wife 
 some day. Dear, good man! If he could only find someone 
 to love, that might help him; but oh! she would have to be a 
 wonderful person clever and beautiful and good." 
 
 " Don't be sad about it, anyhow. It will all come right in 
 the end. Come here, Heinke. Be good to me! " 
 
 In July Anna's little boy was not very well, and so Mrs. 
 Boje spent some evenings away, sitting by the child's bedside. 
 Then the two had their meals together in the gable room. 
 They sat opposite to one another at a square table, and he said, 
 " My wife," and pretended there was a child sitting at each 
 side of the table. She laughed and scolded him, and then sat 
 again on his knee and let him do as he would. 
 
 One such evening he unfastened her hair and sat for a long 
 while gazing at her in blissful admiration. Then, taking hold 
 of her with both arms and with earnest impassioned eyes and 
 a constrained voice, said, " Heinke, it is not right for us two 
 to wait another year before we marry." 
 
 She looked at him with troubled eyes. "No, Peterkin; I 
 think so too; it isn't good." 
 
 " If you can be ever so careful, and don't mind living 
 quietly and simply with me, we might have the wedding at the 
 New Year." 
 
 She played with his watch chain, her eyes cast down. " Oh ! 
 I should love it ! Darling, I am old enough I am twenty- 
 two. It's all your fault, Peterkin. I was such a quiet, simple 
 girl." 
 
 And so they agreed to have the wedding at the beginning of 
 the New Year. 
 
 They became more calm, talked of how they should manage 
 about their little outfit, and agreed on the names of the first 
 two children. 
 
 In these three summer months Heinke Boje became a woman, 
 and forgot Kai Jans.
 
 CHAPTER XXII. 
 
 ONE day, about this time, Pe Ontjes came to his wife as she 
 was dressing her child, now quite well again, and said, 
 
 " Do you know, dear, I shall have to take shares in Dusen- 
 schon's new building scheme ; it's going to be a great affair." 
 
 She let the child go and looked at him in amazement. " Oh, 
 Pe Ontjes," she said, "don't. I am ready to approve of every- 
 thing you do yourself, however dangerous it seems to me, but 
 don't do business with this man ! " 
 
 Her obstinacy began to annoy Pe Ontjes. " Our businesses 
 are very closely connected. Our customers are the same people. 
 They come first to me and then to him. If his business grows 
 mine must grow." 
 
 She shook her head in gloomy determination. "If you do 
 it, it is all over with us." 
 
 "With us?" said he. "How do you mean? With our 
 oread?" 
 
 "Yes," said she; "and " 
 
 "And what?" said he. 
 
 She pressed her lips together, and her sombre thoughts 
 clouded her eyes. " It is over with my belief in you. Dusen- 
 schon is a bad man." 
 
 " You're the only person in Hilligenlei who says so." 
 
 " That is not true. Old Thomas Jans does not trust him, 
 nor does Tor Straten, the painter, nor Clausen, the carpenter. 
 And there are other people of sense. Even if I am the only 
 one, I am sure he is a bad man. I don't follow the crowd." 
 
 " All you Bojes have one great failing," said he, " your 
 hearts are cold." 
 
 She clasped her hands and cried in wretched pain, " Pe! 
 I cold! to strangers, perhaps; but to you and my child? I 
 cold ! " She caught up the child and covered it with burn- 
 ing kisses, tears starting to her eyes. 
 
 He went into his writing-room. After a while she followed 
 
 252
 
 HOLYLAND 253 
 
 him and said in a restrained voice, " Pe, dear, you are a lion : 
 you must not go with the fox that's an old proverb." 
 
 He was no longer accessible to argument. " What is the 
 risk? We can separate any day we like." 
 
 Her scorn blazed up anew. " I cannot have you in Dusen- 
 schon's train, and that's what it will mean. You're there 
 already." 
 
 He laughed mockingly. 
 
 " I want my great, strong husband to be strong and inde- 
 pendent, or else I am ashamed. I have been ashamed for a long 
 time now, and I will not be ashamed." She stamped with her 
 foot, and cried with tears, " I will not be ashamed. I cannot 
 live if I am." 
 
 " Go and be ashamed, then," he said drily. 
 
 Her face grew deadly pale, and she said, turning away, 
 "Oh! is this Hilligenlei ! " Turning on the threshold she 
 said with a kind of fearful self-restraint, " On the day when 
 you become Dusenschon's partner I shall take my child to 
 mother's, and work at the machine. I love you beyond all 
 reason and sanity, and therefore I will have you honour me." 
 
 She was gone. Three dark weeks came and went. They 
 exchanged not a word. She spent her time in her bedroom, 
 sitting for hours on the edge of her bed in anguish of mind. 
 He spent the day in his writing-room or the shed, the night in 
 a little bed in the attic, unable to sleep because of his uneasy 
 conscience, which kept him brooding over the idea that her 
 judgment of Dusenschon was the true one, but that now he 
 could not draw back for fear of laying himself open to her 
 scorn. At times the fear that he had started on a false and 
 dangerous road made him groan aloud. At times he felt a pas- 
 sionate longing for her. " Good Heavens! " he thought, " how 
 glorious she looked when she spoke of friendship, how pathetic 
 when she wept." In torturing indecision he thought, " What 
 am I to do? I can neither do one thing nor the other." And 
 he began to be cynical and suspicious of everyone. His 
 peaceful soul seemed to have fallen into a pit of disease and 
 discontent. 
 
 During the second week Tjark Dusenschon went to Berlin, 
 taking the mayor and Suhlsen, the fat alderman, to see the 
 cardboard factory. A few days later mayor and alderman 
 returned to the club, their faces flushed with wine, and de-
 
 254 HOLYLAND 
 
 scribed the imposing buildings and flourishing trade they had 
 seen. Tjark Dusenschon had remained in Berlin for a food 
 exhibition, and to entertain a company of soldiers on a feast 
 of his own manufactures, raw ham and sausages. 
 
 On the Friday, Heine Wulk announced in the newspaper, 
 " According to a dispatch we have just received, our distin- 
 guished fellow-citizen, Mr. Dusenschon, has received a recog- 
 nition of the excellence of his goods in the form of a laurel 
 wreath. Such a success will undoubtedly encourage Mr. 
 Dusenschon to proceed to the projected extension of his busi- 
 ness here, in which the town will not be slow to meet him. 
 We are also authorised to disclose that Mr. Dusenschon is 
 returning to Hilligenlei by the evening train on Saturday." 
 
 As a matter of fact, Saturday saw Tjark Dusenschon's re- 
 turn. The mayor, Alderman Suhlsen, and some members of 
 the club were at the station. Heine Wulk and Jeff Buhmann 
 stood in the background regarding Tjark Dusenschon, with 
 the laurel wreath on his arm, with beaming faces. Outside, 
 as he went down the steps, he was received by a band of men 
 belonging to the Artisans' Musical Society, collected by Birn- 
 baum, the publican, who greeted him with " Know'st Thou 
 the Land." They had decided on this as being the only song, 
 with the exception of " See the Conquering Hero," which made 
 any mention of laurel wreaths. A weak " Hurrah! " came from 
 some hundred people standing in the shadow of the trees. The 
 folk of Hilligenlei had had little experience of public demon- 
 strations. Tjark Dusenschon passed through their midst with 
 grave and careworn face, and they said to one another, " You 
 can see he has something to think about now that is no 
 trifle." 
 
 Pe Ontjes' bitterness extended to Tjark Dusenschon. The 
 laurel wreath seemed to him ridiculous under any circum- 
 stances, and especially for a sausage manufacturer. 
 
 It was in this temper that he was standing before his door 
 on Sunday morning, when old Suhlsen came lumbering along 
 and stopped to give a long-winded account of Dusenschon's 
 journey. To cut the long story short, Pe Ontjes asked, " What 
 does Heine Wulk mean by saying ' The town must meet Du- 
 senschon ' ? " 
 
 The old, beer-sodden busybody came nearer, and explained, 
 " Although Mr. Dusenschon possessed enough capital of his
 
 HOLYLAND 255 
 
 own to cover the cost of building and the installation of ma- 
 chinery, it would take a year and a day to realise that capital 
 for present use. The magistracy was therefore going to pro- 
 pose to hand over ten thousand pounds from the Town Savings 
 Bank, and retain as equivalent shares of equal value in the 
 cardboard factory. We, the mayor and I, have examined the 
 factory, and are acquainted with its position. It is a huge, 
 two-story building with a vast chimney, and three houses at- 
 tached in which the hands live. Everything is in the best 
 condition and full working order. It has not been entered on 
 'Change, but its soundness is guaranteed by the excellent con- 
 dition of the factory and the assurance of a recognized Berlin 
 firm, to say nothing of the fact that the personality of Mr. 
 Dusenschon, his energy and ability are of immeasurable value." 
 
 The last sentence, a creation of the mayor's, had been passed 
 round the club and rammed down the throat of every stranger 
 for the last three months; but its brilliance could not illumine 
 the darkness of Pe Ontjes' soul. 
 
 " It is against the statutes of the Savings Bank," he said. 
 
 " Against the letter of the law," said Suhlsen. " But sup- 
 pose we were to refuse, Mr. Lau? what then? You know 
 that the government is backing up Mr. Dusenschon, and, it is 
 said, a certain neighbourhood has made him a very favourable 
 offer." 
 
 The old man went on his way, and Pe Ontjes, turning back 
 into the office, sat down on the edge of his desk and lost him- 
 self in thought. " Yesterday the laurel wreath, to-day ten 
 thousand pounds ! " He felt the curious sensation of suddenly 
 in a foreign land hearing the sound of an old familiar voice ; and 
 as he listened how it happened he did not know but he was 
 going to school with Tjark Dusenschon. There was a clatter- 
 ing of slippers, the sponge that hung by the blackboard bobbed 
 up and down as they passed, the school door opened, and there 
 they sat, side by side, in rows, with Tjark at the bottom of 
 the first bench, and he heard Max Wieber saying, " Tjark 
 Dusenschon's eyes are good, and so are his words; but what 
 he does is always a surprise, and not a pleasant one." 
 
 Then they were sitting in the half-dark smithy, Buhmann 
 roaring out his words of wisdom, Scheinhold, by the bellows, 
 waiting for an opportunity of putting in a word, Kai Jans, 
 with eyes like saucers, and his hands on his knees, and Tjark
 
 256 HOLYLAND 
 
 his eyes and words were all laurel wreaths, laurel wreaths. 
 And then, yes ! 'ien, " You might give me a few halfpence. 
 Grandmother aiu. I have nothing to eat to-night." And next 
 would come a sr'prise an unpleasant one the appearance 
 of Tjark Dusen.:Jion in some new blue tie, or old, red, sixth 
 form cap. Yes ; that's how it had been all the time. 
 
 Pe Ontjes was still sitting there, sunk in deep reflection, all 
 his thoughts busy with the days of his childhood, when the 
 door opened, and Tjark Dusenschon stood there. Pe looked 
 up, his thoughts still in his boyhood, his eyes still those he had 
 had as a boy. " You rascal ! what have you done with the 
 
 money 
 
 Tjark Dusenschon saw the look, and understood it. His 
 eyes wandered. " What do you mean? " 
 
 ' That company business is no good," said Pe Ontjes, strik- 
 ing the table with the palm of his hand. 
 
 Dusenschon went out with some indifferent remark. 
 
 The big man of the Gude Wife sat down heavily on his 
 chair and relapsed into his brooding. Childish days were van- 
 ished. He listened. Now, it seemed, another sound must 
 come the clear ring of a soft, woman's voice. But it did 
 not come. The door of the living-room opened, and she 
 walked along the passage with her firm, light step, humming 
 to herself. 
 
 He nodded. " So ! she sees that Dusenschon has gone off 
 double quick, and now she is singing the song of victory, im- 
 agining that she is much cleverer than I am, much more capa- 
 ble, and Heaven knows what! One must be stronger than 
 Anna Boje, or there is no existing with her at all." 
 
 She rose before his mind's eye in all the glory of her beauty, 
 and roused such a transport of love in him that he groaned 
 aloud. 
 
 Leaping to his feet, he began to ponder deeply to wonder 
 whether he were a complete man one who could stand alone, 
 quite alone a man who saw, decided, acted for himself, on 
 his own judgment. Brooding profoundly, he gradually sepa- 
 rated himself from Hilligenlei and everything in it the 
 mayor, the club, the citizens and, standing alone on the 
 dyke, saw the old town with Tjark Dusenschon for its king, 
 and sleepy or idle men for its leaders, and for the first time he 
 felt love and fear for it. "Hilligenlei!" he said slowly and
 
 HOLYLAND 257 
 
 softly. " If Tjark Dusenschon is a swine 4 L^, and brings Hilli- 
 genlei into disrepute before the country, I will know how it 
 stands with Dusenschon! I will know t^-day, and then 
 then, when I know she shall do penance on her dear knees, 
 with laughter and kisses." 
 
 While he was still ordering his thoughts in the light of the 
 new certainty which had come to him, old Thomas Jans came 
 along in his grey, mud-bespattered working clothes, his spade 
 over his shoulder, and his tin canteen in his hand, and looked 
 in at the window with his deep-set eyes. 
 
 Pe Ontjes threw up the window, and the old man told him 
 he had received a letter from Kai, with which he was not at 
 all satisfied. " I have thought a great deal about it, and 
 I think I can scrape the money together. I am going to risk 
 the journey to Berlin. He has often asked me. Tell me, do 
 you know how to get there and what it costs? " 
 
 " I will tell you that in two words," said Pe. " It's six 
 o'clock now. You must be at the station at eight sharp in 
 your Sunday clothes with your blue cap and your pipe. I will 
 go with you. If anyone asks you, say I am only going as far 
 as Hamburg with you." 
 
 "Are you in your senses?" said the old man in an injured 
 tone. " Do you suppose I can make up my mind to such a 
 step in two hours, and get ready, too? It's impossible before 
 to-morrow midday." 
 
 " You must be at the station by eight sharp. Now be 
 off." 
 
 The old man stamped off, shaking his head as he went. A 
 little further on he fell into a slow trot. Pe Ontjes went 
 into the shed and arranged some matters in the office. Then, 
 it being time to start, he went upstairs, put on his seaman's 
 clothes, and went down into the sitting-room. 
 
 Anna and Heinke were sitting there with the child at their 
 feet. Anna looked up at him curiously with eager, expectant 
 eyes. He pretended not to see. " I am going to Berlin this 
 evening," he said. 
 
 " Oh! " cried Heinke, " to Berlin? Do go and see Kai. I 
 have had such a depressed letter from him. The misery he 
 sees there seems to be breaking his heart." 
 
 " What are you going to Berlin for? " said Anna. " Has it 
 to do with Tjark Dusenschon ? "
 
 258 HOLYLAND 
 
 " Say that I have only gone to Hamburg. Look after the 
 house." He went out. 
 
 Anna jumped up and ran after him just as he was about to 
 shut the front door behind him. With shining eyes she stepped 
 up to him. " Haven't you a single word for me? " 
 
 " No! " He looked at her with cold scorn. " Not one! " 
 
 She turned and went silently back into the room. 
 
 Next day, at midday, they slipped out of the train in Ber- 
 lin. 
 
 The passage of time had somewhat shrivelled up Thomas 
 Jans. He pushed his blue Sunday cap well over his head, his 
 keen eyes looking out under the brim. He thanked the guard 
 for their good journey, and then, puffing hard at his pipe, 
 trotted behind Pe Ontjes. After resting for a space at their 
 hotel, they walked down Frederick Street together. Then Pe 
 Ontjes wanted to send the old man to Well Street to see Kai, 
 but he, after a thoughtful glance at all the people and convey- 
 ances, and the tall houses around him, said, " I won't risk it; 
 I will stay with you." 
 
 So they went down Frederick Street together Pe Ontjes' 
 tall figure in front, the little old man behind him, stopping 
 every now and then, and then running on again. " Life is 
 rather more rapid here than on the lightship in the Hilligenlei 
 bay, but my wife's idea of Berlin was certainly quite wrong. 
 She thought it was all silks and satins, but I see shabbier boots 
 and stockings than you would find anywhere in Hilligenlei." 
 
 At Potsdam Station they took a train which carried them 
 out of the surge of humanity, away from the high walls, 
 through a barren tract of open country, depositing them, after 
 an hour's journey, near a little village. They went up to the 
 station-master and asked him about the cardboard factory. 
 
 "Cardboard factory?" said he, "I don't know. I haven't 
 been here very long." He called to a porter. " Oh, yes," 
 said he, "yes; there, behind that wood." He said more, but, 
 being from the eastern provinces, they could not understand 
 it. 
 
 They marched ahead through the greyish sand. Pe Ontjes 
 straining his eyes for the chimney and a big, two-storied build- 
 ing with rows of windows. He walked steadily on, the old 
 man puffing at his pipe comfortably as he followed him, his
 
 HOLYLAND 259 
 
 eyes taking in everything around him. They reached the top 
 of the hill, but saw nothing save a withered wood of pines 
 and fir-trees. 
 
 " I must sit down for a bit," said the old man, seating him- 
 self on a kind of wall that ran along the side of the road to 
 re-light his pipe. Pe Ontjes climbed up on to the wall, and 
 stretched out his neck and sniffed the air like a greyhound. 
 
 " Can you see anything? " said the old man pleasantly. 
 
 " Don't knock over the wall," said Pe angrily. The old 
 man sat smoking like a small furnace. After a time he asked 
 again, " Can you see anything? " 
 
 Pe Ontjes, who was still standing on the wall, suddenly 
 gave such a mighty lurch that it collapsed, and he came down 
 with it. Looking down at his feet in amazement, he saw that 
 the so-called wall was a mere mass of lime and broken pieces 
 of stone put together anyhow. " Hullo! " he said. 
 
 " Look there ! " said the old man, tracing out the course 
 of the wall with his pipe. " Look! it's a sort of square, be- 
 hind the pines, do you see ? I see it all now " 
 
 " Huh ! " said Pe Ontjes scornfully. 
 
 The old man smoked in silence for a time, and then went 
 on, "I tell you what you know, if a workman who has 
 lived in Hilligenlei for forty years wants to borrow five pounds 
 for the education of his child or any other useful purpose, he 
 could go from one end of the place to the other without get- 
 ting a penny. But let the first rascally windbag come along 
 and say he has half a million buried in the sand in Berlin, and 
 you are ready to give him Hilligenlei itself, and its honour 
 into the bargain." 
 
 Pe Ontjes stood whistling, rehearsing in his mind a series 
 of conversations with Tjark Dusenschon, the mayor, Anna 
 Boje, and Pe Ontjes Lau. 
 
 " How long are we going to sit here? " 
 
 At this moment Pe saw a man coming through the wood. 
 " Was there ever a cardboard factory here, my man ? " he 
 said, raising his voice. 
 
 " No ! " said the man ; " but there is, perhaps, going to be 
 one." 
 
 "Tell me!" Pe went on. "Do you know Tjark Dusen- 
 schon? He's got a figure like a guard and a head like a 
 smooth, round turnip which he resembles in other respects."
 
 26o HOLYLAND 
 
 " No! " said the man, in some surprise. " I have never seen 
 such a man in my life." 
 
 They returned to the station, and there sat for three hours 
 in sun and wind on a real wall. The old man smoked, and 
 quoted all sorts of curious parallels the giant Goliath who 
 was somewhat slow of understanding; Eli; and Absolom, who 
 hung by his hair. Pe Ontjes listened, and sometimes even 
 laughed, thinking of the glorious peace he would make with 
 Anna Boje. 
 
 It was late in the afternoon before they again found them- 
 selves in the midst of the city, and Pe Ontjes stopped before 
 a huge building. 
 
 "Will you wait here a few minutes?" he said to the old 
 man. " This is the Board of Works. I just want to enquire 
 as to what steps are being taken about the harbour channel, 
 and things in general in Hilligenlei." 
 
 He was led into a room, where, to his considerable surprise, 
 he found a friendly, grey-haired man from his own district, 
 who dismissed him finally with a thoughtful nod after putting 
 all sorts of questions. 
 
 The old man was still exactly where he had left him, his 
 cold pipe held tightly in his hand as if it were, among so much 
 that was strange and new, the only thing he knew, gazing 
 earnestly at the stream that flowed past him as he stood close 
 to the wall. 
 
 Their spirits sank as they left Frederick Street and turned 
 off into the dreary, straight streets of the north-eastern 
 quarter. 
 
 " Just look! " said the old man. " In Hilligenlei, when one 
 stands on the dyke one can see land and sand over the sea as 
 far as England, and the vastness of the sky above is almost 
 frightening. But here, if one turns round what does one see? 
 A man who lives in one of these great quarries must have a 
 dead weight on his heart or an iron yoke on his neck." 
 ' On turning into the street in which Kai Jans lodged they 
 found crowds of men standing in groups of various sizes and 
 talking eagerly to one another at the doors of the houses. 
 Undersized young men were streaming, conversing the while, 
 into the public-houses at the bottom of the street. Here and 
 there women leant out of the windows, and pale-faced chil- 
 dren standing on the door-steps followed the conversation of
 
 HOLYLAND 261 
 
 their elders with an unchildish understanding in their serious 
 eyes. In the distance the gleaming helmets of the police were 
 visible. 
 
 The old man stopped a young workman who was walking 
 along with his eyes upon the ground to ask him why all these 
 people were not at work, but the man, not comprehending the 
 dialect, looked up at Pe Ontjes, who repeated the question. 
 He then related in his peculiar German that he and the others 
 were boiler-makers, and now on strike. 
 
 " Why are you striking? " 
 
 " To put it shortly, because the master won't allow us to 
 have our own beliefs. He won't have us admit that we belong 
 to the labour party." 
 
 The old man's eyes twinkled. " He imagines, then, that his 
 word will keep off the great time which will and must come ! " 
 Lifting his forefinger, he said quaintly, " The living garment 
 of God changes! " 
 
 The workman smiled. "That's Goethe!" 
 
 " Come! " said Pe Ontjes, " let us get on." 
 
 They found the number, and climbed up three flights of 
 dark, narrow, dirty steps. 
 
 " Have we got to climb further? " said the old man. " Do 
 you hear that noise upstairs all those voices?" 
 
 "There's something wrong! " said Pe Ontjes, still climbing 
 slowly up. On the landing the doors stood open right and 
 left. From the rooms to the left came the sound of weeping 
 and female voices. In front of the opposite door there stood 
 a middle-aged workman, holding back his wife with one arm, 
 saying, " Why do you want to see such a miserable sight ? 
 You won't be able to sleep for three nights after it." 
 
 " What has happened ? " said Pe Ontjes. 
 
 " An old woman lives here whose son was a bad lot and 
 died in penal servitude. She brought up his two children, her 
 grandsons, who are now about fifteen and seventeen. Well, 
 the old grandmother, a very good, honest sort of woman, 
 saw that the two lads were going to follow in their father's 
 footsteps. They were apprenticed to our smithy. Well, the 
 last few days they have been out of work. They got drunk, 
 and played wicked pranks with a little girl, and then went 
 and boasted of it to their grandmother. That was more than 
 the old soul could endure. She is a good, honest woman from
 
 262 HOLYLAND 
 
 the country, where such things don't happen. She only left 
 the country eight or ten years ago. Anyhow, this afternoon, 
 when the two lads waked up from their debauch and asked 
 for coffee, she gave them a good dose of rat-poison in it. 
 They're both lying dead now. The police will be here di- 
 rectly." 
 
 He went in at the opposite door, and, saying to the women 
 who were crowded in the dark little passage, " Make way! " 
 led them into the room. 
 
 There, near the table, on the floor of the wretched room, 
 in the half-darkness, lay the two boys, their bodies, clad in 
 miserable rags, convulsed in the last agony of death, their 
 faces livid, their lips still flecked with foam. By the window 
 sat the old grandmother, her thin frame bent by toil in the 
 fields. She was cleanly dressed, and as she smoothed down 
 her apron with her emaciated hands she said in a strangely 
 calm and monotonous voice, like that of a clerk reading for 
 the tenth time an uninteresting protocol, " Their father lived 
 to be forty, and fifteen of those years he spent behind iron bars. 
 His evil deeds brought misery upon seventy people, his evil 
 words upon seven thousand. They would have done the same. 
 Where is the police? I am a God-fearing old woman, and I 
 know what I am doing." 
 
 Lifting up her head, she saw the ten or twelve people who 
 were pressing in at the door, and said, as if to herself, " I am 
 not afraid of anyone except Kai Jans." 
 
 Pe Ontjes Lau turned round and asked the man behind him, 
 " What has Jans to do with it? " 
 
 The man took them both to his door, and said, " Some time 
 ago a certain Kai Jans lived for two years with us, and for 
 the last year he has lived with us again. In between he was 
 a parson in his home, but found no peace there. He is the 
 sort of man, don't you know, for whom every day is Christ- 
 mas Eve; but people and things always spoil it for him. He 
 thought there ought to be much more happiness in the world, 
 if only things could be put right. He came here to try and 
 find the meaning of things. But he hasn't been able to find 
 it. The first time he was here, as a student, he used to sit 
 with us in the evenings, help the children with their lessons, 
 and argue with me about religion and politics. He was al- 
 ways gay and friendly. Of course, he was only a boy then,
 
 HOLYLAND 263 
 
 and his eyes seemed to see everything for the first time. Since 
 he came back again he hardly talks at all himself, but sits 
 there asking questions and brooding. He asks the children 
 about their thoughts and plans us grown-ups about our faith 
 and politics the old people, most of whom came from the 
 country, how the landlords treated them, what their faith was 
 then, what they thought of the Church, and how they feel 
 now, and so on. 
 
 " I have never known a man who could make other people 
 talk so, and say so little himself. Generally, he is melancholy 
 and broods. Sometimes, when he is talking with the children, 
 he becomes merry for a moment, only to become suddenly 
 serious again. 
 
 " One evening, not very long ago, he had got five or six chil- 
 dren in his room. The door was open. He told them how 
 a village boy wakes up before sunrise and helps his father to 
 take out the cart, and as they cross the heath they see the sun 
 rising behind the wood ; and they pass through villages, and 
 then through a little town, and see one thing and another, re- 
 turning by a different way. The Hoy then goes to a school 
 where boys and girls, big and small, sit together, and in the 
 afternoon he goes down to the shore with his companions. 
 They see distant sails far out to sea, and hunt for clams and 
 molluscs. In the evening they sit in front of the house-doors, 
 and before they go to bed a great thunderstorm rolls by, rum- 
 bling like a huge waggon. We could hear him telling the 
 children all this from the kitchen, and at the end he asked, 
 'Well, what do you think? Wasn't that a lovely day?' 
 The children laughed and said, ' Do you suppose we be- 
 lieve what you've told us? It's a fairy tale, of course! ' He 
 left his room and came to us in the kitchen in despair, saying, 
 ' Do you see, your children call the ordinary life of a village 
 child a fairy tale poor little wretches!' His voice went 
 right through us. I can see him saying it now. . . . Did you 
 say you knew him ? Oh ! " the man cried out all of a sudden. 
 "I can see mother! come here; this is Kai Jans' father! 
 . . . Come into his room, please." 
 
 On the way he said, " He has known the two boys upstairs, 
 they who are dead, for six years, and he said often to the old 
 woman, ' Don't lose heart, grandmamma! The boys will turn 
 out all right!' She did lose heart, and, I think she was
 
 264 HOLYLAND 
 
 right. But it will break his heart when he comes. Here! 
 this is his room." 
 
 He led them past his weeping wife and his children, who 
 stood shyly by the kitchen door, into the room. It was a clean 
 little place, looking out on to the gloomy court below. They 
 looked round, and then, being fatigued, were about to sit down 
 when they heard several people running upstairs, and the 
 sound of dreadful words rang out. Pe Ontjes ran to the 
 door. 
 
 " Kai Jans! " he cried, " come here! " There was no reply. 
 
 Going upstairs they found him at the door crying, 
 "Grandmamma! what have you done? Oh! dear old grand- 
 mamma! now you are a murderess! " 
 
 The old woman sat still by the window, stroking her apron 
 with the same composed mien. She said with perfect calm, 
 
 " It is done now, Kai Jans. This is a much surer way than 
 your endless ' Wait, grandmamma, it will come right ! ' They 
 would have been perpetually in and out of trouble, and I 
 should not have been able to save them. This was the end." 
 
 He knelt beside the children and stroked their hair. " Men 
 are to blame they who gave no land to your father and 
 your grandfather else you might have been honest farmers. 
 They do not even grant you a place to stand in ; they lift you, 
 four stories up from Mother Earth, and there they leave you. 
 And the man who does not live on the soil, the man who has 
 no land, is utterly lost." He sobbed aloud. " We have noth- 
 ing, nothing no unity, no trust, no home, no faith, no love, 
 no hope. We are shaken this way and that like corn in a 
 sieve. What is wrong with the world? I cannot find my 
 way in it." 
 
 A strong hand was laid on his shoulder. " Come with us! " 
 said Pe Ontjes in a loud voice. 
 
 Kai Jans stumbled to his feet as if called by an angel of the 
 Lord and reached out his right hand, still bent from the night 
 by Cape Horn. " Pe Ontjes!" he cried; "dear Pe Ontjes! 
 Oh, father, is that you? You see you see how it is with 
 me." 
 
 They drew him out into the passage. There a little dark 
 man came up to him, his head drooping a little to one side, 
 and stepped aside with him. " Excuse me," he said in a friendly 
 manner. " I am a relation of your friend "
 
 HOLYLAND 265 
 
 "Ah, yes; I know you," said Kai, pulling himself together. 
 " We met once at my friend's house. I remember. We talked 
 about religion. You are a Catholic." 
 
 " Yes," replied the other. " I am to inform you that he 
 expects you to spend several years with him. He is starting 
 for South Africa in the autumn." He briefly informed him 
 of the object and duration of the journey. Then, with a cer- 
 tain embarrassment, he went on : "I cannot help seeing that 
 you are deeply depressed. May I say something? I assume 
 that our mutual friend has informed you that I come of an 
 orthodox family. My mother comes from a noble family of 
 orthodox Protestants; my father was an orthodox Catholic, 
 and I have followed him." 
 
 "Yes," said Kai, "what do you want to say to me?" 
 
 " Your friend, my cousin, has often talked to me of you and 
 your brooding, and yesterday he showed me your last letter. 
 So when he commissioned me to find you here I conceived 
 a burning desire to say to you, ' Cease your brooding; let it 
 be ; it will never bring you to the goal.' " 
 
 Kai Jans listened unwillingly. 
 
 " I implore you," said the stranger, catching hold of Kai's 
 arm with a movement of kindly anxiety. " When I was a 
 young man I am now fifty I suffered from doubts and 
 brooding, but I gave it up. It was no use. I pushed it from 
 me with both hands. I said to myself, ' I won't brood, I 
 won't inquire, I will believe the belief and teaching of Mother 
 Church.' And," his voice softened and trembled, " since I 
 formed that resolution I have had the power at any time to 
 step out of the cruelty, the coldness, the sinfulness of life into 
 the quiet peace of the holy sanctuary of the grace of God and 
 the Saints." 
 
 "And now?" said Kai Jans. 
 
 " I implore you to believe that I have no desire to make 
 you a Catholic. My mother was a Protestant, and happy in 
 her faith. All I beg of you is to nestle in the faith of your 
 Church as a chicken under the hen. Believe in redemption by 
 His blood. And yet the bosom of my Church is the most sure 
 haven of peace and rest." 
 
 Kai Jans shook his head and said in a strangled voice, " You 
 are right. There is no difference between the Catholic and the 
 Protestant dogmas. Each is the desert of worn-out doctrine.
 
 266 HOLYLAND 
 
 To accept may bring happiness, but it is the happiness of a 
 king who has given away his crown and feels happy in his 
 night-cap, or of a soldier who has cast away his cockade and 
 feels at home in a marauding band. Speaking for myself, I do 
 not want such happiness. I will look into the eyes of the 
 Eternal Powers and all their terrors, even if I go mad in doing 
 it. There is no good in our talking to one another." 
 
 He departed sadly. The workman, whom they had met in 
 the street and who had directed them, now entered the room, 
 and, taking hold of Kai Jans, said, " You have seen all our 
 misery. Now go and revenge the dead, and the children sit- 
 ting in the dark courtyards instead of playing! Who was that 
 pious sneak? Kai Jans, come and join us! " 
 
 Kai Jans shook his head despairingly. " How gladly I 
 would if I could! But I can't! You are just as narrow and 
 unjust as all the other parties. No man can serve a party and 
 keep his soul free." 
 
 The young workman looked at him angrily. " You can do 
 nothing without a party, you know that." 
 
 " That is not true," said Kai Jans hotly. " Those who have 
 effected the most have belonged to no party. Their sense of 
 justice prevented it." 
 
 " If you join us you would have ground to stand on and 
 a field to work in, and your father would rejoice." 
 
 "No, no! not thus will I win my ground, my field; that 
 were no Holyland. I cannot accept any orthodoxy, either 
 political or religious. I cannot. Don't be angry with me." 
 
 "Come!" said Pe Ontjes stiffly. "Make an end of this 
 and come with us." 
 
 " Go, then," said the workman good-humouredly, giving him 
 his hand. "One cannot do what 'the heart does not desire. 
 But do not forget us." He, too, departed. 
 
 Kai Jans put together the things he wanted to take with 
 him, and, after paying his landlord, followed the other two, 
 leaving his host standing sorrowfully at the door. 
 
 Work hours were over when they left the north-east, and 
 the streets were crowded w r ith thousands of workmen, women, 
 children, and vehicles an army that now seemed to be try- 
 ing to get back into its ordered ranks, and now wandered this 
 way and that without aim or purpose. The throng was held 
 in and cramped by the high, steep walls that rose up on either
 
 HOLYLAND 267 
 
 side. Far in the distant west the glow of evening burned in 
 the wide sky above. Kai Jans said sadly when he saw his 
 father stop to gaze at the stream of human life before him, 
 " There are not a hundred men in all these thousands who 
 know the real meaning of life. Look at the red in the sky! 
 How far we are from God and Nature! how far, therefore, 
 from happiness ! " 
 
 They retraced their steps down to the station, where they 
 had some refreshment and sat in deep depression of spirit. 
 When they came out again it was night. 
 
 Half an hour later they were speeding through the night on 
 their way to Hamburg. The old man sat in the corner with 
 his pipe, as if crushed by some mighty power. Gradually the 
 hand which held the pipe dropped on his knee, and his drowsy 
 head sank on his breast. Pe Ontjes lay stretched full length 
 on the seat, righting in his sleep against Tjark Dusenschon 
 and the Hilligenlei authorities, without minding, in the stress 
 of his rage, that Anna looked at him with laughing eyes and 
 shook his body from side to side. 
 
 Kai Jans sat staring in front of him, his mind painfully re- 
 tracing the events of the last few weeks and the shocks they 
 had brought, re-living the vain broodings, the fruitless search 
 that had occupied his soul since childhood, declaring at last, 
 
 " All is over. It is all without meaning or purpose. What 
 is there to do? Go out of the world, or drag on this dreary 
 tedium of existence? Neither the one nor the other was pos- 
 sible. What then? There is a third alternative. One can 
 go mad, mad, mad yes, go mad! that was it! Get out of 
 the train at Hamburg and tell all the people in the station 
 and in the streets, ' Children of men, why do you run about 
 in this restless way? Why are your faces so careworn? Why 
 are your children so pale and downcast? Why don't they go 
 and play in the woods? Why do the young toil and moil in- 
 stead of wearing flowers in their hair? Why do you live, so 
 many of you, in hideous darkness? Why do you have huge 
 prisons, huge asylums? What is the matter? Are you mad? 
 Don't you know that round Hamburg there is a whole world 
 of holiness and joy? Look about you! Open your eyes! 
 Don't you see all around you is Holyland ? ' ' 
 
 For an hour his mind travelled painfully on the brink of the
 
 268 HOLYLAND 
 
 awful abyss, drunk and disordered by the bitter draughts of 
 misery, till merciful nature gave him the relief of deep sleep. 
 
 In his sleep he saw a vision of peace. A great bird, white- 
 winged, as large as a heron, came flying towards him with a 
 gentle motion of his vast wings, and said, " Seat yourself upon 
 me, and I will show you something that will make you re- 
 joice." As soon as he had taken his seat he felt a sense of 
 freedom and joyous expectancy. They flew over land and sea 
 so swiftly that they seemed merely to traverse meadows and 
 ponds, till they came to a high range of wooded mountains, 
 and there, upon the summit, they halted. Then his companion 
 said to him, " Do you see? " As he raised his eyes he beheld 
 a wide and wooded land swelling gently here and there, across 
 which the fresh breeze blew like the breath of God. At the 
 fringe of the woods were big, sunny houses, standing in gar- 
 dens, in which people were at work, tall and strong, with 
 purity shining in their eyes and peaceful thought enshrined 
 upon their brows. And as he looked down with a sense of ex- 
 quisite contentment, he heard a voice at his ear, and, turning 
 round, saw the eccentric old sailor with whom he had once, 
 sixteen years ago, spent three days on shore near Vancouver; 
 and, behold! this was the land he had seen then! "Look!" 
 said the old sailor, " it is given to you once to behold the 
 Holyland because you have brooded over it so passionately." 
 With these words the vision vanished. 
 
 He never saw it again, waking or dreaming, but for the few 
 years he was still to live it was a secret source of strength.
 
 CHAPTER XXIII. 
 
 IT was evening the moon had just risen when they 
 arrived at Hilligenlei Station. Clausen, the contractor, Tor- 
 straten, the painter, and a couple of healthy-minded young 
 tradesmen who had held aloof from the society of the club, 
 came up to Pe Ontjes and asked where he had been. Like 
 Pe, they had hitherto troubled their heads very little about 
 the town and its management, absorbed in their business and 
 their families ; but since yesterday their suspicions had been 
 aroused. Pe Ontjes related what he had seen. 
 
 "That's it! " they said. " He suspected that you were on 
 his tracks, and got hold of the ten thousand yesterday!" 
 
 "Where is he?" said Pe Ontjes. 
 
 " He's in the club, if he hasn't made off already." 
 
 " I am going to the club," said Pe Ontjes quickly. " You 
 look for him elsewhere." He looked up and down the street. 
 " We must get more people to look for him. Where can we 
 find them?" 
 
 Some people, women and children among them, ran up the 
 street towards the harbour. " What is up? " said Kai Jans. 
 
 " Yes; what can it be? " said the others. " Before, we saw 
 some people running as if mad down to the harbour." 
 
 Nagel, the smith, ran past, and they called out to him, 
 "Hallo! master! whither away?" 
 
 He turned round as he ran, and, crying " Don't you know? " 
 said something about Dusenschon which they did not catch 
 and ran on. At his heels came a big boy, shoes in hand, who 
 tried to slip past them in his stocking feet; but Pe Ontjes 
 caught him by the scruff of his neck and said, " What is up, 
 boy?" 
 
 Wrenching himself free, he cried out, " Dusenschon has had 
 the treasure-ship dug up from the sandbank they have found 
 a million already! " 
 
 "Good heavens! " cried Pe Ontjes. " Do you hear that?" 
 
 269
 
 270 HOLYLAND 
 
 Roaring and shouting came from the door of the public- 
 house. The names " mayor " and " Dusenschon " rang out 
 loudly; hurrahs resounded. People kept darting out of the 
 little gabled houses, house doors banged, women shouted and 
 ran up and down. Hagel, the lame shoemaker, came past on 
 his chair calling out " A million ! " as he drove on. An old 
 woman, who had lost all her children, came out of her home, 
 fastening her big, blue-checked apron as she went. " Oh ! if 
 only my children were here ! We shall all be rich now ! " 
 
 At the end of the harbour street they found Stiena Dusen- 
 schon standing, preening and pirouetting, under Rieke Thom- 
 son's window, smiling to herself. She was over seventy now. 
 " Have you heard ? " she cried in a loud chant. 
 
 " Poor mother! " said Kai Jans. 
 
 Rieke put her big head out of the window and, recognising 
 them, said scornfully, " Well, Pe Ontjes, well, Kai Jans, do 
 you believe now that Tjark Dusenschon will bring the Holy- 
 land to pass? I have always said he would." 
 
 " You have always been right," said Pe. " Where is Tjark 
 Dusenschon? We have another laurel wreath for him." 
 
 " He's mocking at us ! " cried Rieke in shrill excitement. 
 " You two will never come to anything, never." 
 
 As they went along the streets and through the market-place 
 people came streaming out of the taverns discussing with 
 drunken voices whether they should go to the sandbank. Some 
 determined to go to the club and salute Dusenschon. 
 
 " Come! " said Pe Ontjes. 
 
 " Oh, let me go home," said Kai. " I had rather not come 
 to the club. I have looked up to all these people since I was 
 a child, and I almost do still. It's horrible to see kings dragged 
 into the mud." 
 
 ' They're only beer and card kings. It will do you good," 
 said Pe Ontjes. "Come!" 
 
 As they drew near the club they could already hear the loud 
 roar of voices. They went in and opened the door and saw 
 fifteen or twenty members sitting round the table amid clouds 
 of smoke, with a big glass full in front of them. On the table 
 and all round the room were all sorts of childish objects 
 cups, albums, stuffed birds, cheap painted statuettes, mixed up 
 together in senseless confusion. Their effect was anything but 
 beautiful. In the centre of the long table there was a huge
 
 HOLYLAND 271 
 
 wooden pig with a wreath of sausages round his neck, which 
 had been subscribed at a private and extraordinary meeting of 
 the club, to do honour to the club and to Dusenschon. Above 
 Tjark Dusenschon's chair hung the laurel wreath which he had 
 brought from Berlin. He himself was no longer present. 
 Daniel Peters, still an elegant figure, in spite of his sixty years 
 a mass of conceit from the crown of his head to the soles 
 of his feet was standing on a chair, the flow of his oratory 
 interrupted by the noise. Doctor Winsing's coarse voice rose 
 above the rest. " Come, mayor; you might just as well confess 
 it now ; did you and Suhlsen really get to Berlin at all ? " 
 
 " How many stories has the factory, eh, Suhlsen ? " 
 
 They all laughed and shouted, " Suhlsen says two, and the 
 mayor says three! " 
 
 " They were seen in Hamburg on Thursday evening. When 
 did they go to Berlin, in that case? " 
 
 " Where is Dusenschon? " 
 
 Daniel Peters stroked his beautiful, long moustache. " Gen- 
 tlemen " 
 
 "Goon!" 
 
 " Since we knew already what to think of Herr Dusenschon, 
 the journey to Berlin was certainly superfluous. Nevertheless, 
 I and my respected colleague did go to Berlin, in our supreme 
 devotion to duty, and did see everything in all its details." He 
 again thoughtfully stroked his moustache and said very ear- 
 nestly, " Gentlemen, I am well aware that this room is not the 
 official centre of Hilligenlei; the distinctions it confers are not 
 the official distinctions, which will, gentlemen, be conferred in 
 the chambers of our time-honoured town hall; but I merely 
 state a universally recognized truth when I say that this room 
 has often contained, as it does at this moment, the best intel- 
 ligence of our ancient town. That being so, the distinctions 
 which it has to confer are not to be despised." 
 
 "Good! go on!'; 
 
 " I have to acquaint you, my honoured friends, that the Hil- 
 ligenlei Club, founded March 3Oth, 1848, of which I have at 
 this moment the honour to be president, has unanimously 
 elected as an honorary member Mr. Dusenschon, owner of the 
 sausage factory, which, be it said with confidence, will be the 
 most important in Germany in the course of a year. I say
 
 272 HOLYLAND 
 
 again, to express the feelings of the meeting, unanimously 
 elected." 
 
 Thunders of applause and an outburst of shouts followed. 
 " That is certainly magnificent ! " " That is certainly an hon- 
 our to the club!" "That is Hilligenlei all over not a 
 single carping voice! " They shook hands all round with 
 every expression of serious satisfaction. 
 
 Lau, the corn merchant, had certainly chosen an inopportune 
 moment. He pressed his way to the table, through the smoke 
 and the up-lifted glasses, crying, 
 
 " Where's Dusenschon gone with the money? What has 
 he done with the money? I have been in Berlin it's all a 
 swindle." 
 
 They did not understand. The magistrate, who disgraced 
 his high and noble office by drinking more than he ought every 
 evening, folded his hands round his beaker and, rising to his 
 feet, said with no expression in his bleared eyes, but an air 
 of great importance, "Mr. Lau, our statutes do not permit 
 people without introduction. . . ." 
 
 " What is the matter? What does he want? " 
 
 Pe Ontjes was in a towering rage. 
 
 " I have been in Berlin. It is an absolute swindle. Do you 
 understand the word or no? There is no cardboard fac- 
 tory. It is all a cheat and a swindle. Do you understand 
 that?" 
 
 Suhlsen got up heavily and stared at Pe Ontjes with horror 
 in his eyes. Then suddenly he collapsed into his chair, his 
 head striking against the table. The mayor's crimson face 
 went as pale as death. 
 
 " Mayor, you " 
 
 There was a great outburst of shouting. "What is up? 
 Suhlsen! Mayor! You were there, though. Speak, man! 
 though you go to hell for it. Did you see the factory or not? 
 Have you been in Berlin or not? " 
 
 " Only to Hamburg! " said Daniel Peters, turning round 
 and standing in an agony of indecision, his eyes fixed on the 
 ground. 
 
 The young man who had met Pe Ontjes at the station 
 pressed in at the door, followed by their companions. After 
 them came the host, the waiters, people from the street. One 
 of them, falling on the mayor, pushed him back and shouted in
 
 HOLYLAND 273 
 
 his ear as if to wake him, "Where is the rascal? We are 
 shamed before the country." 
 
 Doctor Winsing, who had never looked at a medical book 
 since his examination, and made up for his total deficiency in 
 either intelligence or wit by a plentiful supply of self-assurance, 
 cried out in a loud voice, " We do not permit the use of such 
 language concerning a member of our club, as long as the case 
 is not proved." 
 
 "You do not permit?" said Pe Ontjes. "Who are you? 
 We have been used to look up to you, to the magistrate, the 
 students, the parson, who is here. But what are you, after 
 all ? " He did not know how to express his meaning. 
 
 Kai Jans went on : " The whole town, its men, women, and 
 children, have looked up to you, the possessors of the dignity 
 of office. All believed you really were something. As a matter 
 of fact, you draw your salaries and perform your duties with- 
 out intelligence or inspiration. You ought to be proud and 
 open-eyed, men of light and leading in the town ; you ought 
 to make a pure and Holyland of it that is your duty." 
 
 Old Suhlsen was carried out. One artisan after another 
 came up to the mayor and reproached him, till the landlord 
 led him away into the next room and closed the door behind 
 him. For a long time he sat huddled together in the corner, 
 looking up dully when anyone came near, and saying, " Shave 
 off my beard; shave off my beard." He seemed to feel that 
 his beard must go with his ruined vanity. 
 
 Pe Ontjes and Kai Jans went to look for Tjark Dusenschon. 
 Kai wanted to turn aside when they reached the park. " Let 
 me go home," he said. " I have seen enough trouble to-day 
 and yesterday." 
 
 "You are to come," said Pe angrily; " we must settle with 
 Tjark Dusenschon." 
 
 " I want to see no more," said Kai, in a broken-spirited voice. 
 " I have seen all that is sad and hideous in the world already. 
 Why should I see Tjark 's face too?" 
 
 "Come! it will do you good after all your brooding." 
 
 Just as they were turning into Seller Street a little, old- 
 fashioned cart came along, and they saw in the moonlight that 
 the driver, a harsh-looking peasant, turned to look sharply at 
 them as they went by. They had gone some way down the 
 street when Pe Ontjes said suddenly, " Do you know, that
 
 274 HOLYLAND 
 
 peasant looked to me suspicious. Listen! Where is he go- 
 ing?" 
 
 They stood still to listen, and heard the cart rattle down 
 the harbour street. 
 
 "Do you hear? He's driving down to the factory. Let's 
 see where he stops." 
 
 They hurried down to the factory and found it lit up as 
 usual, work proceeding inside, pigs squealing. They looked 
 found them in astonishment. The cart must be somewhere. 
 Then Kai perceived it on the road below the dyke, hidden by 
 the dark wall that rose behind it. Going up to it, Pe looked up 
 sharply and said in a low tone, " Whom are you waiting for, 
 Bahne Voss of Krautstiel?" 
 
 " That's nobody's business ! " said Bahne, laughing. 
 
 " Stay here, and don't utter a sound," said Pe softly, " or 
 you will feel my fist on your jaw. Kai, go to the factory and 
 see if he is there you may drive him into my arms." 
 
 Kai went over to the shed and through all the half-dark 
 rooms, looking for the office. Then, following the squealing 
 of the pigs, he found himself in a long passage that ran down 
 to the styes, and there, by the light of the moon, he could see 
 a hugely tall man stumbling awkwardly, with bent back, after 
 one of the pigs. He recognized Jeff Buhmann. 
 
 "What are you doing here?" he said. "What are you 
 doing here? Do you run after the pig, and catch hold of its 
 tail, and live in the shed?" 
 
 " Hallo ! " said Jeff, wiping the sweat from his brow. " It's 
 you, Kai!" 
 
 "Tell me, what is all this? Where is Tjark Dusen- 
 schon ? " 
 
 "Oh!" he said, breathless, in a voice of keen distress, "I 
 don't understand it at all. I have been here three days, and 
 I'm about done. My wife thinks that I am fishing for eels. 
 He has no more pigs and no more money, I think, and he's 
 searching for gold in the sandbank with his men." 
 
 " There's not a word of truth in it all," said Kai. " It's 
 a swindle." 
 
 Jeff sat down heavily. "All a swindle?" he said. "All a 
 swindle ? Where is he, then ? " 
 
 " We don't know escaped, I expect." 
 
 " Kai, he is a wonderful man for all that a wonderful
 
 HOLYLAND 275 
 
 man. Far, far superior to you and Pe Ontjes. So it's all a 
 swindle ! My compliments to you, Kai ! " 
 
 "Only tell me where he is!" 
 
 " An hour ago he was in the office. People came past shout- 
 ing about the sandbank and some accident, and then he disap- 
 peared somewhere. I have always had a high opinion of him. 
 I must say he gave me more satisfaction than any man I 
 know." 
 
 " Come with me to Pe Ontjes." 
 
 Pe Ontjes stood by the cart, waiting in vain. Some people 
 came past and, recognising his voice, shouted, " We've got him. 
 We put him in the cart and brought him to the town hall, and 
 took the money. It's in the Savings Bank again. We let him 
 
 go." 
 
 " What sort of state of mind was he in? " asked Kai. 
 
 " Angry enough, as one might expect, otherwise quite un- 
 moved. His only fear seemed to be of punishment. I expect 
 he made his way on foot to the nearest station." 
 
 Pe Ontjes, Jeff, and Kai Jans made their way to the long 
 house. " I must say," said Pe Ontjes, " that I am disappointed 
 at not seeing him." 
 
 He went up to the house, and, finding Stiena Dusenschon's 
 door open, went upstairs, only to descend again immediately, 
 declaring, " The house is empty." 
 
 They returned to the street discussing where he could be. 
 Jeff happened to look across to the smithy, and saw that the 
 door, which was split, had been carefully closed. " Good Heav- 
 ens! " he whispered. " I know where he is! " going up to the 
 door. 
 
 There, in the moonlight pouring in through the western 
 window, there sat, on the old, broken-down carriage that had 
 once been Kissen's, and for which they had once made a lot- 
 tery, there sat Tjark Dusenschon with Stiena, his old grand- 
 mother, by his side. Opposite them, on an overturned barrow, 
 the mayor, Daniel Peters. Tjark was holding forth, his clear 
 eyes shining. 
 
 Kai Jans addressed him in passionate words: "What are 
 you going to do now? Tell me what you think about! In 
 what a wretched state you must go out into the world ! " 
 
 "Wretched!" said Tjark in astonishment, taking hold of
 
 276 HOLYLAND 
 
 his imposing pocket-flaps with both hands. " You are really 
 too stupid." 
 
 "Hit him in the face," said Pe Ontjes. 
 
 " That is madness, Pe Ontjes," said Jeff, seating himself on 
 the anvil. " He cannot help it. His misfortune is that he 
 confuses gross and net, and he did that as a boy." 
 
 " Do not forget," said Tjark Dusenschon, with calm indif- 
 ference, " that I am an honorary member of the club." 
 
 " What does life mean to you ? " asked Kai, greatly troubled. 
 "What are your thoughts? What is your purpose in the 
 world?" 
 
 "What do you mean?" said Tjark. "Don't be offended, 
 Kai, but you are a fool. It is clear that one must take money 
 when one can get it." 
 
 Afraid that the man would impose upon him again, Pe 
 Ontjes said, " Come, Kai ; let us go." 
 
 " What are you, though ? " insisted Kai eagerly. " What 
 is your motive? What is your purpose in life? Tell me, Tjark 
 you have some serious aim ! " 
 
 Tjark looked at him with a gentle smiling, shaking his head. 
 " Poor fellow," he said. " You are really troubled about me. 
 What do I know of myself? Things amuse me." He listened. 
 " It is quiet outside now. I must go. I didn't want to fall 
 into the clutches of that gang." 
 
 When they came out again into the clear moonlight Kai 
 said in a tone of unutterable weariness, " Let me go now, Pe 
 Ontjes. I have seen misery enough." 
 
 " No! " said Pe shortly. "You must come with me. We 
 must see how the town takes it. We must fight this thing 
 through, Kai. Truth and Reality are our watchwords, and we 
 must face whatever comes, however awful." 
 
 Returning to the park, they were met by crowds returning 
 from the sandbank, raging, shouting, and laughing at the way 
 in which they had been swindled there. Wild shouts rang, 
 and people hurried to and fro on every side. From every house 
 and street there was a ringing of bells. Pe Ontjes laughed. 
 
 " Don't laugh," said Kai Jans. " Is it a time for laughing 
 when your native town is sunk to such depths of degradation ? " 
 
 "What does Hilligenlei matter to me?" asked Pe Ontjes 
 wildly. " Nothing matters except wife and children." 
 
 " Don't say that! " said Kai. " Don't say that! They are
 
 HOLYLAND 277 
 
 our brothers and sisters. If we did not think that, we should 
 fight like wild beasts." 
 
 " Brothers and sisters, indeed ! " 
 
 A man came towards them in the moonlight from the chest- 
 nut avenue, in whom he recognized Pete Boje come over from 
 Hamburg to spend the half-day with his mother. He had 
 taken Heinke to stay with Anna, that she might not be alone 
 on such a tumultuous night, and was now on his way to the 
 station to catch the night train back to Hamburg. He knew 
 all that had happened, and said, " In the future one will hardly 
 dare to say that one comes from Hilligenlei," then walked by 
 their side in silence to the station. 
 
 "If that were all!" said Kai Jans, "but just look at all 
 these people! " 
 
 Some hundred or two hundred men were running to the 
 station from all directions. One could hear the tread of many 
 feet and the sound of hideous oaths, mixed with coarse, drunken 
 laughter. 
 
 " Listen to their laughter! " said Kai. "They don't know 
 that they are so many madmen ! " 
 
 Pete Boje shrugged his shoulders and said with an air of 
 cold indifference, " We are all that, Kai. How should we be 
 anything else ? " 
 
 " But surely you have always been happy always known 
 what you wanted," said Kai. 
 
 Pete gave a quick laugh. " Yes ! I was young and fresh. I 
 found joy in climbing upwards. But since I have got to the 
 top The endless rush in our yard, day in, day out; trying 
 an improvement to-day, only to throw it aside to-morrow for 
 a better; getting through more business than other firms and 
 other nations ; the workmen dissatisfied ; some people always 
 tale-bearing, others struggling to get on and so every day 
 and all day. The whole thing is so aimless." 
 
 They had got nearly to the station. Huge crowds of men 
 stood collected in the shadow of the coalsheds, waiting silently 
 to attack Tjark Dusenschon or the mayor on their way to the 
 station. 
 
 " Do you know, though," said Pete, " there are some people 
 who are happy." 
 
 "Where?" said Kai, turning round upon him swiftly. 
 
 " People with a fixed idea. You must become a man with a
 
 HOLYLAND 
 
 fixed idea, and then you will be happy. In the asylums you 
 will find men who are happy men with happy, fixed ideas, 
 and the members of peculiar sects ! I have seen it in our works 
 and in London. For example, the Salvation Army people are 
 happy. That's it! Just find a fixed idea, and you will be 
 happy." 
 
 "Yes!" said Kai, his eyes burning. "Yes, you are right. 
 We are not very far from the time when men were like dumb 
 animals. We don't live by reason now only by fancies and 
 fixed ideas. Oh, Pete, how I wish I had such a fixed idea 
 one that would apply to all mankind a big, glorious idea 
 that would bring us nearer to light and knowledge." 
 
 "Good night!" said Pete .Boje with a laugh. He shook 
 hands and left them. 
 
 " Look! look! " said Pe Ontjes. A crowd of drunken citi- 
 zens had brought the wooden pig from the club table and 
 fastened it to a pole, and were now carrying it, with loud 
 groans, through the peaceful silence of the lovely moonshine. 
 Some were men with grey heads, some were members of the 
 club. The people who had been standing in the shadow of the 
 sheds now came forward, one by one, and joined them. The 
 great, noisy crowd filled the square. 
 
 "Look!" said Pe Ontjes, waving his hand towards them. 
 " There is your Hilligenlei. That's what its people are like. 
 That's what humanity is like. There it is ! " 
 
 " Dear Pe Ontjes," said Kai in a strange voice, and catching 
 hold of his arm as if to prevent himself from falling, " you are 
 a simple fellow, but from your childhood you have had a 
 firm hold on life " 
 
 "Boy!" said Lau in some embarrassment. "I a firm 
 hold? I tell you Anna Boje and I are driven back and for- 
 wards by love and anger. Like everyone else, we are without 
 rudder or compass to guide us." 
 
 Kai Jans let fall his arm, and said in a spiritless voice that 
 betrayed the sick horror of his soul, " No one knows anything. 
 There is no Holyland, no God. All, all is confusion ! "
 
 CHAPTER XXIV. 
 
 NEXT morning Pe Ontjes went and told Heinke of Kai Jans' 
 arrival, and said, promising her an antique, gold ornament be- 
 longing to his mother, " You are a pretty girl and a clever one, 
 and his friend. I'm not clever enough for him, and Anna is so 
 readily unjust. You go and comfort him." 
 
 She thought, " How fortunate it should just happen that 
 the other has a month's holiday,' and is over the hills and far 
 away. I can give myself up to the poor, dear man. Consola- 
 tion comes easily to me, for I am so happy. Oh, dear, dear 
 Peterkin ! " 
 
 So she went to Mrs. Lau and obtained immediate possession 
 of the ornament, picked a red carnation in the garden and put 
 it in her belt, and then made her way to the long house. 
 
 He was sitting at the round table at which all the Jans chil- 
 dren had been christened, eaten their meals, and done their les- 
 sons, gazing in a brown study out across the sea. 
 
 " Let us go upon the dyke," she said. He got up and shook 
 her by the hand. " I am a poor companion for you, child ! " 
 
 " Sh ! " she said. " Pe Ontjes has told me all about it. 
 Come!" 
 
 On top of the long pier that ran right out to sea she slipped 
 her arm through his with a movement of confiding affection 
 and walked so by his side. The west wind blew in their faces, 
 blowing back her dress. The sun shone on the left. 
 
 " Do you remember, when you were in the top form you 
 told me once that your ancestors came from the Marcomanni ? 
 First they dwelt up there on the windy hilltops, and then 
 came down into the fens and became farmers." 
 
 " They ended by being workmen in Hilligenlei. The last 
 of the line was a good-for-nothing dreamer with neither land, 
 nor rights, nor position in his home." 
 
 Dropping his arm, she pulled off her jacket, with her spark- 
 ling eyes on him. 
 
 279
 
 280 HOLYLAND 
 
 "You have no place in your home? Is there anything more 
 beautiful in your home than a beautiful girl? You have a 
 place here! Do you think it is easy to live in this place and be 
 of it? Would you be any better if the old farmers bowed be- 
 fore you, and the tower of Hilligenlei saluted you?" 
 
 He looked her, amazement in his eyes. " How you have 
 changed! you have become so sweet and gentle!" 
 
 " Ah ! Peterkin ! " thought she. 
 
 The sun shone and the wind blew. They walked out into 
 the glittering grey sea, and she pressed his arm tenderly against 
 her yielding side. 
 
 " I have put on my best frock! do you see that? I have, 
 you see, my flower and my ornament all to give you pleas- 
 ure." 
 
 He looked at her again, wonderingly. " Your mouth used 
 to be a shade too small," he said, " but now it has grown strong 
 and wide. And your eyes are darker and softer than they were. 
 They used to be like two fair-haired girls of ten years old 
 playing ball in the wind; but now there is a young mother 
 playing with her child." 
 
 " Peterkin's love has done that," she thought. " Sit still, 
 my soul." 
 
 " What are you saying? " she said aloud, " I am twenty-two 
 now, that's what it is." 
 
 " Do you know," he said, smiling bitterly at himself, " when 
 I was a young student and you were still a child there was a 
 time when I cherished the secret hope that you would one day 
 be my wife. Thank Heaven I let that dream go; thank 
 Heaven we are friends, and no more. What a long engage- 
 ment that would have been! What a gloomy bridegroom! 
 Finally, he would have said, ' I am sorry, Heinke Boje, but I 
 have no bread, and no thoughts for you.' " 
 
 " Don't be sad," she said. 
 
 " Over thirty," he said, " and still I don't know whether 
 there is a place where I can be of use in the world. God takes 
 the others by the hand and leads them to some field or other, 
 be it ever so small, saying, ' Build thy house there, plant thy 
 garden there.' But He holds me for a fool. For me He has 
 no field. He condemns me to be a huntsman a lost hunts- 
 man who seeks through brush and briar and fen a splendid, fab- 
 ulous beast."
 
 HOLYLAND 281 
 
 Her spirits sank, and she turned round in silence, thinking, 
 " I have played badly to-day." 
 
 When they reached the rushing sluice she gave him her 
 hand and said with trembling lips, " You are more to me 
 than my mother, my brothers, and my sister. I could not be 
 glad if you were not happy, whatever fortune came to me. I 
 shall come again to-morrow, and go on coming, until you 
 laugh again." Her eyes suddenly filled with tears. She turned 
 and went away. 
 
 The next day she returned in the same blue dress and with 
 the red carnation, and again walked along the dyke with him 
 out to sea. The sea lay beneath them clad in her grey-green 
 garment, a band of light across her breast. Field after field 
 extended, covered with dark-green grass and bright cornfields, 
 and beyond, in the distance, shady farms and villages. Inland 
 the land rose gently, its hillocks covered with meadows, woods, 
 and villages. 
 
 "Look!" she said, looking round her. "How beautiful 
 your home is. Can you find no joy in being a child of this 
 land, where, for hundreds of years, so many brave deeds have 
 been done? You have youth and intelligence and health. Your 
 home and your youth should teach you to seek bravely for some 
 good deed to do." 
 
 ' Two years ago," he said thoughtfully, " I told you that 
 I had begun to work. I wanted to write a book to show how a 
 new current was moving in our days a morning breeze was 
 astir that everywhere there was a longing for progress, a de- 
 sire for change, a courageous spirit of improvement, a hunger 
 for knowledge and righteousness. I wanted to discover the 
 direction of this current to see what sails we ought to set and 
 how we ought to steer we who watch on shore. I dreamed 
 of singing the German renascence. I had begun to work hard 
 at it, full of joy in my task, and hoping to find peace in it. 
 Then came the strike. I had to go hither and thither, helping 
 and speaking, and the envy, malice, and uncharitableness that 
 filled the hearts of the men I worked with rose and crushed 
 me like the powers of darkness. Then came the horrible death 
 of the two boys, and yesterday my home turned into a Bed- 
 lam. 
 
 " Heinke, I know now that this trifling change and improve- 
 ment and progress is meaningless and valueless. It is nothing.
 
 282 HOLYLAND 
 
 It will come to nothing, because the whole basis of our lives is 
 false because we have no real standard of values, no real 
 religion. Heinke, we lack a pure and sound belief a belief 
 that can lead us on like a herald of light and joy a belief 
 which all brave and thoughtful men can accept. Look! if we 
 had such a belief everything else would follow of itself. It is 
 there, at the foundation of our life, in our belief, that our re- 
 nascence must begin. 
 
 " But where is one to find this new belief? None can say 
 where it is. The Almighty does not give it to us. It is aw- 
 ful to pray to God, ' Lord show it me, give it to me ! I and 
 my people must perish else, with bleeding hearts' and to feel 
 Him looking down with those calm eyes, saying nothing, His 
 eyes always calm it is awful. Only to you can I speak of 
 this ; you stand to me for all that is dear and pure in life." 
 
 The eyes she raised to his were full of tears. " Oh ! " she 
 thought, " how I long to kiss his hands, his eyes." 
 
 " Do not weep," he said ; " be glad that you have nothing 
 to do with me." 
 
 She turned and walked in silence by his side. In her youth 
 she did not know what to say to him. When she parted from 
 him she said, 
 
 " Do you remember the fruits you brought me from the 
 South Sea? It was the greatest event in my youth. And how 
 you used to help me with my exercises? You were always good 
 to me, and that is why you are nearer to me than my mother 
 and my brothers and sister, and why I cannot rest until you 
 are glad." 
 
 In the night she lay awake till midnight, brooding and pray- 
 ing for help. And her prayers were passionate, for she came of 
 a family that seldom prayed, only in extremity, and then with 
 all their hearts. 
 
 In the morning, before the air had lost its earliest freshness, 
 she came again. He met her at the door, and they went on to- 
 gether. The wind blew shrill and high. The morning sun 
 shone above the distant line of wood across from the hill of 
 Wotan. And there, on the hill of Wotan, a mountain regarded 
 as sacred by their ancestors, there, in the hollow between the 
 low oak-trees and the barrows of the Huns, there sat, there in 
 the morning brightness, a messenger from Him whom one can 
 neither name nor comprehend. Bending forward with his
 
 HOLYLAND 283 
 
 shining feet in the heather, he bent his brilliant eyes on the two 
 mortals clearly outlined against the glimmering sea as they 
 walked along the dyke. His eyes were as sharp as arrows that 
 burn in their flight. 
 
 They went silently side by side; the wind blew back her 
 dress, outlining her figure. A pair of swallows flew down from 
 the hills flew close by their knees. She stretched out her 
 hand to catch them, and gave a faint cry, saying in the same 
 breath, as if some outer force compelled her. You said, yester- 
 day, that the great need of our people and our time was a 
 Holyland on which to take their stand, and from it draw 
 a sure and inward joy of will and life. Tell me, now has 
 there ever been a man in the world who had his stand on 
 such a Holyland, and was, therefore, joyful, and reaped a good 
 harvest? " 
 
 He stood still, regarding her. " Yes," he said ; " I think the 
 Saviour did so." 
 
 " Yes," she said, " but I think He did so not as a simple 
 man, but by His divine power." 
 
 "Ah, child!" he said sadly. "Who knows? Soon after 
 His death His true image was painted over, decked out with 
 gold, and it has gone on so. There are scholars, indeed, who 
 have laboured diligently for more than a century to discover 
 the true picture under all the paint with which it is overlaid, 
 and especially in the last twenty years they have succeeded to a 
 considerable extent. I know most of their investigations. But 
 as far as I can see they have not arrived at any certainty yet." 
 He looked at the ground, deep in thought, and then said hesi- 
 tatingly, " When I was a parson I gloried in His wisdom and 
 goodness, and preached about that. I thought it did not mat- 
 ter whether He was an immortal spirit or a simple man. And 
 it is indifferent no! no! it is not indifferent no!" 
 
 The swallows flew quickly by, with their sweet chirp, close 
 to Heinke's knee. She tried to catch them; then, raising her 
 fair head, she cried, 
 
 " That ought to be indifferent? That? No! there is nothing 
 in the whole world more necessary than that there should be 
 certainty in this. As long as there is no certainty the Holyland 
 is an insecure, unstable possession, men's opinions veer restlessly 
 from one extreme to the other, and every sort of dogma and 
 superstition sways the minds of men. There is nothing in the
 
 284 HOLYLAND 
 
 whole world more necessary than that there should be certainty 
 as to the nature of the Saviour." 
 
 He listened restlessly and then said slowly, as if not sure of 
 himself, " Yes, yes; I think you are right. If it were possible," 
 he went on, painfully working out his thoughts, " if it were 
 possible to find His real life beneath all the overlay, and it were 
 proved that He was a man, a mere man, and one could pene- 
 trate into the depths of His soul and make them visible, the 
 Holyland on which He took His stand, and by which He 
 reaped such a magnificent harvest then, yes ! then one could 
 say, ' Come hither ! all ye people. Look ! this was a man a 
 man like ourselves, who stood in Holyland, and was joyous and 
 happy. Come hither, all ye people. We will take our stand on 
 this Holyland and build for the new birth of our people ! " . . . 
 But no, it won't do! The authorities are not sufficient. I do 
 not believe that it is possible to understand His soul, His life, 
 now. No, I do not believe it. Therefore the Church will al- 
 ways rule and error with it." 
 
 The swallows flew close to her knee with their soft chirp- 
 ing. She bent down and held out her hand to catch them, and 
 they eluded her shyly. She spoke as if some power outside her- 
 self compelled her, and her grey eyes shone. 
 
 " You say that many people have worked at it, and that 
 now, now, important results have been established? Kai Jans, 
 try! Go through their investigations with your child's eyes 
 and the passion of your eager heart. Paint a picture of the 
 Saviour." 
 
 He beat his breast. " I ? " he said. " I, a poor, unlearned 
 creature? " 
 
 " It must be someone like you who does it," she said, " a 
 poor, unlearned creature. Has your hard, struggling youth 
 taught you to see the sorrows of human life with your own eyes 
 and your father's? God has given you wonderful eyes; they 
 reveal that from your childhood you have seen men and things 
 naked as they are. Or are you frightened of what people will 
 
 say 
 
 He shook his head quickly. " I have long ago learned not to 
 care what people think of me. But I tell you it is a fearfully 
 difficult task. To make that long ago, distant, wondrous Being 
 live again ! Heaven help me, how can I do it ? " 
 
 She took his arm and looked into his face with her beautiful,
 
 HOLYLAND 285 
 
 earnest eyes. " Try ! Begin to-morrow morning ! You may 
 succeed or not. Be one of the many who stand ready to help 
 humanity according to their strength, until a mightier hand 
 comes to take the wheel. Begin to-morrow, Kai! Search for 
 Hilligenlei!" 
 
 They had come to a standstill ; she held and shook his hands. 
 " Help, Kai! Do your part in the new birth of your people, 
 and be not afraid ! " 
 
 " If you wish it," he said, breathing hard, " I will try. You 
 have a sweet, wonderful power over me. I feel compelled as 
 by an angel from Heaven." 
 
 She let his hands go, and, calling to the swallows, went back 
 with them to Hilligenlei. 
 
 " Look! " she said, " do you see that white cloud over by the 
 Hill of Wotan how wonderfully it moves, as if it were 
 alive." 
 
 He turned round and looked at the world spread out before 
 him, and at her. She walked on calmly, her beautiful, quiet 
 eyes gazing over the hills. 
 
 " You are the queen of it all," he said. 
 
 " Of course," she said. " Sea and sky and heath and hill 
 cannot do what I have just done." She turned round. " Where 
 are my swallows? " 
 
 " They have helped you well," he said, " and now they have 
 flown away. You're a silly." 
 
 " Go home and work! " she said, nodding to him. " I must 
 go to my work too."
 
 CHAPTER XXV. 
 
 AND so, with unquiet and tremulous heart, Kai Jans began 
 in the blue-walled room in the long house to search the Gospel 
 for Hilligenlei. Every afternoon Heinke came in her short 
 blue cashmere dress and knocked at the window, and he would 
 look up from his book quite dazed, as if some strange monster, 
 crawled up from the harbour, was pressing its forehead against 
 the window. Then he went out and walked silently by her 
 side ; even then his thoughts were in his work. 
 
 If she asked how he was getting on he shook his head, say- 
 ing, " My friend has sent me all the books that have appeared 
 on the subject- within the last ten years, most of them by profes- 
 sors at the German Universities. I know most of them already. 
 . . . It's a tremendous undertaking; I can hardly believe that 
 any certainty will come of it. And yet I am grateful to you 
 for having set me to work at it. Even if I cannot make the 
 holy, royal spring bubble up again even if it is too deeply 
 sunk and choked I can yet find joy in working in the sacred 
 grove that has grown up around it in the course of time." 
 
 "There," said she, "there, Heinke Boje! " She took his 
 arm and told him how, as a child, she had wanted to bring him 
 flowers and had not dared. " Now I have brought you a splen- 
 did flower," and she told him of her daily doings. 
 
 Of one thing, however, she told him not a word; she did 
 not tell him that all through the summer she had sat every 
 evening on a man's knee, and that now, every other day, she 
 sat on the edge of her bed, as all the Bojes did, to read a letter 
 from that man, with sparkling eyes and glowing cheeks. 
 
 Things went on so for three weeks. 
 
 One clear day in September, towards the end of the fourth 
 week, she found him, when she came along the dyke and 
 knocked at the window, not, as usual, buried in his books, but 
 standing gazing out across the sea with a strange calm in his 
 eyes. He came out at once eagerly, and, taking her arm, said 
 
 286
 
 HOLYLAND 287 
 
 with marked excitement, " Dear, it is growing plain. . . . There 
 is no doubt about it. I can't tell you how strangely I feel. 
 . . . It gets clearer and clearer; it is the life of a man, won- 
 derfully deep, wonderfully pure, wonderfully brave, but the 
 life of a man. It is all infinitely moving from beginning to 
 end : his faith, his goodness, his proud longing for the victory 
 he could not win, his mistakes, his death; but I don't think 
 there is anything superhuman in it. It is a drama, and angels 
 experience no drama. Let us go out to sea; I will try to tell 
 you some of it. You must ask me if I say anything strange, 
 and so it will all be clearer to me. Oh, Heinke ! you see, there 
 is no one to whom I can talk of this." 
 
 So he began, and she listened attentively. Often he paused 
 to remark that links were still missing here or there; often 
 her simple questions gave him pause and showed him that his 
 conclusions had been too hastily formed. 
 
 So it went on, day after day. It was all new and strange to 
 her, and filled her with a glad astonishment. 
 
 " I am not going to write anything yet," he said. " I must 
 think it all out clearly and simply ; simplicity is the first essen- 
 tial in religion of all things. I shall represent Him entirely 
 from the historical point of view, keeping close to the original 
 sources, only supplying the very briefest connection where they 
 fail. Every word must be three times revised." 
 
 At the beginning of September he tried to begin to write, 
 but all kinds of difficulties presented themselves. Once more he 
 had to spend long days in searching the original sources and 
 the books of the more recent investigators. This lasted for 
 weeks, during which he wrote down nothing. 
 
 The weather being rainy he took his walk on the dyke alone ; 
 when she came in the evening she found him quiet and thought- 
 ful. While she was there his father would return from work, 
 and after eating his supper, as usual, sitting by the kitchen 
 fire, came in and sat with them, smoking his pipe. Still deep 
 in thought, Kai Jans only half heard the old man's tale of 
 human life, and his eyes wandered to the beautiful, earnest face 
 of the girl beside him. 
 
 After a hard day's work a man sits down by the edge of the 
 calm pond in the forest and refreshes himself in the silence with 
 gazing in the beautiful mirror, and hearing the high oaks mur- 
 muring in the breeze of all that had happened in the day.
 
 288 HOLYLAND 
 
 And the young woman looked at him and thought calmly, 
 " What a dear, serious man he is become ; I love him more and 
 more. If I did not love the other so dearly it would be an 
 agony to me that he does not want me; to be loved by him 
 would be inexpressibly joyful. But now he is my friend, and 
 I am happy." 
 
 But the further he penetrated into that wondrous life, the 
 more difficult became each decision, and his soul grew heavier 
 and heavier. Added to it all came day after day of gloomy 
 rain. He was tortured by the fear lest his work might pain 
 many good people and might send those of coarser mould, re- 
 strained by some secret fear of the Son of God, headlong into 
 evil courses. 
 
 At times, and more especially at night, when incessant work 
 and anxiety kept him awake, and rain and wind beat mercilessly 
 against his window, distrust and terror assailed him fiercely. 
 " You are wrong, you are wrong. He was eternal, divine, a 
 supernatural being. Woe to you! you are committing mortal 
 sin ! " In the middle of the night he seemed to hear it. 
 " Arise ! the two greatest men of thy race are waiting at thy 
 door to speak with thee. . . . Look at Luther's angry face. 
 ' Does thy belief step over me like a step on the ladder ? ' ' 
 "Yes, it does." And lo, who is that behind Martin Luther? 
 The old man from Weimar himself, mocking at thee. " Don't 
 trouble yourself! you can never weld together those discordant 
 elements, Christianity and the German race ! " " Yes, I shall." 
 
 Then when morning came, grey and sunless, he shrank from 
 his work, and, casting aside his pen, went out. 
 
 There on the dyke, with the boisterous wind blowing gloom- 
 ily around him and the rain beating heavily against him, he 
 fought the old fight again, wrestling in speech with God. 
 ' Thou knowest I have sought Thee and Thy Holyland from 
 my childhood, and Thou, therefore, hast laid upon me immeas- 
 urable sorrow. Where for me has been the joyousness of youth ? 
 Thou knowest how it has tortured me all my days that for 
 two hundred years the Church has reviled the heroes, the poets, 
 the pioneers among my race ; how, because ' they believed in no 
 Saviour, because they were not Christians,' they were thrust 
 aside from Thee. . . . Can I endure it? ... Thou knowest 
 how it has tortured me all my days that all those of my race 
 that seek for progress, artisans, sailors, merchants, teachers,
 
 HOLYLAND 289 
 
 artists, all those whose minds are refreshed by the breath of 
 wisdom, all those who are strong and eager, have fallen away 
 from the beliefs of the Church, and therefore stand in the 
 midst of the struggle of human existence without any nelief, 
 that is, without any rest for their feet. . . . Can I endure it? 
 Thou knowest that I love Thee as truly as those that hold the 
 old belief, that I do not wish to destroy and have no joy in 
 destruction, but would rather build, and, as far as my poor 
 strength permits, will build a new house of belief on the old 
 holy ground ; a house even be it only a log hut at first, in which 
 those among my people who are simple and serious and child- 
 like of heart may dwell and find their happiness in dwelling 
 there. And, therefore, I am daring to do what I do. If Thou 
 forbiddest me, I shall not listen." 
 
 When he came home again he had so far recovered his spirits 
 as to continue step by step to follow the course of the holy 
 hero's life. In the evening he sat under the oak trees, by the 
 deep pond in the forest, saying no word of what lay between 
 his soul and God alone. 
 
 At last there came a lovely sunny September morning, a 
 Friday; a day when all through the countryside one could see 
 the flash of the sickle and the wheat set up in beauteous sheaves ; 
 a day when he reached the end of his researches and at last saw 
 the way that led, high and clear, into the future of mankind. 
 Now he could begin to write all he saw as a living thing. And 
 he drew a deep breath. 
 
 When she came he rose up and said, laughing, " I feel so 
 light-hearted and joyous! AJ1 the ghosts have gone! " 
 
 She looked at him with merry eyes. " You look like the 
 young farmers who get up ever so early at this season and go 
 out to the cornfield they are going to reap." 
 
 " And you ! " he said, with beaming looks, " what has come 
 over you? Do you think my eyes are blind to all beauty? 
 Now . . . now I have found my sight, I can see what I used 
 to see in the days when I was a student in Berlin." 
 
 A kind of terror smote her, and she made no reply. 
 
 " Come," he said, " let's go a long, long walk together 
 quite alone. What is it, child? You can't be surprised at my 
 looking at you! Do you know, life has become quite clear to 
 me."
 
 290 HOLYLAND 
 
 " You mustn't look at me like that," she said, and her voice 
 quivered. 
 
 He took her and laughed out gaily, walking close by 
 her side. " And why mayn't I ? You're no longer in the dream 
 where womanhood and girlhood meet. This year has made you 
 a woman, and such a woman ! " 
 
 She laid her two hands on his and implored him with ill- 
 concealed anxiety, " Dear boy, please . . . please don't talk 
 to me so." 
 
 He did not see the anxiety he only saw the friendship 
 and the love shining in her lovely eyes, and kissed her restrain- 
 ing hands, laughing in his exaltation of spirits. Then, looking 
 at her hand, he kissed it again and said, his heart bounding 
 with irrepressible joyousness, " For seven years I have sat brood- 
 ing, brooding on the hill of sorrow, till at last the most lovely 
 maiden in the land came and smote the hill with her echoing 
 voice, and I leapt to my feet and beheld the world and the sun 
 and the kingdom of Heaven." He took her by the shoulders, 
 and, looking into her face, said, " Look at me . . . look at me. 
 . . . How beautiful you are ! " 
 
 She cried out in pain, " Dear Kai . . . don't talk so ! I 
 cannot, cannot tell you." 
 
 But his whole heart was singing a joyful carol, and he did 
 not hear the trouble in her voice. " Come, let us go up to the 
 heights by the quiet way through the fields. There shall be 
 nothing but joy to-day! To-morrow I will begin to sing the 
 song of the Saviour, such as no man yet has sung. . . . Up till 
 now you have always talked and I said nothing; a tiresome, 
 speechless lover I have been to you. Poor child, you have never 
 had any pleasure from me. Have I ever told you how beauti- 
 fully you walk? like a young queen who has just beeen anointed. 
 Have I ever told you how beautifully you carry your shoul- 
 ders? as if there sat a dove on each, whom you cradled as you 
 went. Have I ever told you how beautiful your hair is? it 
 must be wonderful when it lies over your white shoulders. 
 Yes, yes, you will have a lover to rejoice in you, one who is 
 no dreamer." 
 
 All the hardness, all the reserve seemed wiped out of his 
 face, and all the sorrow. When the windows of a house that 
 has long stood closed and silent are cleansed and opened, and 
 the door cast wide, then a crowd of pretty children stream
 
 HOLYLAND 291 
 
 out laughing into the lovely garden : so from his eyes, dear and 
 true, there shone intelligence and beauty, such a flood of love 
 and goodness pouring upon her that she could not turn away 
 her eyes. 
 
 " How different you are! " she said. " Don't talk to me so! 
 Please, please, Kai, don't talk so please." 
 
 " I am just what I have always been, Heinke," he said, in 
 a voice of tender sympathy, stroking her hands ; " only I have 
 been sick and sorry for a long time and you have had to suffer 
 with me. Now I am well again. You must not be afraid, my 
 dear, because it all comes out at once, in a rush." 
 
 " Dear! " she said, " dear one! " She covered her face with 
 her hands and groaned inwardly, " I cannot tell him . . . no, I 
 cannot. This is the first happy day in his life ! " 
 
 " Smile at me! isn't it like a fairy tale? Here am I, a poor 
 little working man, walking along the dyke with the fairest 
 maiden in all the land by my side! Whither? Whither? 
 Let us take the grassy path and we shall be on the top in half 
 an hour. There is no one there; we can be together for hours. 
 I will find a place in the wood and there kneel before you and 
 look at you, only look at you, no more, for hour after hour. 
 There is no greater pleasure oh, you have such a delicate 
 white face ! you dainty white maid of Holstein ! " 
 
 She tried to say to him, " I can't, Kai ... I can't. ... I 
 am promised to another. ... I love another beyond every- 
 thing," but the words would not come; she could not say it. 
 Such happiness beamed in his eyes; the beating of his heart 
 made his voice tremble. " Let him be happy for one day . . . 
 poor, precious man. It is so delightful to see him happy. How 
 his love burns, how his eyes shine. He shall have my hands, 
 both my hands . . . but no more. ... I cannot let him do 
 anything more." 
 
 So she walked by his side on the green grass, through the 
 wide, rich meadowland, her heart torn by uneasy apprehension. 
 
 He was as happy as a boy. He laughed and played with her 
 hands, then let them fall to pick the flowers growing at the 
 edge of the ditch, which he fastened in her hair and bosom, 
 and a daisy garland round her waist. She let him do his will, 
 thinking first in pain, " O misery," then in sweet content, 
 " The dear man. He shall have my hands, both my hands," 
 and she slipped her hands into his, thinking, " No more."
 
 292 HOLYLAND 
 
 Half an hour later they had reached the deepest solitude of 
 the wood. She, still adorned with her flowers, sat on the edge 
 of a ruinous old wall, while he knelt before her, with his arms 
 round her, gazing up into her face in unutterable rapture, 
 and imploring her again and again, " Give me your lips." 
 Again and again she bent down to him and kissed him till he 
 talked like one possessed. With overwhelming suddenness he 
 saw spread out before his eyes the glory of the world, with 
 its sure and dazzling hope for himself and all humanity, and 
 now a pure and lovely woman was in his arms. 
 
 Clouds blew over the wood from the east; the first heavy 
 drops fell through the sultry air, audible on the foliage of the 
 trees. " I can never gaze enough at you. I shall never rise 
 again. I am so at rest, so happy; for the first time in my life 
 I am filled with happiness and peace. . . . Oh, your kisses 
 ... it comes to you by nature, but I must learn from you 
 how to kiss." 
 
 " Kai, Kai, no more. Dear one, no more to-day. To-mor- 
 row oh, to-morrow no more now ! " 
 
 " Yes, to-day and to-morrow and every day. I am the most 
 blissful man in the world. I have often wondered why all 
 other men seemed so gay and peaceful and serene, and I alone 
 must always suffer, must bear the pain of want of money, of 
 trouble at home, of continual brooding. But now I am glad 
 of it; now that I have found happiness I can feel the deeper 
 bliss and thankfulness. . . . Reverent I have always been, dear, 
 you know that; since I was a child I have always looked up 
 with a humble heart to the mysterious Ruler of the World, 
 but never did I feel such profound reverence as to-day, when I 
 recognize His mysterious hand in the most beautiful of created 
 things. Yes . . . now I can tell the story of the Saviour. He 
 grew up from the earth and was the most beautiful of the 
 children of men ; more beautiful even than you ! " 
 
 She sat looking at him and holding his two hands in her lap. 
 The sweetness of his love swept over her, as wave after wave 
 breaks over a vessel lying stranded on its side, until it is alto- 
 gether broken and washed away. " He has the elder right; 
 from my childhood he has been my friend. I have been wrong. 
 I thought he was only a dreamer and loved me not; I never 
 knew how I had secretly grown to love him. Never before 
 have I seen this new, beautiful side of him. How beautiful
 
 HOLYLAND 293 
 
 his hard face and his bright eyes are. . . . Alas ! what am I to 
 do? What am I doing? Let me go, Kai . . . Kai, don't 
 don't kiss me any more." 
 
 " Give me your lips. I shall not sleep to-night if I have 
 lost one kiss." 
 
 " It's beginning to rain, Kai. . . . We must go home." 
 
 " Let it rain, Heinke, let it rain ; it will bring nothing but 
 blessings on your dear fair head." 
 
 She bent down to him with a gesture of passionate abandon- 
 ment and kissed him again and again, her heart rent in twain. 
 " Oh, if he could know and behold this ! He has given to me 
 all the purity of his youth, and now I am sitting here with 
 another. Oh, is it possible. ... I am a wretched creature. 
 . . . Oh, I must leave him and turn to this one. ... I have 
 never known how much I loved him. . . . No, no. I cannot 
 leave him ; he would despise and hate me, and that would kill 
 me. Oh, unhappy that I am, how dear his eyes are; they are 
 to blame. I will look at them no more." She covered her 
 eyes with her hands and groaned aloud, " Don't kiss me any 
 more . . . it's raining so. ... Come, dear Kai, I mustn't 
 do it any more I mustn't." 
 
 He sprang to his feet, and, sitting by her side, put his arms 
 round her. " Let it rain only give me your lips . . . why 
 are they so red, why do they kiss so burningly? Oh, your 
 mouth is wonderful; your eyes are inexpressibly sweet. . . . 
 It is strange that your cheeks do not burn." 
 
 " You must kiss them, Kai, then they too will burn. Come, 
 dear, dear one, come to me." She turned to him and kissed 
 him without ceasing on cheek and mouth. Her hair had be- 
 come loose, and she undid it and spread the soft waves, on 
 which the rain fell in heavy drops, all over him. Her breath 
 came hard and her whole body trembled. " I must do what I 
 am doing," she thought, " God forgive me. To-morrow 
 I will tell him to-day is a day of laughter and tears, kisses 
 and gnashing of teeth. Mother was right when she said, 
 1 You Bojes will all suffer because of your proud, passionate 
 hearts.' Come to me, Kai ; to-day all shall be given you. 
 Come . . . there . . . now. Kiss me, kiss me. Your kisses 
 are dear and pure." 
 
 The heavy summer rain wet her thin dress so that it clung 
 close to her form; he passed his hand over her, kissing the wet
 
 294 HOLYLAND 
 
 garment and praising the beauty of her limbs in eager, trem- 
 bling words. So they sat at the edge of the wood under the 
 young beeches, he in happiness, she with tortured conscience, 
 till the dusk came. 
 
 Then they rose and went down from the heights of the 
 valley, turning into the way that led to Hilligenlei. It was an 
 ancient way, that had been tramped by all kinds of feet, and 
 now these two passed along it. He spoke of the happiness of 
 to-morrow, she said nothing of the misery of to-morrow. 
 
 She came home and went up into her room. Then, ringing 
 her hands, she quickly changed her clothes, and then, throwing 
 herself on her bed, stared out into the darkness. Her mother 
 came in and said that she was going to spend the evening 
 with Anna, but she made no answer. 
 
 She cried aloud, over and over again, without her own 
 knowledge, " What am I to do ? " For a time it seemed clear 
 that Kai Jans had the elder claim. Then she saw the other, 
 alone and unhappy, with all his life the bitter feeling in his 
 heart, " That which was most sacred has betrayed you." . . . 
 Then she resolved to write to Kai and tell him, " I cannot ; 
 I am promised to another," but then she heard his misery break 
 forth in a loud cry. She could come to no conclusion, and 
 wandered all over the house seeking for a room where she could 
 leave her sorrow on the other side of the threshold. 
 
 At last, she could not have said how, she found herself in 
 the gable room. There, as if compelled by some might stronger 
 than her own, she fell suddenly on to her knees by the table 
 where they had sat together, first looking at the pictures, after- 
 wards she sitting on his knee. Then her tears came at last. 
 She wept aloud, stroking the table-cloth and the arm of the 
 chair with her hand, and kissing them as she spoke to him. 
 " My true love, my dear, dear one, listen a moment. I cannot 
 live and know you alone and sorrowful. Ah, my dear, how 
 quickly you caught me, how fast you held me, how you trusted 
 me, how good and dear you were! You did not ask how it 
 stood with soul and body; you trusted wholly in my goodness. 
 You laid your pure young manhood at my feet. . . . Oh, 
 come to me, come. ... I long to show you how I love you." 
 She wept and stroked the table-cloth, and gradually became 
 calmer. Her tears ceased and things became clear to her. 
 
 She lit the lamp, and, sitting down at his desk, wrote a short
 
 HOLYLAND 295 
 
 letter to Kai Jans, telling him of her engagement and how she 
 had not been able to tell him of it. Now she must tell him 
 that, and tell him she could not leave her betrothed; it would 
 embitter his whole life, and her conscience would never cease 
 to torment her. " Kai, I cannot do it. ... I am alone in the 
 house and I implore you, come and let me comfort you and be 
 strong; I cannot bear to see your despair." 
 
 Half an hour later, as she stood with beating heart by the 
 table in the lower room, listening to every step that passed in 
 the street, he came. 
 
 " Kai," she said, stretching her hands out to him in entreaty, 
 " I could not have acted differently . . . to-day. You were so 
 happy, you carried me off my feet; your love came so suddenly 
 and was so sweet. Oh, Kai, forgive me; be strong. I cannot, 
 cannot desert him." 
 
 Pale as death, he could not utter a word. She sank down 
 on the sofa and wept bitterly, her arms on the table in front 
 of her. " Oh, poor, dear one. I cannot, I cannot. Oh, don't 
 look at me in such despair. Oh, what misery everywhere." 
 
 He sat down opposite to her and asked her in a voice of utter 
 dejection how she had got to know the other, how long they 
 had been together, what their relations were, and so forth. 
 With outstretched arms and her hands folded on the table, the 
 tears streaming from her eyes as she looked at him, she an- 
 swered each of his questions as if replying to a judge. 
 
 At last she cried, weeping bitterly, " It is impossible for me 
 to leave him; I should ruin his life, and that would make me 
 miserable too. His heart is mine, wholly, and mine his. I 
 love you, too, very much; I love you terribly . . . how much 
 I did not know . . . but I must conquer it." 
 
 " That's the end, then," said he. " It is my fate, and no 
 one can contend with fate. There only remains the question 
 of what I am to do with my life." 
 
 His utter wretchedness appalled her and she cried aloud, 
 sinking back in the chair and stretching out her hands to him. 
 " I implore you to be strong. I love you so. Oh, Kai, be my 
 dear friend. Kai, some day, perhaps, a terrible sorrow will 
 come to me or to my children. . . . Who will help me then? 
 Oh, dear one, do not turn from me in anger. ... I cannot 
 bear it." 
 
 He bent over her and stroked her hair. " I am not angry
 
 296 HOLYLAND 
 
 with you; far, far from that. It is our fate. Be not afraid. 
 I am a man; I can see to it that I hold my head upright. I 
 have my old father and your dear friendship still. There . . . 
 there . . . don't cry so. ... Now let me go." 
 
 She held his hands fast, weeping sore. " I will think all 
 night what I can do for you; all my life I will try to find a 
 way to make you glad. It would have made me so happy to 
 have been your wife, so happy. He knows of you, how dear 
 you are to me, how good. I have told him a great deal about 
 you, and I shall tell my children. Kai, have pity on me; be 
 brave and do not ruin my life and his." 
 
 He looked down upon her and stroked her lovely, fair hair 
 again and again without saying a word, with eyes that seemed 
 to say "How strange it is; how sacred!" Then he went 
 away. 
 
 He went home to the little blue room that opened from the 
 kitchen, where he had slept since he was a child, and lay long 
 unconscious on his bed, without stirring. He was aroused by 
 what seemed to be the sound of a deep voice, saying clearly, 
 " Did you think you could tell the Saviour's story with laugh- 
 ter in your heart ? " He covered his face with his hands and 
 wept. 
 
 The next day he sent her a brief note, in which he begged 
 her not to come to him for the present; he could not bear to 
 see her. After finishing his work he should go away. He had 
 heard from his old friend that he was sailing for Cape Town 
 at the end of the month, and probably he would accompany 
 him. He shou!4 be glad to have an opportunity of getting to 
 know the man she loved. 
 
 A week later Peter Volquardsen returned, and, having heard 
 everything from Heinke, went over in the evening and talked 
 things over with Kai. He told him of his own quiet, peaceful 
 childhood, sheltered by the care of wise and thoughtful parents ; 
 of his acquaintance with a splendid and cultured man, who 
 had brought into his life the purifying influences of art. All 
 his life had been ordered and wisely counselled. His mother 
 had taught him to know the great mysteries of life, its inner 
 secrets; his father and his elder brothers had taught him the 
 ways of the world. He had gone through life as through a 
 garden, beautiful in its unclouded peace, without troubk or
 
 HOLYLAND 297 
 
 doubt, guarded to the right and the left by the fair gifts of 
 art ; and one day he had come on his way upon the most pre- 
 cious tKing of all, more to him than all that art could give 
 Heinke Boje. He related all this with shining eyes in his 
 clear, straightforward way; at the end he took Kai Jans' arm 
 and said, " I know that your life has been different." 
 
 Then Kai told him the story of his own life; in a quiet, 
 emotionless voice he told him his earliest recollection was that 
 his little mother had no money in the house, that she ured to 
 read English novels, and the only pictures he ever saw were 
 Berlin fashion plates and the hideous paintings in church. He 
 described the day when his eldest sister had come home and 
 knelt before her mother on the ground; the time he had spent 
 in learning from Heine Wulk how to be a wind-bag; then his 
 wretchedness on the Clara and the confused experiences on the 
 Gude Wife, when his hand was injured, and he used to think 
 constantly, "You are no use for anything; jump overboard." 
 Then came the grammar school, the sensation of ill-fitting 
 clothes and heavy boots, and the weariness of giving lessons; 
 the feeling, " Your father is a strange, vague sort of man ; " 
 then his poverty-stricken student days. Student days! when 
 hungry eyes catch stolen glimpses of the range and variety of 
 life; when one strives blindly in the mighty stream of existence 
 and the only pleasure lies in friendships with young men in 
 happier circumstances and occasional glances from a girl's 
 friendly eyes. 
 
 Then with manhood came the time of gloomy, puzzled 
 brooding, when his soul seemed oppressed by leaden clouds 
 that weighed upon it, when all round was anxious, impenetra- 
 ble darkness and for long no light. Then at last, when the 
 darkness became hideous, came the light! ... yes ... and 
 with the light came knowledge of the truth and beauty by his 
 side. He had known her from a child ; he had a claim ; 
 at least, he had helped her soul and character to grow. He 
 thought she belonged to him ... oh, how dear, how beautiful 
 she is ... how beautiful and dear! 
 
 Thus they began, each speaking of himself; then they turned 
 to wide and serious problems, and it soon proved that there 
 was much sympathy in spite of all differences in temperament 
 and circumstances. They parted with the feeling that they 
 could be friends.
 
 298 HOLYLAND 
 
 A week later Heinke herself came, in spite of his request. 
 With a shy gesture of unspeakable tenderness she begged him 
 to walk a little way with her. In reply to her question he told 
 her that he had begun his description of the life of Jesus, and 
 was painfully making progress with it; he hoped to complete 
 it in about five weeks. 
 
 Soon he made her turn back. She saw that he spoke with 
 difficulty, his face was pale and his eyes fixed on the path. She 
 asked him in a low, trembling voice, " Do you dislike walking 
 with me? " 
 
 " I cannot bear it! " he said breathing hard, " it is beyond 
 my power. I cannot bear to see your face and the movements 
 of your dear body; it is too much." 
 
 " Oh," she moaned, " what a wretched creature I am." 
 
 " It will be different," he said, " with the passage of time 
 but now, I beg you, do not come again. I will come to you 
 once before I go away!" 
 
 She wept aloud. " Oh, I wanted you so much to go on 
 caring for me until we both grew old and quiet; then we could 
 sit side by side, holding each other's hand. I can't bear you to 
 be strange and wrath with me." 
 
 " How could I be wrath with you? " he said. " Have you 
 sinned against me? You are love and truth itself; nothing I 
 possess is more precious than your friendship; believe me, I 
 shall cherish it. But now I must go away and stay away, until 
 I am strong. Go now, be not afraid for me." 
 
 He gave her his hand and she went, weeping. 
 
 For six weeks he worked day by day and heard nothing from 
 her. But every day, as he walked along the dyke about four 
 o'clock, he could see, looking beyond the town in the direction 
 of Volkmersdorf, a solitary figure standing. He stood still, 
 and they looked across at one another without daring to raise 
 their hands in greeting. 
 
 One lovely evening in the middle of October, when a fresh, 
 cold autumn breeze was blowing and the golden rays of the 
 sinking sun tinged the last leaves of the chestnuts with vivid 
 colour, Heinke Boje came home from Volkmersdorf without 
 having seen him. She went into her room, and there, on her 
 bed, lay a letter, in which he said farewell to her in a few ten- 
 der words, and beside it a fresh manuscript, with the super-
 
 HOLYLAND 299 
 
 scription, in the strong well-formed letters that she loved so 
 well, " The Life of the Saviour, presented in accordance with 
 the results of German research: the foundation of the German 
 Renascence."
 
 CHAPTER XXVI. 
 
 THE MANUSCRIPT 
 
 MANKIND has risen painfully out of the darkness of night. 
 Its rise has taken many hundred thousand years. For hundreds 
 of thousands of years men lived like foxes in a land without 
 trees or forests. Couching fearfully in caves in wakeful slum- 
 ber, in cunning ambush or in wild attack, their existence was 
 that of the animals, and they had no consciousness of any dif- 
 ference between them. Gradually in the course of thousands 
 of centuries their peculiar qualities, and especially the shape of 
 their hands, raised men above the other animals. Gradually, 
 with many doubts, this recognition came first to one and then 
 another, the most intelligent and bravest of the race. 
 
 It took thousands of centuries before it was recognised by 
 all that there is a difference between men and animals. And 
 man is the master. But the darkness and confusion of the 
 souls of animals endured for long ages in their souls, their ter- 
 rors were the terrors of animals; they feared the wind, the 
 reflections of water, the darkness of the wood, thunder and 
 lightning. Everything around them seemed possessed by un- 
 known spirits; they had no knowledge of good and evil; the 
 differentiation of being afraid from not being afraid, of 
 strength from weakness, of victory from defeat, exhausted their 
 categories. 
 
 Wandering in hordes and tribes from the centre of Asia, 
 moving and propagating themselves like sparrows, growing 
 continually, one horde constantly displacing another, they 
 gradually spread over the whole face of the earth, and thus 
 came to different lands and different climates. Some tribes 
 came beneath the exhausting heat of the burning sun ; others to 
 desolate regions; others to ice-bound chill, where they lost their 
 vitality, succumbed, or were frozen out of existence. Many of 
 these tribes and peoples perished centuries before our epoch; 
 
 300
 
 HOLYLAND 301 
 
 others are gradually being exterminated in our own times in 
 Australia, America, and Africa; others, more fortunate, came 
 to regions where strength and progress were forced upon them 
 by the pressure of vigorous neighbours, by sun and wind and 
 sea, by barley and wine. They raised their heads higher and 
 higher, the eyes grew brighter, their foreheads more lofty. 
 Slowly and painfully their fear of Nature died away. The 
 bravest among them went boldly into the darkness; it is the 
 bravest child of a company of terrified children alone in the 
 house that ventures into the dark corner. For long they contin- 
 ued in fear of ghosts and tried to placate them by prayers and 
 offerings; very gradually, with the growth of man's power over 
 Nature, these spirits lost their terrors. Evil spirits shrank 
 back, and their powers dwindled, with the slow and gradual 
 growth of a faint belief in good spirits. There arose a dim, 
 uncertain apprehension that right was not with the strong, but 
 with the good. The inner light of conscience burned up, and 
 as its rays penetrated the mist the path of mankind was clearer ; 
 they had a guide, they could not wholly lose their way, they 
 might come further than our dreams may know. 
 
 But it was not the whole people, not the masses, that made 
 a universal step in advance ; the light only shone in individuals. 
 In a smooth sea the waves come gently swelling on, grey-blue, 
 one after another, far out to sea, till lo, all of a sudden one 
 wave rises higher than the others, leaps up, and comes on splen- 
 did in its silver crown until it falls over its own feet. These 
 men, the solitary crowned among mankind, rise like that wave 
 and fall even so, over their own feet. 
 
 On the morning of the race the steps forward were slow and 
 tentative we do not know the earliest names. The art of 
 writing was still unknown, and it is only after its discovery 
 that we are acquainted with the names of those holy heroes. 
 Persia produced Zarathustra; China Confucius; India Buddha; 
 Palestine Moses, Elias, Isaiah, Jeremiah ; Greece /Eschylus and 
 Plato. All these men stood alone among: their people, and had 
 to suffer for having advanced beyond their age. Even in them 
 there still was much that was hard and dark, wild and almost 
 childishly confused, and yet in their hours of illumination they 
 rose to a high and gracious insight which the human spirit can 
 never outgrow. " I came not to hate but to love." " If I have 
 thee, O God, earth and heaven to me are naught."
 
 302 HOLYLAND 
 
 After the passing of these men there came a time of calm. 
 The universe rises and falls in waves ; the exhausted vital force 
 produced no more heroes. Each nation stood in rigid silence, 
 holding its inheritance in its closed hand, and while mediocrity 
 grew the grip closed fast so that the inheritance, closed in, 
 began to putrefy. This inert silence lasted for centuries; on 
 the ocean of national life no wind blew, no waves rose; putre- 
 faction seemed likely to spread all over human life. 
 
 Then the sword descended on the peoples living round the 
 central sea. The Romans, a people vexed by no subtleties, 
 troubled by no search for truth, no brooding over problems, 
 but devoted to the practical side of life, the calculation of ma- 
 terial advantages, subdued all other nations to their sway; 
 everywhere they rent and disturbed, tearing asunder the old 
 nations of sensitive dreamers, Egyptians, Hebrews, Greeks, 
 Persians, Germans. 
 
 And in this wild confusion of dismembered nations there 
 arose a horrible conflict of opinion. There was a seething tur- 
 moil of beliefs like the turbulent confluence of seven waters in 
 the stream; men went and asked the philosophers for their 
 opinion ; others abandoned themselves to the unrestrained trans- 
 ports of the Greek mystics, crying, "Nature! Nature! O 
 man, thou art no more! " to kneel next day before the image 
 of an Egyptian goddess. Some raised their eyes in worship 
 to the marble statue of a Roman Emperor, seeking in vain for 
 the holiness of human goodness in those harsh imperial traits; 
 the men who went on Friday to hear from the German sol- 
 diery how they worshipped Baldur and Freya under the beech 
 trees of their native land, stood on Saturday with covered heads 
 in the Jewish Synagogue, hearing the teacher read from the 
 ancient book, " Keep my commandments. So shall it be well 
 with thee." 
 
 This confusion raged all round the Mediterranean; from 
 the streets of Gibraltar to Persia there was nothing but ques- 
 tioning and murmuring, "What is the meaning of human life? 
 What is the meaning of God? What is truth? Do you 
 know what makes a human heart holy and joyous?" Thus 
 at a time of long drought country folk stand in groups talking 
 and arguing together. ' The rain must come . . . look at 
 that cloud! . . . no, it is nothing;" then suddenly in the 
 night, when their thoughts are far away, a rustling begins to
 
 HOLYLAND 303 
 
 sound among the tree tops in front of their windows. Thus 
 men waited and talked and strained their eyes. Man cannot 
 help searching for the meaning of life, searching for happiness. 
 At last Nature's time of rest came to an end. Its rising and 
 falling is like the rising and falling of the waves, and now 
 once more a man arose, a hero in the mould of the holy heroes 
 of old, and from the east the rustling sound spread over the 
 withered nations, till it became a mighty roar. 
 
 In one corner of the huge, motley Empire there lay a coun- 
 try very much like Schleswig-Holstein, of the same size and 
 narrow length and the same extended coastline; in the north 
 the silent expanse of heather-covered hills, in the south a great 
 and brilliant town just as in our country. As in our country, 
 also, there dwelt there in the villages a population of farmers, 
 a mixed race sprung from two excellent stocks. It was an 
 unhappy people, suffering under the cruel and inefficient gov- 
 ernment of a corrupt princeling in the north, and an imperial 
 legate in the south. Foreign capital devoured the land as a 
 wolf the sheep ; the people were drained dry with direct and 
 indirect taxation, customs dues, and monopolies; officials stole 
 and peculated in all directions; all the money, and money is 
 power, was taken out of the country. 
 
 Then there was the Church, with its extravagant claims. 
 In the great capital in the south a huge temple arose, with vast 
 halls and courts, lofty, ornate consistories, thousands of priests, 
 high and low, and many teachers attached to it, who spread 
 its tenets through the land; all to be maintained at the popu- 
 lar expense. 
 
 The crowning misfortune was that the people was divided 
 against itself; there was a seething confusion in politics and in 
 religion. One party was composed of the quiet people, dwell- 
 ing scattered all over the country, especially in the villages and 
 on the moors. They were men occupied in laborious manual 
 labour, which leaves the mind free to wander off into strange 
 dreams and brooding abstractions; men occupied in toil for 
 daily bread that left the soul free to raise itself to God. The 
 Church was too cold, stiff, and respectable for them ; they 
 sought out some eternal truth to comfort them for themselves, 
 burying themselves after the day's work was done in ancient 
 records and prayer-books, and reading there in joyful amaze-
 
 304 HOLYLAND 
 
 ment how, in times of like necessity, centuries ago, their parents 
 had not lost courage, but had held fast to the belief that the 
 eternal did not cherish the proud and rich, but rather the lowly 
 and humble, and to them would one day send a " Saviour." 
 Only the few rose to such heights of faith; the piety of the 
 majority was a dull, uncomprehending acceptance. 
 
 The second party was the Liberals, and they fell into two 
 well-defined camps. There was a small, highly respectable 
 Liberal party in the capital composed of rich men who, super- 
 ficially educated, enjoyed the present and were hand and glove 
 with Church and State, caring little for abstract principles; 
 the other was composed of men of an inferior social grade, 
 minor officials of the Empire in the customs and police de- 
 partments, and the more frivolous, adventurous sections of the 
 working classes, the energetic men of aspiring disposition. 
 
 The third party was the Nationalists, by far the most pow- 
 erful, the party of narrow, orthodox patriotism. Their pro- 
 gramme was " Maintenance of national religion and customs 
 in opposition to everything foreign." " Pray seven times a day, 
 wash seven times a day, give alms seven times; go to church 
 daily; alter nothing, improve nothing; this is the way to please 
 the Almighty. To reward us He will send us a hero, a 
 1 Saviour,' who will free us from the accursed foreign beliefs." 
 Clad in its rotten armour this mighty party, full of petty and 
 malign suspiciousness, stood guard over what it considered 
 " purity " and " holiness," inspected all the prayer meeting* 
 and schools in the country, ruling the people with tyrannical 
 might. The Liberals resisted, saying, " Live and let live ; away 
 with dead formulae and commandments ; " and the quiet coun- 
 try folk resisted, saying, " You are too proud, too narrow, too 
 rigid for us ; we seek God after our own fashion, reading in our 
 old, sacred books, and pondering in the night-time. We have 
 no time to spend all day in praying and washing and going 
 to church; we have our bread to earn." The Nationalists in- 
 vented a nickname to express their contempt for these unpa- 
 triotic people, a biting gibe that hit both parties : " They are 
 publicans and sinners." 
 
 Over and above these three great parties there were swarms 
 of homeless beggars, tramps, and sick folk. There were no 
 physicians, no asylums, no hospitals, no social sympathy of any 
 kind. All the crime, misery, and vagabondage of the country
 
 HOLYLAND 305 
 
 skulked up and down the high roads or the village lanes, in 
 front of the very doors of the rich. The Nationalists cast out 
 alms as the creed bade them, and bred more beggars. 
 
 Such was the condition of this nation by the sea, a people 
 miserable and torn by opposing factions, tyrannised over by a 
 harsh and grasping Government whose faith was not theirs. 
 
 Forty years later the great Nationalist party, summoning to- 
 gether its forces for a mighty outbreak, roused the whole 
 people to an ill-fated insurrection which ended in bloody anni- 
 hilation. The people survived, indeed, but, as their hero said, 
 like a flock standing in the night without a shepherd, round 
 which the wild beasts are already sharpening their teeth as they 
 cower in the darkness. Restless, it cried aloud, " Help must 
 come . . . what is coming? It is the end of the world! Is 
 it the hero who has been promised us? Laugh! Let us eat, 
 drink, and be merry, for to-morrow we die. . . . Count up your 
 resources. . . . Will he come from Heaven? Will he come 
 from the people? . . . Listen! do you hear a rustling in the 
 trees? God, our Father, Eternal Power! help. . . . My soul 
 thirsts for Thee, my body faints for Thee in the scorched and 
 parching land." 
 
 In the north, on the moors between lake and sea, there dwelt 
 a man and his wife, Joseph the son of Jacob, and Mary, both 
 of ancient and noble though mixed descent. The man seems 
 either to have died rather young or married somewhat late in 
 life. His wife lived to see her children grow up. This brought 
 her no distinction, for it is a remarkable fact that this mother 
 of a hero seems to have had no comprehension of the inward 
 greatness of her son. 
 
 The couple had five children, who grew up in the fair vil- 
 lage, seeing and learning all that villaee life among an intelli- 
 gent and vigorous race can afford. The first child of the mar- 
 riage, Jesus by name, had a pair of deep, clear eyes, which saw 
 and understood all the peaceful pictures presented to them, a 
 tender and sympathetic soul whose inner light, burning clearer 
 as his childhood advanced, translated what it saw into some- 
 thin e of sweet and precious significance. 
 
 The child went out with the labourer to plough; saw his 
 mother's sadness when she was expecting her youngest child, 
 and her sudden joy when she held the new-born babe in her
 
 306 HOLYLAND 
 
 arms. With his companions he went up into the hills when 
 the first flowers appeared in the fields; they stood with the 
 flowers they had picked in their hands, gazing far across the 
 land to the blue sea in the west. ... In the evening he told 
 his mother that the neighbour's son had left home in anger 
 and gone out into strange lands, trouble following in his wan- 
 ton footsteps. He saw the cornfield on the hillside as it lay, 
 white, ready for harvesting; he stood at the door with the other 
 children to watch the wedding of a village maid. In the 
 morning he told his mother how the bridesmaids had gone 
 through the village at night with blazing candles in their 
 hands. . . . He helped to bind the sheaves, and the thistles 
 that were bound up in them pricked his hands; in the evening 
 of the same day, as he returned home with his father, they 
 heard in the street that the richest farmer in the village had 
 died, and the people declared that he and his brothers were bad 
 men, and misers to boot. . . . He saw the shepherd coming 
 through the village with his flocks, and as the sheep went 
 slowly on the shepherd stopped to relate how he spent all 
 night in searching for a sheep, and found it in the morning, and 
 his weather-beaten face beamed with joy. . . . Late in the 
 evening of the same day a neighbour ran in to tell them that 
 the farmer's wanton son, who three years ago had left his 
 father's house and the village with proud words and headstrong 
 anger, had returned home. He had stood for hours in the 
 street in the darkness, looking at the lights in his father's house, 
 clad in rags. " In such rags! And now, what do you think 
 . . . just listen!" And they heard the sound of singing and 
 jubilation in the village, so great was the parents' joy at his re- 
 covery. The child got up and went out to the door to listen 
 to the singing. 
 
 The town child? what does the town child know of the 
 world, of Nature, of human life? Only a wretched, ugly 
 little corner. The village child sees in miniature the whole 
 world and all that in it is. 
 
 He was a shy, thoughtful child ; he stood aside and looked 
 on at life with quiet, wondering eyes. He played with the 
 other children, but it often happened that almost involuntarily 
 he would step aside from the gay throng as if some invisible 
 voice had said earnestly to him, " Stand aside a little." 
 
 The child's eyes became quieter and quieter; veil after veil
 
 HOLYLAND 307 
 
 sank down over them; but in his soul there was no darkness; 
 the more the outer world faded away there burned up in his 
 soul a still, bright light that filled it wondrously with its glow- 
 ing purity and gracious warmth. Happy, sad, the childish soul 
 stood in the holy hall, before the lofty doors that soon would 
 open, and " now now soon I shall see the radiance of 
 Heaven." Then the children came and waked him, saying to 
 one another, " Jesus is dreaming again ; look, he is lost in 
 dreams." He came back to the others, his eyes still misty with 
 the sweet remembrance, his face bearing the traces of a gentle 
 sadness. 
 
 Every Sunday as boy and youth he stood among the other 
 villagers in the village school and meeting-room, to listen to an 
 earnest teacher, who read with slow solemnity from the old 
 chronicles and psalms; a Nationalist and clerical, he read out 
 God's many commandments with brows sternly knit, " Thou 
 shalt . . . Thou shalt ... If thou dost so-and-so, thou shalt 
 please God. . . ." 
 
 The boy listened in shy bewilderment. . . . Then the 
 teacher laid aside the book and took up another, and the voice 
 of the gloomy, serious man warmed and his eyes burned as he 
 read of the heroes who had arisen of old among the people as 
 the birds rise out of the heather; how they brooded alone, 
 searching for an answer to the weary riddle of human life, the 
 riddle of birth and death, God and conscience, guilt and justice, 
 seeking a way by which a tender human soul might win its way 
 through life without sorrow or punishment. Some of these 
 brooding heroes did force a way through night and terror, but 
 not by their own unaided strength. Children run fearfully 
 through the darkness, terrified, with such beating hearts, 
 till at last they find themselves in their mother's outstretched 
 arms, where for a while they sob stormily, terrified by their 
 own daring, till, their terror subsiding, they laugh again. Like 
 them, these heroes rushed in blind and eager confidence on their 
 adventurous search for truth and faith to the feet of the Eter- 
 nal Reality, and there cried, " Eternal Reality, we believe that 
 Thou art goodness." From this glorious citadel they speak 
 to their people with a glowing courage shining in their eyes, 
 tell them of the misery of godlessness, of the great goodness 
 of God, of the glorious hope of wondrous help from God, and 
 of the Saviour who was to come to purify and bless the land.
 
 308 HOLYLAND 
 
 As the boy listened to these stories of the holy heroes his pure 
 young heart swelled with a secret and lofty joy. " Thou 
 shalt . . ." was forgotten; fear was fled; far into the night 
 he beheld in dreams the brave and holy heroes, with their pas- 
 sionate belief in the goodness of God, their passionate love for 
 their unhappy people, and the Saviour to come, the bravest and 
 purest of them all: till he fell asleep, his cheeks glowing with 
 happiness. 
 
 There were in the village a number of upright, unlettered 
 families who belonged to the quiet country party, and probably 
 his parents were among them. His tender spirit drank in the 
 ancient beliefs, the ancient dreams that he heard his parents 
 and their neighbours discussing. They spoke of God, who 
 dwelt above in the blue realms of Heaven surrounded by good 
 angels ; of the devil, banished to the remotest corner behind the 
 heavy grey clouds on the northern verge of the sky, with his 
 company of bad angels. Mortal destiny depends on the fortune 
 of the war raging day and night between God and His satel- 
 lites and the devil and his; all sickness and madness comes from 
 the evil spirits ; how they plague the sick people in the village ! 
 Seven spirits or angels sent by the devil lodge within the 
 maniac living at the far end of the village with his parents; 
 it is they who make him utter the shrieks that resound through 
 the streets. A time will come when all this shall be changed ; 
 some day there will be an end of all sorrow and trouble 
 caused by strangers and by evil spirits. The Saviour will come 
 the greatest of all the holy heroes. Some say he is to be an 
 angel and fall down from Heaven; others he is to be a man 
 descended from some ancient, impoverished royal house. With 
 the help of God he will set up the rule of God upon earth all 
 over the land, from the moor villages of the north to the cap- 
 ital in the south. Then the people will be free and holy and 
 happy. 
 
 Thus the boy heard all the beliefs held by the Church and 
 among the people in this time of trouble and disquiet. And 
 he criticised them all, yet, till the day of his death, he never 
 despised or cast away a single belief or superstition. Like his 
 people and his times, he lived in a world of wonders. For him, 
 too, angels descended from Heaven all his life long. He saw 
 the devil fall like a flash of lightning; he believed that Satanic 
 emissaries possessed the insane and the diseased. He believed
 
 HOLYLAND 309 
 
 that with the help of God or of the devil, man could perform 
 superhuman actions; the dead could rise from the earth and 
 walk. 
 
 But there was a trait of greatness in this growing son of 
 man, a gift that marked him out, and this it was. He com- 
 prehended in the music of his nature all the notes sounded by 
 the words of people and by the ancient books, but one supreme 
 note rose in him, sounding clearer, stronger year by year, sound- 
 ing pure and strong and penetrating above all other notes, dom- 
 inating and subduing all other notes the note that had ceased 
 to sound among his people in his time, the note that had not 
 yet been struck by other nations, the note which the holy heroes 
 of old had comprehended and to which they had responded, 
 " Let me rejoice in Thy grace that Thou hast seen my tribula- 
 tion and hast troubled Thyself for the need of my soul." 
 
 His real heroism lay in this, that in a time of dull acquies- 
 cence, of sordid ideals, and confused aims, he had held up a 
 high and lofty belief in the goodness of God, and died for this 
 belief in the freshness of his youth. . . . 
 
 As yet, however, he is only a boy, a youth, uncertain of him- 
 self, cherishing in wondering doubt and bewilderment his pro- 
 found and marvellous thoughts. 
 
 Then came early youth. He learned a craft in the village. 
 He became a carpenter and left the village. Wandering 
 through the valley, down the dry river-bed, he saw the ruins 
 of the house which had been torn up by the last earthquake; 
 then, reaching the sea-beach, he saw the pearl-fishers' boats 
 dancing on the surge, while the merchant stood on the bank 
 with his purse to see what they had caught. He passed through 
 the poverty-stricken moorland villages to the inland lake; 
 standing before the castle that the evil princeling had built, he 
 heard the complaints of the unhappy people of his cruelty and 
 of his ruling vice ; he saw the countless numbers of the homeless 
 poor, the sick and the insane lying in the streets, crowds of 
 soldiers and officials railing against them at the street corners. 
 He took a three days' journey with some of the villagers down 
 the huge temple in the capital. There, in the midst of the 
 hungry misery of the people, he saw respectable Liberals, 
 princes of the Church, going in their silken raiment to a rich 
 banquet given by the foreign governor. At the street corners 
 stood the Nationalists in grave mourning garments. The peo-
 
 310 HOLYLAND 
 
 pie followed blindly, filling the churches, gabbling the prayers, 
 giving the rich priests their poor savings. 
 
 On their way home the peasants discussed whether the Na- 
 tionalists were right in saying that the stipulated gifts must be 
 made to the priests, even though one's own aged parents per- 
 ished of starvation, for God and His commandments come be- 
 fore filial love; whether it were really God's will that one 
 should not move a finger on the Sabbath, even to help man or 
 beast in trouble. Could God be so petty and so jealous? They 
 pondered deeply over this as they went their way, till suddenly 
 one of the quietists struck up an old song in a quivering voice, 
 " To Thee I raise my eyes, Thou throned in Heaven ; behold, 
 as the eyes of a servant are directed to the hand of the Master, 
 our eyes look up to God, till such time as He has mercy upon 
 us." 
 
 He returned to the village in silence. In the home of his 
 parents he dwelt quietly, busy with his craft, building and re- 
 pairing houses in the village. His eager eyes regarded his craft 
 and all that Nature and life presented to him, but they did not 
 stay, caught like fish in a net, but, penetrating like the rays of 
 the sun through all appearances, reached their inner cause, the 
 secret and eternal power behind them. He found joy in the 
 waving field of wheat, in the lily blossoming on the pond, in 
 the young girl standing at the door; but he left them, with no 
 thought of touching or gathering them. All phenomena were 
 to him merely a symbol of the eternal power that lay behind 
 them, dark and obscure. " Thou art all goodness and love. 
 If only all men could share my belief, my happiness! Eternal 
 Power, what am I? what are my thoughts? Send soon the 
 holy Saviour. Great is the need of mv people." 
 
 The people in the village said, " He is a strange man, full 
 of profound wisdom, of holy earnestness, as innocent as a babe 
 at the breast." They saw and knew no more. They did not 
 guess that behind those pure and limpid eves lav a soul that 
 grew every day in depth and insight. He himsplf knew it not. 
 He was a poor, restless son of man, now thrilling with joy, 
 again with unspeakable fears, shaken by godlike thoughts, a 
 genius in being. 
 
 Time passed on ... he reached his thirtieth year. People 
 in the village would ask his advice in difficult matters, but he 
 only cast his eyes down, deep in thought; answering came
 
 HOLYLAND 311 
 
 hardly to him. A few wise, patient men in the village think 
 and say, " What will become of him? Let him be! only wait; 
 some day he will soar aloft like the eagle." Others shake their 
 heads and say, " What is he? A queer creature, that's all." 
 
 His hour is not yet come; soul and spirit are not yet clear. 
 God is still forging and hammering. Of the old heroes it was 
 said, " I make thee to be a pillar of iron and a wall of brass 
 against the whole land, against its Government, against its 
 Church, against the whole population ; " for he must be hard, 
 must indeed be of iron, who is to stand alone against the whole 
 people. 
 
 The whole land was oppressed and restless, a heavy burden 
 lay upon their souls, they were bound down to poverty and 
 madness. Leaden clouds stretched from the sea to the lake, 
 from the heather hills of the north to the great town of the 
 south. Once, twice, the flame sprang high in the woods or on 
 the moors. Some eager, desperate spirit appeared. " I ... I 
 am the Saviour! Arise, my people, arise! " The Government 
 stamped the fire out with fierce imprecations, then drew their 
 breath hard. " When will help come to the parching land ? 
 Now, or never. Go out, child, see whether the storm is 
 rising." 
 
 " There is nothing, father." 
 
 Then the first peal of heavy thunder broke over the land. 
 
 In the south, not far from the capital, a man arose, a man 
 like one of the old, holy heroes sprung from the despairing 
 people. He stood and spoke. What he spoke was half-despair, 
 half-laughing gladness. 
 
 " People ! people ! hear what I say. Have we reached the 
 end of life and of every hope? Does our need reach up to our 
 throats? Then you know how the old books run, 'From 
 an old decaying royal stem shall shoot out a young branch.' 
 Come he must ... he comes! Look! He is quite near. He 
 comes! a man of wondrous powers, the power of God within 
 him ! the angels of God on his right hand and on his left. He 
 will harry and slay the oppressors and carry terror among the 
 people. The Nationalists, with their self-satisfied piety; the 
 Liberals, smooth and silky, who sit in church and at the court; 
 all the lying hypocrites who live in luxury and care nothing 
 for the wretchedness of the people, who lay heavy burdens on
 
 312 HOLYLAND 
 
 the people as if such were the commandments of God, while 
 they themselves do not stir a finger; they load their country's 
 land with debt, devour its houses, and pray all the time with- 
 out ceasing; all these people are an abomination to the Lord 
 and to His Messenger. He will destroy them all. And when 
 He has done all this, when He has driven forth the enemy and 
 slain those who ruin the people, then the others, the oppressed, 
 the quiet people of the country, shall dwell in peace and hap- 
 piness in a land purified and free, He their glorious King, 
 they His free and gladsome people. . . . Where are ye, ye poor 
 and pure in heart? How few ye are, my people! Hark! He 
 comes! Purify your souls! Away with all evil from heart and 
 life! Hark! the steps of the Son of God ! " 
 
 So he spoke in broken words, spoke to a despairing people. 
 So the alarums ring out before the break of day over the army 
 lying in uneasy sleep on the battlefield opposite the foe. The 
 whole people heard his voice. 
 
 The Liberals laughed. "Live and let live!" The proud 
 Church party stared. "What? the Saviour is to come as our 
 enemy? What a fool the man is!" All the quiet, unhappy 
 people in the land leapt up. " What a note is that ! What 
 does he say? Misery at an end?" and they went to him in 
 crowds. And the clear note penetrated to the silent depths of 
 that divinely quickened soul dwelling in the quiet northern 
 village, to Jesus the carpenter. "What does he say? The 
 piety which the Church teaches is false? God wants pure, holy 
 men. . . . Yes, these are they whom He wants." 
 
 At night in autumn a storm rises in the western sea, comes 
 over to land with a roar, expends its first headlong onset in 
 vain against the high, thick beeches round the woodland pond. 
 Foiled, it pauses for a moment, to dash with concentrated force 
 against the stubborn resistance of the trees; as they crash to 
 the ground it throws itself upon the pool, lashing and tortur- 
 ing it. Such a storm now arose in the depths of his silent 
 soul. "What does he say? the long-promised Saviour is com- 
 ing now? now? now the great wonder is to be? the people is 
 to be free and happy! now? yes, now! Our need is at our 
 throats. Yes, he is coming now. I will go and see the 
 man." 
 
 And so the quiet young master laid aside hammer and meas- 
 ure. As he went the Eternal Power glowed and worked
 
 HOLYLAND 313 
 
 within him. " The Saviour is coming. . . . What does he 
 look like? What will he be like? God and the spirits of 
 goodwill work powerfully within him." 
 
 When he reached his destination on the evening of the sec- 
 ond day he found crowds gathered together from all directions, 
 from west and east, from the great town in the south and the 
 moors in the north. An ill-treated, confused, and despairing 
 people, betrayed and cheated by King and Church. They looked 
 up to the one strong man who spoke to them of the downfall 
 of the King and of the rich and of the pious Church party, 
 and foretold the time of bliss at hand for all who were free 
 from sin. " The Saviour, the Messenger from God is at hand ; 
 in one hand he holds death, in the other a happy life in a free 
 land." Thousands came to him, and, kneeling down in the 
 stream that flowed in its bed of white sand down into the val- 
 ley, vowed, with his hands upon their heads, " Our souls shall 
 be as pure as the water, as clean as the white sand, so that we 
 may dwell in a pure and happy land under the holy hero, we 
 who now are meek, lowly, and oppressed." 
 
 This sight, this supreme moment, made a deep impression 
 on the northern peasant ; his soul, freed from the dangers which 
 has beset it among the silent moors, of distraction by visionary 
 dreaming or restless wandering from its true course, was roused 
 at once to insight and to action. " What does he say? . . . Pure 
 men are to live in a pure land? How can a man become pure? 
 He does not know. No one knows. Do I know? . . . Do I 
 know? . . . The pure life? Yes. I can point the way . . . 
 have I not borne that knowledge in my soul since I was a 
 child? Have I not always seen Thee, holy and everlasting 
 power, as Fatherly love? I have been Thy child since I could 
 think at all; Thy child, loving, pure, beloved. In communion 
 with Thee all sin is wiped away. The kingdom of Heaven is 
 at hand. Happiness is at hand for my poor people. Yes, it 
 is at hand . . . now it must come. Help, O Father, that Thy 
 Kingdom come! Bring all Thy people to Thy knees pure and 
 happy as I am! Father, what am I to do? where is the Sa- 
 viour? Father, who is he? Father, show him to me. . . . 
 Father, who is he?" 
 
 Overcome by the waves of thought and feeling that surged 
 through his soul, he knelt down in the white sand among the 
 others, seeming in that action utterly to abrogate his will and
 
 314 HOLYLAND 
 
 to hand over his whole being in passionate self-surrender into 
 the hands of the sacred and everlasting Power above him. " I 
 am Thine, my will is Thine; my Father, who art goodness and 
 truth. . . ." and in a moment of wrapt and wholly blissful 
 ecstasy he seemed to feel and to hear that the Eternal Power, 
 his " Father in Heaven," accepted this passionate surrender of 
 his pure will. " Thou art my beloved son, in whom I am well 
 pleased." 
 
 He arose and stepped back. That night he stayed in the 
 district; in the new and rapturous illumination of joyous 
 thoughts and sublime presentiments he understood clearly the 
 vague misery, the singing joy of his childhood. "I am a 
 prophet, a herald of eternal truth like the holy heroes of old! 
 A messenger from God. Happiness is coming to my poor peo- 
 ple: the Kingdom of Heaven! it is at hand. I announce it, 
 I His messenger! the last of His messengers, the Saviour?" 
 
 Next morning he set out northwards. For two, three, 
 hours he walked till his homeward way brought him into a 
 lonely and desolate region. Here the lofty feelings that had 
 surged up in him sank, and as he wandered over the barren 
 moor his heart became heavier and heavier at every step. At 
 last he stood still, brooding. " When I reach home to-morrow 
 evening, I, who have always been so shy and silent, must stand 
 up and say : ' Purify your hearts, purify your lives ; the King- 
 dom of Heaven is at hand. . . .' They are all expecting a 
 holy hero who shall free us with sword and word from the 
 foreign yoke. 'Out with your .swords! ' That I cannot do. 
 God's voice has never said that to me. Or can I? I am the 
 wisest in the land ; I have power over men ; shall I announce 
 what will please them? Shall I alter a little what God says 
 within me? What I have to say to them is too lofty, too 
 sacred. . . . The quiet, yes; but my mother; my brothers; all 
 the rich men of the village! The Nationalists and the Prince! 
 The first will be suspicious; the second will threaten; and the 
 Prince will have me put in prison. ... So I must alter it a 
 little; I must alter it. I will clothe myself in gorgeous rai- 
 ment, miracles, and splendid deeds, and then say, ' I am the 
 Saviour ! Sword in hand ! ' and then the people will rally 
 round me. . . . No, no, you spirits of evil . . . avaunt, mes- 
 sengers of Satan. ... I will listen to God alone." 
 
 The day passed and night descended; he cowered at the
 
 HOLYLAND 315 
 
 edge of the cliff, a poor, lonely man, tortured by hideous doubt, 
 a man in the bitterest extremity of need. 
 
 He prays, and strength comes to him for a moment; but 
 again his courage sinks ; he prays again, begging his " Father 
 in Heaven " to give him strength and light. He begs, " Show 
 me the truth. Tell me, shall I help my people with Thy 
 sword and Thy word, or with Thy word alone? " All night 
 his soul sought for a way of escape like a caged wild beast 
 that ramps restlessly up and down, glaring in vain at the bars 
 through which he cannot pass. 
 
 Later he told his friends, and they believed what had become 
 a part of the popular faith that Satan, the ruler of the evil 
 spirits, appearing from the darkest quarter of Heaven, stood 
 by his side and said to him, " Add something of earth to the 
 pure work of God." 
 
 His fear of others, his vanity, all his sensual desires fought 
 with a strong man's strength against that stronger part of him 
 that was pure and holy. All day the struggle lasted. At times 
 he turned to go northwards, and then, shrinking back, he 
 turned again on to the moor. Often he was in great danger 
 of betraying his Father in Heaven and returning home the 
 same quiet craftsman that he had left it, save that his soul was 
 rent asunder and his inner life desolated by the reproachful 
 voice of conscience. Often he came near to adding something 
 of earth, " Out with your swords! I am the holy leader whom 
 God has promised you." The whole future of humanity de- 
 pended on the purity of soul, the courage, and the truth of a 
 single man. 
 
 But he was very brave. He was so stainless, so pure. He 
 thought of the rapture of the momentary communion of his 
 soul with God. In passionate prayer he clung to the knees of 
 his Father in Heaven ; and He helped him. Certainly the Eter- 
 nal was by his side. Yet the work was his own ; it is him we 
 must thank. Jesus, the northern carpenter ; it is He who helped 
 mankind. At last he arose victorious. " I will do Thy work 
 and Thine alone, without the sword, without any earthly help. 
 I will believe and not doubt; Thy blessed kingdom is at hand, 
 and I must raise it without the help of the sword. I leave it 
 to Thee to show me in Thy own good time whether I am in- 
 deed the Saviour. Help me, O Father in Heaven." 
 
 Then, he said, he was made strong. Angels from Heaven
 
 316 HOLYLAND 
 
 stood round him, and fear was gone from him. Drawing a 
 long, deep breath, he went northwards with no more doubt in 
 his heart. His will was now at rest, desiring only to do the 
 pure and gracious will of God. " I will do Thy will, an- 
 nounce the coming of Thy kingdom and Thy rule in my coun- 
 try, troubling myself not at all about other men." He went 
 north. 
 
 The report followed him, " The Baptist has been put in 
 prison by the duke; he is to die at the hangman's hand." But 
 all fear was gone from him. He stands there pure and free, 
 in his hands the purest task in the world, close to the Eternal 
 Power, close to his " Father in Heaven." 
 
 In two days he reached his native district. Avoiding his 
 own village he made his first appearance as a preacher in a 
 village that lay to the east of it. He rose without any doubt 
 or any fear, his eyes shining with joy and the authority of the 
 Eternal, which said to him, "Arise! speak! Thou art My 
 dear son. Speak! It is My will that thou sayest what thou 
 sayest and dost what thou dost." 
 
 The eagle now began to fly. He arose, and for the first 
 time went up to the desk and opened the ancient chronicle; 
 and as they looked at him they saw this was no dry teacher, 
 but a man whose deepest soul was stirred and possessed by the 
 spirit of God. He read the place where it is written: "The 
 spirit of the Lord is upon me. Because he anointed me to 
 preach good tidings to the poor; He hath sent me to proclaim 
 release to the captives, and recovering of sight to the blind, to 
 set at liberty them that are bruised, to proclaim the acceptable 
 year of the Lord." 
 
 Laying the book down he drew a deep breath, and said, 
 " The ancient scripture is being fulfilled now, now. Poor, 
 oppressed people, the promised time of happiness is come; the 
 kingdom of Heaven is beginning among us. Give yourselves 
 to Him and be His children, and all the shadows that weigh 
 on human life will disappear, all of them ; evil conscience, sor- 
 row, death itself. In the light of happiness human life will be 
 as resplendent as the halls of God. Give yourselves to Him! be 
 His children ! The kingdom of Heaven is at hand, the blessed 
 time of which the prophets spake is at hand. Listen, believe 
 my words, and rejoice."
 
 HOLYLAND 317 
 
 So he spake, and the poor, the trembling, the oppressed, mar- 
 velled and rejoiced. He went on his way from place to place, 
 avoiding his native village, and his long years of silent, lonely 
 pondering had taught him to understand the ground tones of 
 human life. All day his heart ached with a passion of pity 
 for the misery and need where all might have been sweetness, 
 and found no rest for the anguish of his compassion. " I must 
 cleanse my people so that they may find that bliss in the near- 
 ness of God which has been mine since my childhood." The 
 whole day he was filled with the immovable courage that in- 
 spired the early heroes. " I will make it come to pass. I will 
 conquer my brethren and make them approach God in the 
 joyful spirit which is mine. The soul is made for goodness, 
 its nature is divine; it must succeed in casting forth Satan and 
 his friends. A storm shall blow through the land and set the 
 people free from evil ; the good shall conquer and convince the 
 evil; the eager shall carry the sluggish with them; the quiet 
 overcome the cold-hearted pietists. God and His angels shall 
 rule over the people; under His protection they shall be pure 
 and happy, freed from sin and sorrow, each man under his own 
 roof tree." 
 
 Such was his faith, his love, his hope: and he announced it 
 in words like morning dew or the water of a deep and spark- 
 ling spring, to a people of quick understanding, deep piety, and 
 ancient race, who looked back from the desperate misery of the 
 present to the glory of the past and yearned for freedom and 
 happiness. It was natural that he roused them. Excitement 
 spread all through the northern district, his passage from vil- 
 lage to village was like a bridal train. Downcast eyes looked 
 up : they began to sing and hum in voices that had lost their 
 music through long disuse. Once more men talked of great 
 questions at their doors and by the fireside: these were great 
 times when they talked of their God, of their souls, of their 
 country. Stir and excitement took the place of the old lassi- 
 tude. 
 
 The quiet men were well pleased with him. " He doesn't 
 count off on his fingers what one has to do, and what one is 
 allowed to do. Seven times seven: and you may eat this and 
 you may not do that, and on the Sabbath, so and so. Who can 
 attend to all these commandments? He speaks the one simple
 
 318 HOLYLAND 
 
 truth, ' Give thy soul to thy Father in Heaven and to thy fel- 
 low-men . . . then, thou art blessed.' " 
 
 And in the evening the fishers were sitting and standing on 
 the shore beside their boats: they had listened to him and seen 
 him. " Simon . . . why have you sat all day without saying 
 a word, staring, you who are the most lively of all as a rule? 
 What do you say to the man ? " Simon got up from the edge 
 of the boat, his lips trembling, and his eyes fixed on the 
 ground. " Brother, look after my boat and my nets., . . . To 
 give one's soul to God ; to have one's life filled with love and 
 truth. . . . Blessed is the man who goes with him. ... I will 
 follow him and be always by his side." 
 
 The small officials surrounded him : he was their man. The 
 Nationalists said to them : " Pray seven times, wash, and lay 
 down your office. If you don't do this and that you are sin- 
 ners, outcasts, foredoomed to Hell." He did not so. He did 
 not rebuke : he did not curse. He showed them the happiness 
 of a soul relying in love on the goodness of God. " It is a 
 light yoke and a soft burden indeed. How heavy in compari- 
 son are the commandments of the Church, the misdeeds, the 
 evil conscience, the anxiety, the struggle for existence. The 
 burden of a life far from God is too heavy for mortal shoul- 
 ders to bear: but we can bear it with a brave and innocent 
 heart if one rests like a child against the knees of God. And 
 afterwards comes the Kingdom of God." 
 
 When they heard this they rejoiced and 'said unto another: 
 " What can one say to that ? It's the absolute truth. What 
 do you say, Matthew, you brooder, what do you think of it ? " 
 The same evening he saw Matthew sitting at his desk in his 
 publican's office, and, as he passed, cast a long look towards 
 him : a look that went through and through the man, so that he 
 rose slowly to his feet, compelled by those wonderful eyes and 
 the force of that spotless goodness, and, taking up his cloak, 
 he followed him with blanched face. 
 
 All the sick who had lain in misery, often from their child- 
 hood on, in the houses of their relatives ; all those who had been 
 driven from their homes by melancholy, or ill-weaved ambition, 
 by the visions of madness or the grip of infectious disease, and 
 dwelt apart in deserted and ruinous hovels all these and 
 there were thousands of them came in wild excitement. All 
 believed that for some sin they had committed they were now
 
 HOLYLAND 319 
 
 inhabited by emissaries of Satan. To them, the possessed, he 
 came, this gracious, gentle son of man, this child of God, with 
 nothing but joy, joy and irresistible hope in his heart. " There 
 is an end to all sorrow. The joyful kingdom of Heaven is at 
 hand ! " They cried aloud : " Behold, behold ! He is like the 
 holy heroes of old ! God dwells within him, a spirit from God 
 dwells within him. He must be able to help us, in whom a 
 spirit of evil dwells." Round him they gathered, a crowd of 
 groaning, cursing, beseeching humanity: lost souls in crippled 
 bodies. 
 
 It is impossible to paint the picture in sufficiently moving 
 language. This people had, perhaps, no more sick among them 
 than others, but all the sick lay in the street, aided by no doc- 
 tor, sheltered by no roof, consoled by no compassion. Now 
 help had come: help from God. Ten thousand sick and one 
 physician! And he? He knew one thing there is, there can 
 be no sickness in the kingdom of Heaven. The demon of dis- 
 ease fell away like discarded rags from all who were ready to 
 put away evil from them, to take their stand on God's side. 
 He could heal when heart and will came to meet him. There 
 was on his side a holy longing to help, almost feverish in its 
 intensity, a passionate cry to his " Father in Heaven," " shall 
 not Thy Kingdom come in this land." When there met him 
 on the other side an eager faith, an utter dependence of the 
 diseased and weakened will on the courage shining in his stain- 
 less eyes, then he could help. " Thou art the child of God ? 
 A child of God cannot be sick. . . . Come, give me thy hand. 
 . . . Now . . . arise . . . now . . . rejoice, be not afraid." 
 
 They cried aloud " Behold, the Saviour! he is the Saviour! " 
 The cry rang through him. "The Saviour? Am I he? If I 
 am, my people are in my hand. . . . Lead me not into tempta- 
 tion! Evil spirits speak with their lips." 
 
 In the evening he came to a village by the lake, and entered 
 the dwelling of an acquaintance. Immediately the house was 
 full of people, crowding up to door and window. In the 
 village there was a hysterical young man, with no strength of 
 mind or body, who had lain for years speechless and crippled 
 in a morbid trance, supposed by himself and the villagers to be 
 smitten by evil spirits. Now. his father and mother took up 
 the litter in which he lay, and, coming to the house, cried, 
 " Let us come in." It was impossible. Strong arms raised the
 
 320 HOLYLAND 
 
 litter, or the flat-wooden roof, removed some of the beams, and 
 lowered the sick man to Jesus' feet. There was a loud outcry 
 on all sides, the surging crowd turned their eyes to him in 
 passionate expectancy. " You can help : you must help the 
 poor man." The sick man looked up at him, trembling en- 
 treaty in his eyes. He bent over, and something of his holy 
 desire to help, something of his confident certainty passed into 
 the sick man. " Since thou hast come in passionate entreaty, 
 in trembling faith, thou art free from the evil power: the evil 
 spirits have no power upon thee. Thou art the child of God: 
 His time is come." With a cry the sick man raised himself. 
 " Arise and walk." It was a great time. 
 
 A spring storm went through the little land. He bore the 
 storm and the storm bore him. The kingdom of heaven had 
 really begun. " It is clear: the whole people will be won. 
 Everywhere the rule, the kingdom of God shall have might! 
 His will has hitherto only been done in Heaven, it shall now 
 be done on earth. The land is now becoming holy, and a 
 Holyland is free and happy. What can resist, if God and man 
 stand together ? " 
 
 The first dark clouds rose in the smiling sky. Two, three, 
 at the same time. 
 
 It was the faith of the whole country that a Saviour was 
 to bring about the kingdom of Heaven upon earth. Therefore, 
 soon after his appearance, there began to be questionings among 
 the people. "Is this the Saviour?" They pondered deeply 
 over it: " Is this he? Yes, this is he. Look at his eyes: he is 
 the blessed Son of God. Think how good he is, how blessed 
 the work of his hands." 
 
 Then they began to doubt again. " No, this is not he. How 
 could you say this was he? Do you not know that the Saviour 
 shall be descended from an ancient royal house, that he shall 
 fulfil the law, heal all the sick, destroy the oppressors, and 
 create an empire upon earth. This is not the Saviour." The 
 hero knew that he was the Saviour: his own holy spirit said to 
 him : " I am he for whom ye wait, for I can bring my people to 
 the blessed accomplishment of the kingdom of God. I am he 
 for whom ye wait and I will declare that I am." 
 
 He saw the deep gulf that separated his faith and the faith 
 of his people: he saw that they did not understand him, that
 
 HOLYLAND 321 
 
 they could not free themselves from the old, material faith: he 
 saw that they always desired to confound his teaching with this 
 old material faith, and now it surged perpetually round him 
 like the surf dashing against the cliff. The people said to him, 
 demanded with the furious hunger of a concealed desire, " Be 
 the Saviour of our dreams!" He stood firm, pure in heart, 
 gracious in spirit, child and man : " I will be the Saviour that 
 my Father wills." 
 
 Then there fell a shadow over that pure and lofty spirit. 
 The sick and the insane were importunate in their entreaties: 
 and so it came to pass that he became a worker of miracles. 
 Then, as now, people were never tired of propounding as a 
 final and irrefragable doctrine, " Health is the highest good." 
 " Make me healthy! and me! and my brother! and my child! 
 If you can do that you are the Messiah, the Saviour." Phys- 
 ical suffering, physical needs, rose up like a giant and pressed 
 him from his path. 
 
 The goal to which his path led was not the release from sick- 
 ness of a hundred sick, but the emancipation of a whole people 
 from all the ills of mind, body, and estate by bringing them 
 over to the side of God. He saw the danger rising gigantic 
 before him, and a spirit of restlessness drove him from village 
 to village, and roused him anew in the midst of his desire to 
 dream alone in lonely fields. 
 
 A new trouble came from the south, from the capital. The 
 Nationalists and clericals, dwelling in close proximity to the 
 great temple, used to send their least important teachers, 
 priests, and agents to the poor populations of the north. But 
 now that there resounded from the north the clear note: " Our 
 Father in Heaven has set up His kingdom in our land; He 
 will make us free and blessed," they realised that the question 
 was highly serious. And so these leaders of religion and pa- 
 triotism sent to the north their most harsh and fervent agents. 
 They regarded him with dark, knitted brows. 
 
 It was a strange intercourse, with the mass of the people 
 indifferent to religion, actively opposed to the Church, and the 
 publicans, the betrayers of their country. " Yes," he said, 
 mockingly ; " why should I trouble about the righteous, the 
 strong, those who have everything? They need no physician. 
 I love those who seek to be purified and healed, who hunger 
 and thirst after strength." They came to him with uplifted
 
 322 HOLYLAND 
 
 hands, a commandment at the end of each finger. " God says, 
 you shall fast." "Ah!" he replied; "we are forced to fast 
 when our throats are closed by fear or famine." " God says, 
 you shall do no work on Sundays." " Yes," said he, " rejoice 
 and help one another on Sundays." In clear words, glowing 
 with goodness, he opposed their distorted and senseless interpre- 
 tation by his truth, which came to men like sunshine. He 
 thought, indeed, that he might avoid a breach with these men. 
 Carried away by the enthusiasm of the people, he thought that, 
 in spite of their gloom, they, too, would be aroused; his brave 
 and stainless soul still cherished the dream, " The whole people 
 blessed and holy beneath the sceptre of God." 
 
 But a few days later, embittered by the discovery of their 
 own impotence, they went before the people. There is nothing 
 in the whole world more dreadful than the professional religion 
 of people whose hearts have no love in them. " He violates 
 the commandments of God, do not ye do so. His great deeds 
 are done by evil means." Then the Holy Helper arose, his 
 gracious heart, as always, full of pity, standing before them, 
 as the angel of the Lord once stood in burning wrath before 
 Cain, he said, " Beware! He who knowingly calls that which 
 is good evil is guilty of an immortal sin." They shrank back 
 and made their way south, to the capital, where they reported: 
 "This man is bringing the Church in the north into disgrace; 
 he is a danger to God and the State." They worked in the 
 dark, by underground means. . . . Soon afterwards, on their 
 instigation, his own mother and brothers came from his native 
 village and appeared in front of the house where he was. 
 " We have heard that some say he is one of the heroes of old ; 
 others even declare him to be the Saviour himself. He is a 
 poor, demented man. Help us to take him home with us." 
 
 When they told him within that his own folk were mourn- 
 ing over him outside, his strong, stainless heart stood still for 
 a moment; but he lifted up his head. 
 
 And the goodness of God permitted him at this moment to 
 meet beaming eyes looking up into his. " I have no mother," 
 he said, " and no brethren. My mother and my brethren are 
 those which hear the word of God and do it." 
 
 Yet the blow rankled. " I am deserted by mine own people, 
 by those who have known me from my childhood and know
 
 HOLYLAND 323 
 
 that there is in me a good spirit sent from God. I will go 
 home and see whether they receive me." 
 
 He went from village to village, through crowds of wor- 
 shippers, and curious, miserable, and sick; at every corner 
 agents of the Church; and so reached home. They were ready 
 for him there. They looked at him with sombre eyes. Jesus 
 the Carpenter, old Joseph's son; is he to set himself above the 
 learned priests of the capital ? Is he to be a saint and a hero ? 
 The Saviour Himself who is to bring the kingdom of Heaven 
 upon earth? 
 
 "If you can . . . look, there is a sick man. . . . You have 
 known him since your childhood. Help him." 
 
 In the sick man's eye there was no gleam of confidence, of 
 love. His trust and courage, thus lamed, could not avail; he 
 could not help him. 
 
 Then they mocked at him, and cried in furious anger : " The 
 fool has made us a laughing stock in the land." They wanted 
 to lay hands upon him. But he went, and departed from 
 among them. 
 
 His home was lost. 
 
 From this day onward the way of the gracious one led into 
 the shadow; from this day his face bore the expression of in- 
 tense struggle. He knew not that all could not be children 
 of God ; there must be a parting. The Baptist had spoken of 
 it. Well, then, let the parting come. ' Think ye that I am 
 come to give peace on the earth? Not peace, but a sword." 
 
 There was no fear. His burning eyes sought out his oppo- 
 nents. He knew his path and feared it not. The craftsman 
 took up the contest against the history of his people, against 
 the great men of his people, against all the powers of the 
 world. He knows the power of evil is at an end. God is with 
 him. God gives him the victory. " I am come to cast fire upon 
 the earth, and would it were ablaze already." 
 
 Through the land there rang a clear and piercing trumpet 
 call ; like a signal to the regiment standing drawn up in the 
 morning grey, to charge upon the foe, it penetrated to the mar- 
 row of those that heard. No man had hitherto struck so deep 
 into those sacred springs where the divine dwells in secret in 
 the hearts of men. No one had spoken with such power to 
 thrill and change.
 
 324 HOLYLAND 
 
 " Is it keeping a thousand commandments, my brethren, a 
 load that is laid like a sack of sand upon the back of an ass, 
 that makes men righteous? Is it praying, fasting, going to 
 church, or washing? Purify your hearts, my brethren; hold 
 your hands always ready to do what is right and true. Only 
 those who do the will of God can hope to live in a free and 
 happy land. Purify your lives, purify your souls! Be holy; 
 the kingdom of Heaven is at hand, which shall set men asunder. 
 Ye have heard that it was said to them of old time : " Thou 
 shalt not kill." But I say unto you, Away with all anger and 
 all hatred, let your soul glow in forgetting and forgiving. 
 Ye have heard that it was said, " Thou shalt not commit adul- 
 tery," but I say unto you, If thou look after another woman 
 with desire in thy heart, pluck out thy right eye and cast it 
 from thee; be pure with the one eye that thou hast. Again, 
 ye have heard it said, " Thou shalt not forswear." I say unto 
 you, A lie is an unthinkable thing to the children of God. 
 Let your speech be yes and no ... that is enough. You have 
 heard it said, " An eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth." I say 
 unto you, Resist not him that is evil. Let them strike you. 
 You will overcome them by your gentleness. ... Be all good- 
 ness and compassion. Put away everything: clothing and fam- 
 ily. Have no other thoughts but " Father in Heaven, Thy 
 kingdom come." What are possessions, what is right and 
 wrong in the kingdom of God? But if the power of evil tries 
 to drag you away from God, call on Him and pray, pray fer- 
 vently. Ye shall be heard, most assuredly ye shall be heard. 
 Would a father, when his children ask him for bread, give 
 them stones? . . . What things are ye to pray for? Trifles? 
 Clothes and shoes, a house and garden, good neighbours, and 
 so forth? Assuredly not. A little bread for to-day, so that ye 
 may live to see the kingdom come. Pray that the kingdom 
 come ! Pray that ye be ready for its coming. Pray, " Our 
 Father, Thy kingdom come. Thy will be done on earth as it 
 is in Heaven. Give us bread this day ; forgive us as we forgive 
 others." 
 
 Looking into their faces, he saw reflected in their eyes the 
 struggle between joyous belief and oppressed misery. 
 
 Bitter was his condemnation of all earthly goods. " Ac- 
 cursed is money; accursed the care that lurks in the shadow of 
 money. Wealth is guilty when it dominates all thoughts and
 
 HOLYLAND 325 
 
 conquers the soul itself, guilty when it lives in idle forgetful- 
 ness of the poor and sick dwelling near it in the squalor of their 
 sunless homes. Accursed is money. If you possess it you are 
 guilty. Expiate your guilt; give away your money to lessen 
 the poverty of the land." 
 
 A man rose up and came to Him, " Lord, my brother is de- 
 ceiving me about my inheritance. Command him to give it 
 to me." He turned away in contempt. " Man, who has made 
 me a judge of inheritance? I am no assigner of acres and 
 oxen ! I am here to say, ' Let your wealth go. Look, the 
 sparrows sow not, the lilies spin not, and their Father in 
 Heaven feeds and clothes them every day. Shall he let the 
 children of his kingdom, the care of his soul, perish of hunger 
 and cold? Away with money! It is worthless, it hinders you. 
 Do not collect money, collect rather the love of God and man. 
 Care for this only ; God's land shall be our home. Soon ! to- 
 morrow! or the day after to-morrow! Care and strive only 
 for this to be worthy of the blessed home, the blessed time 
 that is close at hand.' 
 
 " Be not afraid, children of God ! Despair not of your own 
 soul ; God dwells within it to help it. See how small a grain 
 of mustard seed, you can hold it between the tips of your two 
 fingers; and yet it grows, grows into a tree. Be not afraid, 
 children of God ; will one thing only, to bring your souls close 
 to God. Forgetting all else, care for this alone. The mer- 
 chant goes down to the beach to buy what is for sale. A pearl- 
 fisher held a pearl in the hollow of his hand, a pearl of great 
 price; to be bought cheap. A bargain, a bargain! The man 
 hastened away; he sold and put away from him his land, his 
 house, and all his possessions, and returned with the money in 
 the hollow of his hand, and bought the pearl. It was of un- 
 speakable value. In a moment he became very rich. Breth- 
 ren, purify your souls! Draw near to God! The bliss of God 
 costs little to obtain. Look at my eyes, look at my life, look at 
 all I do God's bliss dwells within my soul. God's bliss 
 comes yes, it comes. Look at me." 
 
 An old woman had kept her eager eyes fixed upon him ; now 
 she cried in her clear old voice, " Blessed is the womb that 
 bare thee, and the breasts which thou didst suck." 
 
 His soul was still full of soaring hope. He forgot and 
 despised the enmity of the clericals. The wound his home had
 
 326 HOLYLAND 
 
 dealt him healed, although a scar remained. There were many 
 who doubted, but many stood before him with joyful eyes. 
 Lofty exaltation went before him like a gleaming herald; and 
 the faithful stood at his right hand and his left like knightly 
 watchmen. Rejoicing sounded behind him like a waving ban- 
 ner. 
 
 His courage was high; he sent the disciples who had been 
 three or four months with him now into the surrounding dis- 
 tricts ; they declared, " There is an end to all sorrow ; the king- 
 dom of Heaven, yearned for so long, is now at hand. A man 
 like the heroes of old, a man beloved by God and men, a man 
 of kindly strength and lofty stainlessness of soul is now among 
 us. He announces the day of healing, he forgives sin, and re- 
 proves the spirits of evil and casts them forth. He has con- 
 quered altogether; our enchanted souls stand before him in 
 speechless rapture. Believe us, cast all evil from you that your 
 hearts may laugh like ours, and then God in Heaven will sud- 
 denly make an end of all our misery, and, with the help of 
 His thousand angels, will build His kingdom in our land." 
 
 After a week they returned. " Oh, Lord, even the evil 
 spirits within the sick and the insane did our bidding." Then 
 his soul rejoiced mightily. " I saw Satan fall from his dark 
 corner in Heaven like a flash of lightning on to earth, to save 
 what he could save. He sees that his kingdom is at an end 
 upon the earth. But I laugh and rejoice in Thee, my Father 
 in Heaven ; I laugh and rejoice that Thou, a Mysterious Being, 
 hast displayed to me thy graciousness and made me Thy child, 
 and now helpest me to bring to Thee many others of Thy chil- 
 dren. I laugh and rejoice that no one has known Thee save I 
 alone, that all must now see from me and learn from me and 
 attain bliss through me. I laugh and rejoice that Thou hast 
 not opened Thy kingdom to the great and wise, but to men 
 like me, lowly and unlearned." 
 
 And so, rejoicing, he went on his way, always kindly, always 
 full of graciousness. 
 
 A rich Nationalist named Simon, who liked to have famous 
 people at his table and to have a reputation for generosity, in- 
 vited him to a feast. The table was set in the open hall; the 
 guests sat round with bare feet, according to the custom of the 
 country. There was a great press at the door ; a poor girl, tor- 
 tured by remorse for a life of dissipation, heard that he was
 
 HOLYLAND 327 
 
 there of whom it was said that the spirit of God dwelt in him 
 in some wondrous manner. She stood there seeking for him; 
 then, recognising the true, gentle eyes, she fell on her knees be- 
 fore him. As she lay there she saw that his feet were dusty 
 from the way, and, taking water from a vessel, she washed his 
 feet, weeping the while, and, bending down, dried them with 
 her long hair. A silence fell upon the hall ; there was no sound 
 save her bitter weeping. Then the hero, looking up, saw secret 
 scorn written on the face of his host. " If you were a saint 
 you would know that she is a prostitute." Fire burned in his 
 eyes. " Simon ; I have something to say to you." The silence 
 was more intense. " A moneylender lent money to two men, 
 fifty shekels to one, five hundred to the other. Neither of 
 them could pay him back. He gave them what they owed him. 
 Now tell me, which of the two would love the moneylender 
 most?" 
 
 Simon smiled : " The one to whom the most was given." 
 
 Then the gracious one said angrily: " Listen, Simon. All 
 over our country it is customary to give a guest who comes in 
 from the dusty street water to wash his feet, and a friendly 
 handshake. You gave me neither the one nor the other. You 
 think you do not need to be kind ; you think you need neither 
 God nor man ; you think you owe nothing to anyone, not even 
 fifty shekels. You think. . . . Oh, this lost, ruined woman ! 
 . . . This woman, Simon! Five hundred shekels, that is a 
 great deal to owe God and man! A great sinner! But, be- 
 hold, all her sins are forgotten and forgiven ; because of the love 
 she has poured out to me, a wanderer, and to God, whom she 
 knows within me. Love of God and man, Simon, can cover 
 a multitude of sins. Are you forgiven, Simon? " 
 
 To her he spoke tenderly. " God in Heaven is thy Father, 
 too, and He loves thee. He loves thee, just as thou art. Do 
 thou love Him also, even if thou canst not free thyself from 
 sin! Go now, do not weep so." 
 
 And so he went from village to village, always great and 
 good, filled with new inspirations. 
 
 But behind him, far enough behind for the dust of daily life 
 to have settled down and choked the excited souls; behind him 
 there crept black enemies. They rose like crows from the roof 
 of a church, rising up and up, flying on and on, following the 
 wild beast as he takes his lonely way into the field, flying be-
 
 328 HOLYLAND 
 
 hind him, cawing softly; they rose from the great temple in 
 the south and flew north, flew north behind him, screeching. 
 " You think you will destroy the ancient holy things ; you shall 
 yet see and marvel, you fool, how deeply rooted they are in 
 the soul of the people." They cried passionately to the people, 
 " Remain in the faith of your ancestors! Will you deride your 
 fathers in their graves? Is this ignorant man, brought up in 
 some little village far from the knowledge of the Church, on 
 the verge of the moorland, is he to lay hands on the Holy of 
 Holies, which the learned men of God protect? Is he to lay 
 hands on the sole and most sacred possession of our poor, un- 
 happy country, the Church? What else does it mean? Is this 
 to be the promised Saviour? Does he fulfil a single condition 
 of the true Saviour? He is the servant of the devil." 
 
 They stirred up misery, fear, and terror; they let confusion 
 loose again. They talked secretly with the women and with 
 the palsied old men. They played upon the stupidity and 
 superstition of the masses ; freeing them from the terrible neces- 
 sity of judging for themselves. " We are priests, and therefore 
 know." 
 
 Many refused to listen to them. Those of a deeper tender- 
 ness of soul, many a strong, simple man, many a brave woman, 
 many a workman said, "What is the Church to us? Has it 
 ever cared for us ? " 
 
 Many looked up to him with joyful eyes, transported by 
 his inspiration, his goodness, and his truth. But the great mass 
 of the people, that blind and heavy beast that had lifted its 
 head a little and begun to look about it a little when his clear 
 voice rang in its ears, the mass of the people went back to its 
 slumbers. " Certainly the commandments and customs of the 
 Church are sacred. How could they be so venerable else? 
 Our fathers and our grandfathers strove to keep them faith- 
 fully. Oh, me! what an age; why has one to ponder so deeply? 
 Sit still, my soul; my soul, the priests must know. Look how 
 clever their eyes are, and what deep lines are in their lofty 
 brows ! Beware, my soul ! I pray thee, be at peace and keep to 
 the old order of things." So the heavy beast became calm once 
 more: the crows flew on behind him without uttering a 
 sound. 
 
 The sunshiny hero turned and retraced his steps; the whole 
 district he had covered hitherto was not more than five or six
 
 HOLYLAND 329 
 
 days' journey. When he returned he found a change in the 
 attitude of the people; he saw that they were falling away 
 from him. He went on until he came to a village through 
 which he had passed in triumph four months ago; the people 
 stood on the thresholds, immovable. He passed through several 
 little towns by the lake, where four and five months ago he had 
 been surrounded by eager crowds, with madmen shrieking, sick 
 men brought out into the street on their litters, women im- 
 ploring him for aid, all eyes turned to him in passionate excite- 
 ment, every one at his feet, as he declared, " Our country is 
 now like a blessed Holyland." Now the streets were empty, 
 one or two faces looking shyly round the doors. He came to 
 the little town by the lake which only two months ago he had 
 called " my town " in proud assurance, when enthusiasm had 
 risen high in streets and houses; where the kingdom of 
 Heaven seemed already to rule in the streets and to inspire 
 men's hearts. The sick still came, and some of the faithful. 
 But the mass of the people stayed nervously at home. " We 
 can hear no trumpet blast from Heaven. The kingdom of 
 Heaven does not come. He is good, but mistaken." The 
 clericals threatened. 
 
 When he saw the decline of faith, this nervous shrinking 
 away from him, he could not restrain the words of burning 
 anger. " Woe to you, towns of the lake ; ye who have seen 
 wonders. Others would have repented in sackcloth and ashes. 
 Woe to you, my town ! Thou wast raised up to Heaven, thou 
 shalt be cast down to Hell." All joy was gone; his heart was 
 burdened and cast down. What could he do? His soul, preg- 
 nant with a new and glorious world, could not bring it into 
 being. What could he do? He knows that his Heavenly 
 Father is ever by his side, but men will not believe. What can 
 he do? To go back is impossible, but can he abandon the 
 cause of his joy; leave the truth with all its sweetness? What 
 can he do? Come to an understanding with the Church 
 party? Say, " Go on fasting and washing, keep the command- 
 ments and the Sabbath, and purify your hearts." That was 
 impossible. One cannot cut truth in halves, keep one half and 
 let the other go. If it meant death, he must stand by the 
 truth, one and indivisible. Srrve God whole-heartedly, and 
 God's will be done! . . . "What is God's will? What is 
 He doing with me ? "
 
 330 HOLYLAND 
 
 Then there came two events to bring the final clearness, like 
 nightly beacons to show the further path. 
 
 Once again for the second and last time the wild, dark ap- 
 parition rose before him which six months ago, had awakened 
 his dreaming soul with clarion voice; the hero of the stream, 
 the Baptist. He was now a prisoner, and in his prison strained 
 like the captured deer for the fresh woodland and the keen 
 wind. He sent two disciples to the north. " Go and ask him 
 what he is doing. What does -he seek? Do not the people 
 exult in him, have they made him king? Why does not he 
 arise like a lion and fill the land with his roar? Do not the 
 old prophecies say the Herald of the Lord shall go south to 
 the capital, and then, sitting on the throne of the ancient kings, 
 rule for ever over a free people? Why does he not go thither, 
 sword in hand, at the head of the people that have exulted in 
 him for six months? Go and ask him, Art thou the great 
 Saviour, sent by God, for whom we have cried aloud for eight 
 hundred years? Or must we wait for another? " 
 
 The question fell like lead upon the hero's heart. " He, too, 
 has the old material hero before his eyes! He, too, does not 
 understand." He answered brief and clear: "Tell him, the 
 kingdom of God exists; and this it is: Sickness and sin, poverty 
 and sorrow are declining, and the oppressed people is full of 
 laughing joy." He raised his hand and said, shaken by this 
 cruel separation from the brave hero, " This is a brave and 
 true man, but he has fallen into the grave error of thinking, 
 like the self-righteous, that the kingdom of Heaven will come 
 to pass by means of earthly might. But I say unto you that 
 the pure and lowly are the citizens of the kingdom of Heaven, 
 and they will make their way thither without weapons and 
 without armour, without forms and commandments." 
 
 When the clericals heard how he spoke of their venerable 
 precepts they rose against him; they ventured to attack the 
 lion, now that his strength seemed to be failing. 
 
 ' Tell us plainly what do you say to all the sacred com- 
 mandments issued, by the Church?" 
 
 He trampled their sacred customs and commandments under 
 his feet. " You hypocrites, are these the commandments of 
 God ? No, they are the senseless invention of men, which come 
 between the people and the will of God. Away with the
 
 HOLYLAND 331 
 
 Church ritual of righteousness; it is the curse of the people. 
 Nothing matters but the heart of a man and the life he 
 leads." 
 
 There was an end of the so-called " sacred " precepts, an 
 end of all pretentious self-complacent righteousness; he cast 
 them all to the ground, the ancient holies, the ornate and 
 costly churches, the ceremonial, the countless priests, the 
 wreaths and masses, the sacrifices and the sacraments, the long 
 pilgrimages, all that had weighed on mankind for centuries he 
 swept away; on his shoulders there now rested the whole bur- 
 den of human destiny. 
 
 He was now an accursed sinner, a blasphemer of God. 
 " Listen, listen ! Have you heard ? He has defiled everything 
 holy; he is an emissary of the devil." And the masses, that 
 blind, heavy beast, crept further away from him. 
 
 " What now? What will become of me and my work now? 
 I feel that death and sorrow are drawing nigh. . . . What 
 then? Farewell, young life. ... If I only knew how to carry 
 the duty He has laid upon my soul. Oh, dear country, how 
 can I make you pure and holy, ready for the time when God 
 shall come with His angels to set up His kingdom within 
 your bounds? How can I complete my work, hated as I am 
 by the rich and righteous, supported by the people one day, 
 only to be deserted by them the next? How am I to begin? 
 How can I make the people one with me in spirit, so that we 
 can break into the kingdom of Heaven together? How does 
 He will that I should help Him?" 
 
 And behold ; as he questioned fearfully he saw as if in a 
 mist the old sacred banner waving on his path in front of him, 
 the banner up to which the people had looked with dazzled 
 eyes for eiffht hundred years. "The Saviour will come; the 
 son of a King." How the people gazed! "Is he coming? 
 He is come? There is the banner swaying; look how the 
 sword flashes! " A wild shout of joy rent the skies, the people 
 were at their Saviour's feet. 
 
 " Shall I take the banner in my hand ; shall I say I am the 
 Saviour I ? " 
 
 " Those possessed by evil spirits cry out, ' You are he! ' In 
 many an hour of exaltation the people have urged me to say, 
 'I am he.' The hero from the river asked, 'Art thou he?' 
 All dream of, all long for, the cry, ' Out with the banner! '
 
 332 HOLYLAND 
 
 " I know that I am he. From my childhood I have been the 
 child of God." 
 
 " If I do not raise the banner there is no hope that God will 
 win the people." 
 
 "Beware, do not touch the banner; there is earth clinging 
 to it. Beware! thou knowest that the Saviour, in whom the 
 people believe, is not he in whom thou believest; their belief 
 is wild, confused, it has nothing to do with thee ; it will drag 
 thee and thy stainless mission down into the dark confusion 
 of death." 
 
 He went north, across the border, to be alone in a strange 
 place, with his little band of disciples. His soul was heavy and 
 perturbed. " I know that my Father in Heaven is with me 
 . . . my faith does not tremble. . . . God rules within my 
 soul. His kingdom will come on earth, and soon. How 
 strangely hard it is to be one with God and yet unable to 
 bring His will to pass. . . . And it is time ... I must go 
 south, I must go through the whole land, I must go to the 
 capital and proclaim there also that the kingdom of Heaven 
 is at hand. What am I to do? Listen to the mysterious rus- 
 tling of the old, the miraculous banner! He who holds it has 
 strength. The people follow him! What do the old chron- 
 icles say of the Saviour ? ' A twig from the ancient royal 
 stem ' and I am a craftsman sprung from the people. What 
 do they say? What do the people say when they sit by their 
 doors in the evening? ' He will hold in his hand the might of 
 earthly power; he will ride against the foe with waving ban- 
 ners.' . . . No, I will not do it will not depart from the 
 word that God has spoken to me. Blessed are the meek. 
 Blessed are the pure in heart. And do the old chronicles tell 
 no other story? Do they not speak of the king of peace? 
 ' Behold, O land, thy king is come, clad in peace.' Not a 
 king ruling with the sword over a people armed with swords; 
 a king ruling in the strength of a pure and lofty heart other 
 people that are pure in heart. And I am he." 
 
 So he pondered over the history of his people and over his 
 own future, and he did not depart by one hair's breadth from 
 the truth that was the sacred possession of his soul. They 
 turned and went south, homewards. As he drew near the 
 familiar district the crowd that followed him grew. 
 
 The contest still raged in his soul.
 
 HOLYLAND 333 
 
 " Are you the Saviour ? Then seize the banner ; help thy 
 people and God will be with thee." Already there shone in 
 his eyes the light of another world. The knees of those who 
 saw him bent beneath them; the sick and the poor rejoiced; 
 thousands followed his healing hands, and hearkened to his 
 gracious words, feeling neither hunger nor thirst. He filled 
 the souls with such joy that they forgot their bodies. 
 
 The priests alone remained unmoved; religion had long 
 since turned to poison in their hard hearts. " You are a won- 
 der worker, but what sort of wonders have you done? Healing 
 the sick ? There are many in the land who can do that. Come, 
 make red fire descend from the blue sky, here on this moorland 
 path where you stand now. Or if not that, then let an angel 
 from God stand with his pure feet on the white sand on your 
 left!" 
 
 In bitter anger he replied, " You want a sign from Heaven, 
 that belief and salvation may cost you nothing! Ye have seen 
 and heard of a holiness that has never existed in the world be- 
 fore, and yet ye have not believed! A sign from Heaven? 
 Ye shall have it when ye rise from your graves before the 
 judgment seat." 
 
 Hearing question and answer, the people were once more 
 filled with doubt, because they had seen nothing. " Many 
 people can heal the sick; ay, and work wonders; the world is 
 full of them." 
 
 Once more he crossed the border into the loneliness of the 
 north, wandering over deserted moorland paths, sorely troubled 
 by the scornful attack of the priests and the wavering of the 
 people. " I cannot reach the goal in this way. How am I 
 to bring the Kingdom of Heaven to pass upon Earth? Father 
 in Heaven, help me! " 
 
 ' Thou, art the Saviour; now thou art strong! " 
 
 He went further on his desolate way. " What is written 
 concerning the Saviour in the ancient chronicles? They talk 
 of the waving palm leaves and the rejoicing of children, of a 
 joyous entry in the capital, and then of a glorious rule over a 
 sinless, obedient people; but is that all they say? Do they 
 not speak of the people, " the people will make deaf its ears 
 and turn its heart to stone," and they speak of revilement and 
 contempt, of bitter desertion, of a miserable and lonely death. 
 They speak not only of the Saviour's victory, but of his death."
 
 334 HOLYLAND 
 
 "And after death?" 
 
 " What then what after death ? What says the chron- 
 icle? 'One like a, child of man arose to heaven among the 
 clouds, and was brought before the Ancient of Days; to him 
 were granted power and glory and kingdom upon earth, all 
 peoples and all races were to serve him; his power was to en- 
 dure unchanged for ever, his kingdom was never to suffer de- 
 struction. . . .' It may be that the Saviour must first die and 
 go to God to receive the crown . . . and then . .. . after a 
 few days ... on the third day he returns and establishes the 
 kingdom of Heaven." 
 
 His soul soared to the heavenly heights and expanded so as 
 to embrace the whole of humanity; weaving visions of mar- 
 vellous splendour, touching the extreme limits of human 
 thought in lofty delirium. There was no fear in him. If the 
 hearts of men were made of stone was it not written in the 
 chronicle, " I make thy brow harder than stone, as hard as a 
 diamond?" No; there was no fear; no. He will execute his 
 Father's will, were it even more wonderful, even more diffi- 
 cult. If only men are helped! His ideal never changes; it was 
 still the same as when he first arose among men the condi- 
 tion of humanity, its misery, sickness, madness, wretchedness 
 and oppression, sin and guilt, cannot endure. A wonder must 
 take place. The kingdom of Heaven will and must come. 
 Then men, pure, rejoicing in the goodness of God, content in 
 mind and body, will find happiness in performing His will, 
 " Thy will be done on earth as it is in Heaven." This holy 
 work was his to do on earth with the help of God. That was 
 his idea. Never for a moment did he depart by one hair's 
 breadth from his true and stainless self. He brooded long and 
 painfully over the execution of his idea. He had judged the 
 ancient customs; he now considered the hopes of the peo- 
 pie. . . . 
 
 " I must lift up the ancient standard, it shall be pure and my 
 course pure. I must lift up the ancient standard: only under 
 this standard can the people be inspired by faith. It is the will 
 of God: otherwise He would help me without the standard. 
 I will lift up the standard. Then, then it will come with loud 
 rejoicing from Heaven, with the help of the angels, the king- 
 dom of Heaven upon earth." 
 
 So he brooded. Torn by the world's travail, torn by the
 
 HOLYLAND 335 
 
 very sublimity of his own nature, he went behind the heavy 
 horses that drew the wagon of humanity through the dark val- 
 ley, holding the obstinate, the slow, and the impatient on a 
 short rein, forcing them up on to an upland path, where the 
 sun shone and the wind blew upon them. 
 
 They went on their way across the moor towards the north 
 for three or four days, he in front, lost in thought, the disci- 
 ples behind with sinking spirits, that only rose when he turned 
 to look at them. His eyes were at once their terror and their 
 joy. Thus they reached the foot of the mountain. How long 
 would he wander on, undecided? The hour of decision must 
 come. 
 
 "Tell me, what do the people say that I am?" 
 
 It is sad that he should have to ask people's opinion. 
 
 The disciples replied, " They say you are one of the heroes 
 of old ; one of the dead arisen, they say." 
 
 " And what do you say? " 
 
 The hot-headed fellow among them cried out of a full 
 heart, "You you are the Saviour! . . . we have long 
 known it." 
 
 " Yes, you are the Saviour." 
 
 "Only speak, and you could rule the land." 
 
 " And then, out with the sword ! Down with the foreign 
 rule and the upstart parsons ! " 
 
 "You, King in your native country! . . . Your kingdom at 
 the sword's point! " 
 
 " And we, your disciples, standing to your right and left, 
 vassals and ministers." 
 
 It filled him with horror to see how little even these men 
 understood him, these men, nearer to him than all others, who 
 had been with him for half a year. He answered harshly, 
 " Do ye know what is written ? It may come to war and con- 
 quest. . . . But the old books tell a different tale: a tale of 
 sorrow and death, and then, and not till then, the glory 
 comes." 
 
 They shook their heads; they could not understand. The 
 old books, the inspiration of their youth had taught them only 
 the wild song of joyful contest up with the banner of salva- 
 tion! and God and His hosts will give the victory. The hot- 
 headed one came close to him and whispered, " Do not talk so 
 much of humility and purity and death ! Talk more about the
 
 336 HOLYLAND 
 
 sword! Up to the throne! . . . Who shall sit on thy right 
 hand, Master?" 
 
 He pushed them aside, " Get thee behind me, Satan. I 
 hearken only to the will of God. What shall it profit a man 
 if he gain the whole world and lose his own soul? He who 
 will follow me must put from him all wild and earthly desires, 
 and go with me to life or death, victory or defeat." 
 
 They turned and went to their homes. 
 
 He went on alone. A man pure, good, and holy, wrapped 
 in sublime thoughts, in wonderful visions and dreams, set apart 
 by his love for mankind and for the eternal and mysterious 
 power which he called Father! Never was man so utterly 
 alone; one man against a whole people, against the whole of 
 humanity. But the Eternal Power spread its arms around 
 him. He resolved to go south, and there proclaim the kingdom 
 of Heaven in the capital, bearing in his brave, fearful soul the 
 power to meet all that might come. 
 
 What can stand against the soul of a man sublime and 
 stainless ? 
 
 As they journeyed southwards, his eyes looking their last 
 on the green hills and vale round the lake, crowds once more 
 gathered the helper and friend of men to hear his wondrous 
 words. Now there was a new astonishment: the disciples did 
 not conceal the secret they had learned. " He himself has said 
 he is the Saviour! The Saviour for whom we have waited for 
 eight hundred years! " 
 
 ; 'The Saviour!" 
 
 "Was not the Saviour to be of an ancient royal house? 
 Was he not to come in the golden panoply of war? Was he 
 not to wield the sword and ride upon the storm? This man 
 is good, ay, and holy; he speaks of mercy and of purity of 
 heart." 
 
 Questions were asked and answered in feverish excitement. 
 There was no wild outburst of rejoicing. 
 
 The clericals went to the Duke, who had a considerable regi- 
 ment in the north, and was always eager to find some way of 
 ingratiating himself with the all-powerful imperial governor 
 in the south. They roused him by saying, " Before he was 
 merely a harmless enthusiast, but now that he calls himself the 
 Saviour he has become a political offender."
 
 HOLYLAND 337 
 
 Faithful adherents warned the hero of a conspiracy on foot 
 against him, but he was already on his way south. There was 
 reason for hastening his journey. The great festival of the 
 Church was just beginning in the capital; thousands of people 
 assembled from all parts of the country, and their compatriots 
 scattered in all quarters of the globe came too. 
 
 He would arise in the midst of the festival and declare, " I 
 am the Saviour. I ... I shall bring to pass the kingdom of 
 Heaven upon earth." And then the Heavenly Father would 
 appear by his side with more than ten thousand warriors from 
 His Heavenly host. And if not he would come again, soon 
 after his death, with the Heavenly host behind him. He sent 
 a message breathing contempt to the Duke, " Tell the fox 
 that I am healing the sick and the insane, and on the third day 
 I reach my goal." With the courage of despair, conscious of the 
 shadows closing round him, he said, " I must go on my way 
 to-day, to-morrow, the day after to-morrow, for they must rise 
 in the capital whom God has inspired and set in flames." His 
 words entered in like nails into the hearts of his friends. " I 
 must die; but I shall return in glory, clad with the might of 
 God, to establish His kingdom." 
 
 And so for the last time he journeyed through his home on 
 his way south, with folded lips, in his heart foreknowledge of 
 death, in his soul the courage of despair, keeping his way secret 
 as far as he could, to reserve his strength for his entry into the 
 capital. . . . But his companions went with him, behind him 
 and before him, in joyous array, crying aloud, " The long- 
 expected Saviour is at hand! The great transformation is at 
 hand ! The great day is come ; not as we expected, but it is 
 come. Wonders are taking place. Come and behold them." 
 
 The agents of the Nationalists flew ahead like crows : " Men 
 of the south, pillars of the Church, hold high your heads. He 
 is at hand, he is at hand, and he says he is the Saviour. The 
 Saviour! " 
 
 And a wild outcry resounded from the temples. On to the 
 south, hour after hour, onwards, through crowds, on lonely 
 paths; as they went their souls inspired by his vivid words to 
 the belief that they should stand armed and ready for the break 
 of the glorious day of the kingdom of Heaven; out of the 
 bloody dawn of his death. He told them of the farmer's son 
 who had left his home in the pride of his heart and gone out
 
 338 HOLYLAND 
 
 into the evil world, and, after wallowing in the mire and fall- 
 ing upon bitter sorrow, returned home and been lovingly re- 
 ceived there. . . . He told them of the woman who lost a 
 fourpenny-piece and searched for it far, far into the night, and 
 how her heart rejoiced within her when she found it. ... He 
 told them of the shepherd's long, long search for the lost sheep. 
 He had a hundred sheep, but he searched till dawn for this 
 one that was lost. How he rejoiced when he found it! Be- 
 hold, of such worth is a human soul in the eyes of God! so 
 does He rejoice over it! Take heed of your souls, that are so 
 cherished. Take heed that they are worthy of the kingdom of 
 Heaven, which is now drawing near. 
 
 The train that followed them swelled as they went on. One 
 day passed, and then another, and the capital was no longer far 
 away. Th'en the pious fools stepped once more across his path. 
 They wanted to force him to weave a net for himself to hold 
 him in its meshes, when he raised his hand and said, " I am 
 the Saviour listen : in the books it is written, as you know 
 ' If the man please he can turn away his wife. Get thee hence, 
 woman ; I will behold thee no longer.' " He looked down 
 upon them. " Marriage means, ye are one for life." 
 
 He was the first to put the weak woman beside the man as 
 his equal. . . . Women of the world, ye owe him much. 
 
 They stepped back in silence. He was greater than the an- 
 cient writings. 
 
 When they halted for the night the mothers came to him 
 with their children in their arms and holding their hands, and 
 asked him to bless them. The disciples, like all the people of 
 their age, wanted to turn the children coldly away. 
 
 " Children ? Away with them ! Creatures of no account ! 
 Beat them, drive them back! " 
 
 He said, " In the kingdom of Heaven there are none of little 
 account; all shall sit at the feast, all shall be filled. And the 
 children above all! The children above all. They are full of 
 trust, and therefore they are great in the kingdom of Heaven. 
 Be as the children are ! Come hither, mother, come hither with 
 thy babe." He took the children on his knee and kissed them. 
 
 He was the first to bring the children into the sunshine. He 
 was the first to put the children beside the old as their equals. 
 Women and children of the world! ye owe him much. 
 
 They went on for the third and last day.
 
 HOLYLAND 339 
 
 The crowd grew, procession after procession filling the wide 
 road on their way to the capital. Strangers coming from the 
 east joined them. All had heard of the holy hero, and now 
 heard more as they ran whispering together and marvelling over 
 his mien and the lofty purity of that face, in which already 
 burned the knowledge of death like a beacon in a stormy 
 night. The sea surged round him. 
 
 A rich young man knelt in the dust before him, " Master, 
 what can I do to enter into the kingdom of Heaven ? " 
 
 And he bent down to him and said, " Thou knowest the 
 commandments : ' Thou shalt not bear false witness . . . 
 
 " All that I have observed . . . since I was a child . . . 
 but there is no peace in my soul." 
 
 He bent further down to him; the young man pleased him: 
 he thought, " Here is a soul that belongs to Thee." " One 
 thing is wanting for thy peace of soul : give all thou hast to the 
 poor and follow me." 
 
 Then he arose, sighing deeply, and staggered away till he 
 was lost to sight among the crowd. 
 
 " How hard it is for a rich man to enter into the kingdom 
 of Heaven." 
 
 The crowd swelled, procession joining procession. The de- 
 cision was near. 
 
 Two of the disciples came up to him, " Lord, promise us that 
 we shall be thy lieutenants afterwards." 
 
 He looked at them in trouble. "Are ye fain to die with 
 me?" 
 
 " Yes, Lord, we are fain." 
 
 His eyes shone into theirs. " It shall be as ye say; ye shall 
 die with me for my sake, and afterwards ye shall rule with me. 
 But God alone can say who shall be second after me and 
 third. . . ." He turned to the friends nearest him, " Ye must 
 not let yourselves be called ' lord.' One alone is our Lord, our 
 Father in Heaven. In the world they sav: Lord, Lord; rule, 
 rule; but ye say: Serve, serve, as much service as possible. 
 Help and heal. Serve as I serve, who eive up my life to free 
 thousands from the evil and meaningless service of life, and 
 give them happiness in the kingdom of Heaven." 
 
 The streets of the little town outside the capital surged with 
 the excited crowd. On the branch of a tree there stood a little 
 man, a publican, who had grown rich with the money he had
 
 340 HOLYLAND 
 
 extorted from a poor and oppressed people. In his eyes was 
 reflected the trouble of his uneasy conscience. " Woe is me, 
 if the kingdom come now and my poor soul must stand out- 
 side, though it yearns for redemption." 
 
 The Saviour saw the eyes and knew them for such as he 
 could use. "Who is that man?" 
 
 " He is a rogue. A traitor, an accursed tax-gatherer." 
 
 " Come down from the tree ; I will eat with thee." 
 
 He walked by him, stumbling and tumbling over his words. 
 " Lord . . . thou wilt be my guest! . . . thou art so gracious 
 unto me. Lord . . . therefore will I give half my goods to 
 the poor this very day, because thou hast been so good to me! 
 Never, never will I cheat again." 
 
 After a brief midday rest he went on his way on the slowly 
 rising road that led to the capital, his disciples half in terror, 
 half in secret exaltation ; in front, behind, and around him the 
 crowds of men that knew and honoured him, burning with joy 
 and expectation, wonderful visions in their souls. 
 
 In the village just outside there dwelt a family; known to 
 him from former feast days; there he rested for the last time. 
 An ass with trappings was brought out, and on it he pro- 
 ceeded. 
 
 The capital lay hid behind great wooded hills; but now, near 
 the bastions, the road turned round the last hill, and there 
 before them lay the town, great and rich, with the mighty, 
 ancient temple in the midst, so vast that it formed a town in 
 itself, with its courts and cloisters and canonries. He halted 
 and looked down upon the town ; as he gazed and beheld the 
 houses, the temple, the castle, and heard the murmur of the 
 great rich city rise to his ears, there was borne in upon him 
 the certainty of a tragic end to come. The sorrow of that mo- 
 ment, and terror for his dear home, overcame him, and fears 
 sprang to his eyes. But only for a moment. " It is the will of 
 God! His will be done. If their hearts are of stone mine is 
 of diamond." As he turned to his followers his eves looked 
 as they had done in the north when he drove from him the evil 
 spirits of doubt. They saw, and a wild outburst of joy broke 
 forth. Garments were spread upon the way and the street was 
 full of palm branches. 
 
 " The kingdom of Heaven is at hand ! Help, Lord on 
 high!"
 
 HOLYLAND 341 
 
 " This is the kingdom of Heaven." 
 
 " This is the branch of the ancient royal stem." 
 
 "A time of joy in the land! Help, O Lord on high! " 
 
 Men and women ran and cried aloud for joy; children leapt 
 and sang; crowds poured out of the houses and from the 
 mighty courtyards of the temple. They had long ago heard of 
 his coming from northern pilgrims. Marvellous was the noise 
 everywhere. " A time of joy in the land. Help, O Lord ! The 
 kingdom is at hand! Help us!" 
 
 The clericals stood by with faces white as death. Two of 
 them pressed their way up to him, " Forbid this mad cry ! " 
 He looked at them in lofty scorn, " Were they silent, the walls 
 would cry out." 
 
 The whole town was in an uproar. The governor and his 
 mercenaries looked down from the citadel in horror to this 
 mighty stirring of the people. There were some who asked, 
 " Who is he? Who is he? " but the masses knew. " It is the 
 pure and holy hero from the north. He says he is the Saviour. 
 He says that the marvel is at hand, the kingdom of Heaven is 
 at hand." 
 
 There stood the vast and costly temple buildings, old and 
 new ; in the courts and in the halls the gay turmoil of the mar- 
 ket, oxen and calves in long rows, there a herd of sheep, there 
 birds in cages, there cartloads of grapes. Imperial gold was 
 exchanged for the currency of the Church at the shining coun- 
 ter of the money-changer. " Give the best of your money and 
 your goods. O people. Give the sweat of your brows! Here! 
 There God is content with you; you are great in His 
 sight." 
 
 Poor people! what a God is this; thy priests lay upon the? 
 a double poverty ; they take away thy daily bread and they cor- 
 rupt thy heart so that thou canst not see the truth. 
 
 The man from the north knows another God ; he does not 
 want hands full of gold, but hearts full of courage, purity, 
 and brotherly love; not churches and feasts and crowds of 
 priests, but right and justice in the land. 
 
 The hero, the Saviour, stood in the midst of the temple and 
 raised his clear voice. The table by one of the money-changers 
 overturned ; the market women began to scream, sheep ran 
 about, cages fell over. Terrified by his lofty presence and the 
 force of his words, the sextons fled. " I say unto you in the
 
 342 HOLYLAND 
 
 name of God, ' My house shall be a house of prayer.' Ye mur- 
 derers, ye robbers, is this your Hell ? " 
 
 The town was filled with wild excitement. The deed was 
 monstrous. The timid flee, the heavy tramp of the soldiers 
 already in their ears. The rest of the crowds from the north 
 rejoice. The priests stood in impotent rage at the doors of 
 their houses. The righteous and the just looked at him with 
 earnest eyes and closed lips. " This means death for thee, thou 
 brave and stainless one." 
 
 The court was now empty of all worldly traffic; the Church 
 was pure. The kingdom of God established. Pure hearts are 
 in unison with God, and their hands lie in their brothers'! 
 The crowd pressed close to him. His soul exulted. " I shall 
 win them all, all! The way is straight into the joyful kingdom 
 of heaven. I need not taste the bitterness of death. . . ." 
 
 But in a remote court the clericals were gathered together. 
 " He must die. That is clear. But caution ! the stupid people 
 are on his side. He must die . . . that is clear." 
 
 For two days he was king of the multitude, ruling in the 
 courts and in the halls. The temple was purified of worldly 
 things; the feet of bearers carrying out the sick rang out clear 
 on the stone flags. Raised to something almost superhuman 
 -in these hours of spiritual elevation by the consciousness of 
 seeking nothing for himself, doing all as the servant of God, 
 he wielded a marvellous power. Children stood in crowds be- 
 tween the pillars, shouting out the cries by which men had 
 summoned the Saviour of old ; thousands lay at his feet ; fresh 
 crowds listened to his words, rapt by his wisdom and goodness, 
 slaking the thirst of their famishing souls. For centuries the 
 high places of the land had been filled by mere shadows of 
 men, mere tools of corruption; never by a man genuine and 
 pure of heart like this one. 
 
 " How genuine he is! how pure! how simple! " 
 
 " Yes, the Saviour must be such a man." 
 
 " A scion of the ancient kings." 
 
 " He is not descended from a royal race." 
 
 "Is he not?" 
 
 ' Then he is an impostor! " 
 
 " That is not true ; look at his face ; listen to his words 
 can that be an impostor ? "
 
 HOLYLAND 343 
 
 Two elders of the Church appeared in the gateway, tall and 
 dignified men, and approached him. " Make way there." 
 
 The crowd makes way. 
 
 They come up to him and say, " We ask thee with what au- . 
 thority art thou come?" 
 
 He looked at them in bitter scorn. " Tell me, had the hero 
 who stood in the stream a year ago, preaching conversion, di- 
 vine authority ? or was he an impostor ? " 
 
 They dared not say he was an impostor; the people knew 
 him for a pure and true man; they shrugged their shoulders 
 and went their way. Like the clang of steel there fell on their 
 ears the parable of the evil tenants, " They killed the servants 
 whom the householder sent, and the householder had one dear 
 son . . . him also they killed. I say unto you, the Lord will 
 give the vineyard unto other husbandmen." 
 
 The high priests were defeated ; they were far removed from 
 the people, immersed in the world of books; yet most of them 
 were honourable men in the main. But now the black spies, 
 the pious knaves, appeared again ; how they rubbed their hands ; 
 what inspiration sparkled in their eyes! Inspiration, indeed. 
 
 " Master, we know that thou art true and carest not for 
 anyone, for thou regardest not the person of men. . . . Our 
 mind is troubled, . . . tell us, may our pious people pay tribute 
 to the Emperor? . . . you know the Emperor is a heretic?" 
 
 What now? If he said " No, no tribute," the imperial tax- 
 collectors would seize upon him, and they would be rid of him 
 so. If he said " Yes," the people would turn against him, for 
 the tribute was thrice hateful, because it was heavy, because 
 it went to a heretic, and because it went out of the country. 
 If he had been a man of low aims! but his ideals were of a lof- 
 tier sort. " Ye hypocrites, if ye carry the Emperor's money in 
 your pockets, pay him tribute with it. ... Pay and trouble no 
 more about it. Think of your souls . . . see that they do the 
 will of God." 
 
 So they, too, went their way. 
 
 In the evening some of the courtiers from the castle came to 
 him, a strange mixture of frivolity and piety in their mien, 
 such as is characteristic of such men. They had been discussing 
 the events of the day at dinner and come to the conclusion 
 " One must not treat so-called heroes too seriously." What 
 did such men care for the condition of the people? They came,
 
 344 HOLYLAND 
 
 smiling with a kind of inebriated pretence of piety. " Master, 
 in the old chronicles it stands, if a man die, having no children, 
 his brother shall marry his widow. Now, suppose the woman 
 married seven brothers in turn, in the resurrection whose wife 
 shall she be?" 
 
 He answers shortly and sternly, " In the resurrection there 
 is no marrying nor giving in marriage; they are as angels in 
 Heaven." 
 
 Then a respectable man came up to him, desiring to know, 
 in one word, for the comfort of his own soul and the souls of 
 all those that stood there, what was the mysterious source from 
 which as from a spring this pure and wondrous life should 
 come. " Tell me, which is the first of all commandments ? " 
 
 The Saviour turned to him and compressed into one word 
 all the hundred commandments of the Church. " Thou shalt 
 love God with all thy heart and soul, and thy neighbour as 
 thyself; that is righteousness. Anything else is the superfluous 
 and baneful invention of men. This is the great and first 
 commandment." 
 
 The questioner's eyes shone. There were many, many shin- 
 ing eyes there. 
 
 But many indifferent, too. " My father and my grand- 
 father were good men, and they contented themselves with the 
 ancient precepts." 
 
 And many doubters ! " It is a dangerous business ; who 
 knows what the issue will be." 
 
 " I have a house and a small field." 
 
 And here and there a mocker. " You will not enter the 
 kingdom of Heaven." "I don't want to; it's too clean." 
 " A strange saint, this." All these men faltered and then 
 dropped out. 
 
 All the time the clericals were busy spying and prying. 
 For two days he had preached ; preached and conquered. What 
 do such conquests effect? The whirligig of time brings round 
 its revenges. The clericals were busy. " It is absurd. This 
 the Saviour! Is he descended from a royal race; is he not a 
 craftsman from a corner of the country where they are all of 
 mixed descent! and all sorts of strangers come pouring across 
 the border." 
 
 He heard the conflict; he saw that all was lost if he could 
 not conquer here, He told them it did not stand in the sacred
 
 HOLYLAND 345 
 
 books that the Saviour must be of royal race; but words were 
 vain ; this belief was fixed firmly in their minds. He had noth- 
 ing to give to the animal instincts of men; there was nothing 
 in his hands but godliness, purity, and truth, and this will not 
 satisfy a people, not even for three days. 
 
 And the angels of the Lord came not. 
 
 They are busy compounding reason and folly, truth and 
 misery, fear and blood ; and gradually they conquer. He does 
 not quail. More and more clearly he sees that defeat must 
 come; he only grows firmer, more unbending; in his soul there 
 grew, stronger and stronger, the mystic faith. " God is yet 
 with me." He sought in the old books for all that could 
 strengthen that proud faith in the midst of the terrors that lay 
 round him like the terrible beasts of darkness. If death were 
 to come, the books foretold resurrection and return; if not in 
 three days, later; return with all the might of God! Then 
 the kingdom of Heaven! He must believe, or he could not 
 bear the burden. Thank Heaven for the words of the books. 
 
 That evening, as he left the temple for the last time, his 
 dispirited disciples looked at him with anxiety in their eyes. 
 " Teacher, look at these mighty stone walls ; they have stood 
 for a thousand years; wilt thou, alone, attack them?" 
 
 Then he revealed to them the picture of the future outlined 
 by his tortured soul. 
 
 " When I am dead then shall be bitter travail in the land. 
 Again and again will the ancient foes attack the land from 
 without, and false beliefs rend it within ; children will rise 
 against their parents; there shall be division between brother 
 and sister. And all this shall be as a sign of the coming of 
 the kingdom of Heaven upon earth. The son of man shall 
 come with might and glory from heaven unto earth and 
 bring to pass the kingdom of Heaven upon earth. Be not 
 afraid! Endure! I shall return." 
 
 And they asked him, trembling, " When shall these things 
 be?" 
 
 To that he can give no answer. " It shall be in your life- 
 time. Suddenly. Be on the watch. Watch and pray!" 
 
 And while he brooded and wrestled with his own soul 
 "Be strong! quail not that is to betray thy Father in 
 Heaven," strengthening his soul with wondrous dreams of the
 
 346 HOLYLAND 
 
 future the clericals were busy plotting for his speedy des- 
 truction. 
 
 He had the true hero's belief in all mankind, and among 
 the disciples there was one who was traitrous and weak. 
 WJien he saw that things were going ill in the capital, the little 
 faith and courage he had had deserted him, and " his opinions 
 changed ; " " scales seemed to fall from his eyes," and vanity 
 reinforced the charge. He went to the men of darkness. 
 " Give me so much," he said, " and to-morrow night I will 
 lead you to a place where you can capture him without diffi- 
 culty." 
 
 They listened to him without shame; no one leapt to his 
 feet and said, " Away with the rascal ; I cannot bear to look 
 upon him." After a brief discussion they decided on doing 
 the deed to-day. No one came forward in his defence ; no 
 one cried out in his anxiety; not one of these shadows had the 
 least suspicion of what they were destroying; they merely 
 stared with the stupid eyes of fishes at the golden crown which 
 had fallen into their pond. All were rotten to the core. 
 Among all these ghosts the appointed victim alone had the 
 breath of life in his frame. 
 
 Evening came. The behaviour of the enemy and the disap- 
 pearance of the scoundrel had warned the hero and his disci- 
 ples to expect the attack that night. 
 
 For the last time he sat down to table with his disciples. It 
 was an ancient custom to keep this day as a feast, with all the 
 means at the householders' disposal. He passed round lamb's- 
 flesh, broken bread, and wine in cups, while offering thanks in 
 a short prayer, in which he recalled the gloom of past times 
 when God had stood by them as their ally. 
 
 At first he spoke with some sadness of his pleasure in having 
 been permitted by his enemies to enjoy the hour of peace in the 
 celebration of this ancient custom. But when the first wine 
 cup went round the horror of his imminent doom rose hideous 
 before him ; looking at them he said sadly, " I shall not drink 
 wine with you again ; but when my Father's kingdom comes 
 we will drink together thus in a pure and blessed land." 
 Listen! is that the soldiers' feet? Murmuring a grace he broke 
 the bread, terror in his heart. ' Thus it shall be with my 
 body; broken even thus." Once more the red wine flowed into 
 the cup; he saw his own blood flow, and thinking of the old
 
 H'OLYLAND 347 
 
 alliance with God, said, " I give my blood that God may make 
 a new and stronger alliance with my people." They rose from 
 the meal and went out into the night. Listen is that the 
 tramp of soldiers in the street? 
 
 He took the arm of his hot-headed disciple and said to him 
 in a low, quick voice, " Listen; I know that the devil will try to 
 tempt you from my side. I have prayed God earnestly that 
 thou, the bravest of all, mayst not lose thy faith in me and my 
 return. If thou recoverest from thy terror, strengthen thy 
 brethren." 
 
 The hot-head boasted loudly, "I? terror? I am ready, now, 
 this moment, to go with thee to imprisonment and death." 
 
 Then the hero said, " This very night, before cock crow, 
 thou wilt desert me." 
 
 His soul quailed as he went on; the joy of the past stood 
 out in bitter contrast to the sorrow of the present. " Do you 
 remember how I sent ye forth, in the north? Did ye ever 
 want for anything? " 
 
 They all shook their heads. " No, never." 
 
 " But now ! Think ; ye must be armed like soldiers." 
 
 " Two of us have swords." But thus they turned off on that 
 false track on which he must not stray, however, and sorely 
 his soul longed for safety. He broke off quickly. " Enough 
 of that." 
 
 They came into an orchard and weariness came over most 
 of them. They threw themselves down on the grass and slept. 
 Three of the most faithful went on with him; but they, too, 
 were sorrowful and weary, and sank down. 
 
 A feeling of utter desolation came over him and he begged 
 them, " My soul is exceeding sorrowful ; even unto death ; 
 abide with me." They lay resting on their elbows, sorrowful 
 and weary, unable to say anything. His weary, lonely soul 
 turned from men to the Eternal Power, " Oh, my Father, if 
 it be possible, let this cup pass away from me! nevertheless, not 
 as I will, but as Thou wilt." 
 
 Then turning to his friends, " I beg ye, watch with me . . . 
 thou, my faithful one, wilt thou not watch with me?" 
 
 Again he turned from them to the Eternal, kneeling and 
 praying. " If it be possible . . . not my will, but Thine. . . . 
 Father, is it not possible?" 
 
 It is not possible; the unfathomable law of creation has de-
 
 348 HOLYLAND 
 
 creed for man death and sorrow; progress is only gained by 
 the sufferings of the best among mankind. 
 
 He knew it, and took his trembling soul in both his hands. 
 " Not my will, but Thine." 
 
 So he lay half the night through. And the report is true 
 that he found consolation. 
 
 Then came the clang of arms. Amid the smoke of the 
 torches stood the betrayer. . . . The swords flashed. The 
 disciples fled. 
 
 They led him into the town in their midst, into the court of 
 the high priest. And in the courtyard soldiers sat and lounged 
 around the fire; servants came and went; all kinds of miserable 
 wretches, dependents of the Church, had gathered together 
 there by order. In the half darkness, at one side of the fire, 
 a short colloquy went on, with much pointing of fingers. 
 
 " Thou wast with him." 
 
 "I ... what nonsense ! " 
 
 " Thy speech betrayeth thee. Thou art from the north." 
 
 " May I be accursed. ... I have never seen him in my 
 life." He stood there, pale as death, with trembling hands. 
 The high priests went by. He slunk out; reaching the gate in 
 safety he went out into the dark street and wept bitterly. 
 
 Morning comes, and the elders of the Church assemble. The 
 affair has been cunningly contrived ; make him a political crim- 
 inal and he falls into the hands of the civil power. ' The 
 State is our bailiff; its justice is speedy." They asked him, 
 therefore, one question only, " Are you the Saviour, the king of 
 the people? " 
 
 The hero prisoner raised his head ; in those pure eyes there 
 burned a light that was not of this world. " I am he! and ye 
 shall see me the Saviour, on the Almighty's right hand, de- 
 scended upon earth in a cloud from Heaven." That was 
 enough. 
 
 Day had broken. He was handed over to the watch and 
 led into the imperial office. 
 
 The whole town was awake; crowds filled the streets. Many 
 a fist was clenched ; angry tears stood in many an eye ; but the 
 gate closed behind him ; he was fallen into hard-hands of fearful 
 strength. 
 
 He was accused before the governor as a political offender. 
 The governor, an elderly man, had seen strange customs in
 
 HOLYLAND 349 
 
 many lands, and accommodated himself readily enough to them 
 all ; like many men in high office, he had either quite forgotten, 
 or never known, any respect for individual consciences. He 
 looked at the accused before him and said, " You are the king 
 of this people? " 
 
 " You are right." 
 
 The governor looked at him again. " He seems to me a 
 harmless creature ; I shall let him go." 
 
 But the pious rabble that stood crowded behind the pillars 
 cried, " Crucify him, crucify him! " 
 
 This was the imperial punishment for treason. The con- 
 demned was bound or nailed hand and foot to an upright 
 stake, and left to hang there till he died. Many thousands had 
 perished thus. 
 
 The most important dignitary of the Church went up and 
 spoke in low tones to the governor. He was really a traitor; 
 he had a great following, especially in the north; if he let the 
 man go ... the Emperor was said to be very sensitive on 
 the question of treason. . . . The hint was understood. The 
 governor's advancement came before justice. The hero from 
 the north was condemned as a revolutionary and pretender by 
 the law of the State to be scourged and then bound to a stake 
 until he died. 
 
 The blows of the scourge cut his flesh to the bone; he en- 
 dured the extremity of physical and spiritual anguish. His 
 strength was absolutely exhausted when the blows ceased; he 
 could not even support the stake which he had to carry to 
 the place of execution ; a man who happened to be by had to 
 carry it for him. Two men condemned to the same sentence 
 for street robbery, were led with him to the place of execution. 
 
 They stripped him on the bare hillside above the town, laid 
 him down and fastened him to the stake. Powerful hands 
 seized him and raised him up. The soldiers offered him of 
 their drink, but he did not take it ; he was too weak. Some of 
 the scribes and some people in the mob mocked at the dying 
 man, and the two thieves also, " Thou art the king! help thyself, 
 then ! " No one knows what passed within him. He said no 
 more. To the last he must have cherished a faint hope that his 
 Father in Heaven would spare him the crowning bitterness. 
 But no ten thousand angels came. Not one came. Not one 
 of his disciples, not one of his relations was there. After he
 
 350 HOLYLAND 
 
 had hung there a few hours he died of loss of blood and 
 suffocation. 
 
 Such was his life. 
 
 Such was his death. 
 
 He was the fairest of the children of men. 
 
 The scattered disciples had fled in twos and threes to the 
 north to save their lives. Arrived there, terror-stricken and ex- 
 hausted, they began cautiously to speak of him. He had cer- 
 tainly believed, he had said to them definitely, " I shall re- 
 turn! soon! on the third day! I tell you, I shall return, clad 
 in divine authority." 
 
 Three days . . . eight . . . went by. He did not come. 
 
 " He must come. He cannot lie; he cannot be mistaken. 
 It is quite impossible that any grave, however deep, should hold 
 such a hero in. How he loved God! How he trusted Him! 
 Did he not say, ' Would a mortal father give the child, that 
 asked him for bread, a stone? and should the Almighty, Whom 
 he trusted so, give him a stone?' How he loved us! What 
 a pure and gracious being he was; how he uplifted our hearts. 
 Oh, Lord, what can we do without thee? Return, O 
 Saviour, bring to pass the Heavenly Kingdom! We need 
 thee so." 
 
 " He must return," said the old chronicles. " He must 
 return," whispered men, looking around them with yearning 
 eyes. " He must return," whispered the lake and the woods 
 and the wind there where he had been only fourteen days 
 ago. " I must see him again," said Peter, who had denied 
 him, " or I cannot live." 
 
 "Listen! Did you see anything, Peter?" 
 
 Next day the first rumour arose. In the evening Peter had 
 seen him walking along the beach, where he had walked so 
 often; there in the darkness he had stood, a friendly spirit, his 
 eyes fixed upon him. 
 
 The next day a new rumour spread from village to village. 
 His old friends, the fishers, had been sitting on the beach 
 that evening eating their supper of bread and fish round the 
 coke fire. The fire blazed, the sea roared, the stars shone in 
 the sky, the night folded them in her giant arms, and they 
 spoke of him. " Do you remember ? Then . . . yes, and that 
 other time . . . what truth he had; what understanding . . .
 
 HOLYLAND 351 
 
 and how good he always was ... a dear gracious being. . . . 
 Do you remember how we sat here . . . here on the beach 
 ... at our evening meal round the fire, the fire blazing as 
 it is now and the sea roaring; and he sat among us and prayed 
 in his dear voice ? . . . Oh, God. . . . Look, then ! . . . Did 
 you see? I have seen him! He stood there just behind you! " 
 
 Another evening three of his disciples were walking in the 
 darkness on a lonely road leading to the south, in deep converse 
 about him ; they wandered on and on, children of an age where 
 all the world was an enchanted garden and the night the home 
 of mystery ; the wounds of their souls burned, their love to the 
 wonderful man glowed. . . . "And they saw him? Was it 
 really he? He lives? He lives! Where is he now? It was 
 about this time that they saw him; what does he look like? 
 Dear, they said, and shining . . . yes, dear and shining . . . 
 perhaps he is with us, invisible . . . suddenly there comes a 
 flash of light, and he stands there by the tree. . . . Did you see 
 anything? Oh . . . calm your fevered heart! . . ." 
 
 They came home with burning eyes ; they had seen him. " He 
 went past us in the darkness and disappeared." 
 
 There was no stopping now. 
 
 Since waking eyes might not behold him, the yearning eyes 
 of faith, shining with passionate love, saw him. Since he 
 came not in the clear light of day they saw his apparition in 
 the darkness. 
 
 Weeks went by. ... Since he came not in his glory he 
 could not hold his place as a wandering light; the apparitions 
 faded away like mirages in a few weeks. But the legends of 
 the apparitions grew, expanding what had been seen. 
 
 Years went by; he never came; they still spoke of him. He 
 had stirred their hearts. 
 
 Gradually there collected among the fisher folk and the 
 moor dwellers a band of believers who accepted him as the 
 Saviour and hoped daily, with glowing faith, for the day of 
 his return to bring the Kingdom of Heaven. 
 
 Years went by. The band of those who spoke of him and 
 believed in his return, grew, extending as far as the capital, 
 and from there, through holiday visitors, to their compatriots 
 in the great imperial city, including every country and every 
 kind of superstition: Syrians and Egyptians, German soldiers 
 and Greek workmen. They painted and decorated the story of
 
 352 HOLYLAND 
 
 the Saviour's life. These children of a wild and restless age 
 dwelt in an enchanted world; when two or three were gath- 
 ered together they whispered the legends of his life with beam- 
 ing eyes. 
 
 And so the brave and simple life became more and more 
 marvellous. 
 
 " I have been told by someone who heard it from one of 
 the disciples that he walked upon the sea." 
 
 " Yes, and have you heard the story of how he commanded 
 the storm ? " 
 
 " Have you heard I was told by someone who came from 
 the place that once four thousand people followed him across 
 the moors? And he fed them all, just think, with seven 
 loaves!" 
 
 " No; there were five thousand people, and he had five 
 loaves; and afterwards they collected twelve baskets of frag- 
 ments." 
 
 " He raised a man from the dead." 
 
 " The greatest is that he himself rose from the dead." 
 
 " Yes, that is certain ; he appeared to all his disciples." 
 
 ' The watch over the tomb was broken up." 
 
 " He ate and drank with them. They ate fish." 
 
 " Once when I was at home for a feast I heard that he had 
 appeared to five hundred people at once." 
 
 " He rose up to Heaven before their eyes." 
 
 'To Heaven? What will he do there? He is going to 
 establish the Kingdom of Heaven upon earth." 
 
 " Yes, he will return. He has only gone for a time." 
 
 " Yes, indeed, he is in Heaven now ; else he was still among 
 us, for he certainly rose from the dead." 
 
 All that they had desired in vain from the son of man, 
 heavenly descent, a royal lineage, supernatural marvels, resur- 
 rection : all this was now attributed to him by passionate love, 
 poetic fancy, and religious longing. 
 
 So they spoke and waited. 
 
 One year after another passed. Thev prayed as he had 
 taught them to their Heavenly Father, " Thy kingdom come ; " 
 they lived pure lives and helped one another, happy in their 
 longing. 
 
 Some of the disciples died. 
 
 And yet he had said, " I shall return in your lifetime."
 
 HOLYLAND 353 
 
 They waited and waited. 
 
 He did not come. 
 
 And because he did not come as he had promised there was 
 a danger that his followers might remain a narrow national 
 sect; that his life had been lived in vain and would be for- 
 gotten ; that the salvation of humanity, the glorious purpose for 
 which he had died, might be lost. There was a danger that 
 this gracious tender personality might float away like a perfume 
 that is shed. 
 
 But a man of might arose, a strange, strong man, to be his 
 preserver and his herald. 
 
 Not far from his home there dwelt a man of the same race, 
 a Nationalist and clerical; a man of deep learning, wide and 
 general education and experience and keen intellect. Yet he 
 was diseased, through and through. In many passages in his 
 letters to his friends he expounded the nature of his disease; 
 he was tortured by nervous attacks, in which life appeared a 
 scene of misery, horror and death, attacks aggravated at times 
 to epileptic fits, during which he saw in a trance wondrous 
 visions of heavenly glory and beauty. He was a little younger 
 than the hero of the north and had never seen him. 
 
 With some of the educated men of his time and country he 
 shared a very peculiar faith ; that time of disturbance suggested 
 strange theories to imaginative minds. His belief, passionately 
 and ardently held, was briefly as follows: God, in the fulness 
 of His eternal might, will send down from the heavenly re- 
 gions the Saviour, an eternal and heavenly being. This eternal 
 and heavenly being, who had been God s right hand in the 
 creation of the world, greater and more glorious than the an- 
 gels of God, will conceal his heavenly majesty in a human form. 
 As the Saviour he will fight the evil men and spirits that pos- 
 sess this wicked world ; will conquer them or perish. At the 
 last he will conquer with the aid of God and His angels and 
 free mankind from all evil. And this eternal heavenly being 
 is coming soon ; it must be soon. How full my life and the 
 lives of all men are of misery, sorrow and distress. It may 
 come any day. Heavenly being! gracious vision! Saviour! 
 The Kingdom of Heaven! come, come; the world is ripe. 
 
 When this man, holding this faith, heard that there was a 
 sect in the north which maintained that the Saviour had already 
 appeared on earth in the guise of a carpenter, that he had been
 
 354 HOLYLAND 
 
 denied and killed by the pious authorities of the Church, but 
 had risen again and would soon return, he was consumed by 
 excitement and rage. It was impossible. His Church had de- 
 nied the holy one sent by God? The righteous in the land 
 had not recognised the heavenly being? . . . Calling for as- 
 sistance from the State he hunted them down and persecuted 
 them zealously. 
 
 But his faith gave him no peace; it was cold and meaning- 
 less ; the mere skeleton of a faith, without the flesh and blood 
 of life. Sick in mind and body he longed for this life. " Lord, 
 send the heavenly being soon ! Lord, how will he appear when 
 he comes? How will he come?" 
 
 Pondering one day over the " false Saviour," he went along 
 a lonely road, brooding in passionate aspiration. " Gracious 
 and pure they say he was ; unspeakably dear ; he wanted men to 
 be children of God ; away with the external forms of righteous- 
 ness. . . . Yes, that is true ; such are his people. Their 
 trust in God is wonderful, the joyful sense of being His chil- 
 dren, with which they endure all that I lay upon them. And 
 they are so gentle, so friendly to one another. They have all, 
 all that my poor soul yearns for in vain. . . . He was slain 
 and arose from the dead . . . freed from this misery of flesh. 
 . . . Their eyes have looked upon him ... if it were true? 
 Was he really the Saviour? . . . Oh, if he would only show 
 himself to me! If I could see him, risen, a denizen of Heaven! 
 Then I should be free from the burden of my body, then I 
 should stand, uplifted, free and blissful close to the knees of 
 God. ... Oh, then! . . ." 
 
 And, behold! as he went on, in an agony of indecision, one 
 of his physical and spiritual attacks came upon him, and he saw 
 the Saviour standing in the radiant glow of heavenly beauty 
 and glory. 
 
 From this hour on he devoted himself with restless energy 
 to preaching the hero. " He has appeared to me ; he is the 
 Saviour." And he decked the hero, the true and simple son 
 of man, with all the marvellous attributes of his imaginative 
 faith. He was the eternal Godhead, the great eternal wonder 
 of the world. He overlaid the humble simplicity of the son 
 of man with sevenfold brocade, glittering and heavy. 
 
 The simple moor folk had known his mother and father, had 
 sat at table with him, seen him in laughter and tears, in sick-
 
 HOLYLAND 355 
 
 ness and health; they had seen him doubtful and uncertain, 
 stirred to annoyance and anger. He had walked with them 
 the long sandy ways to the town; they knew that he was not 
 the creator of the world, but a man like themselves. 
 
 This man, his poet's eye in a fine frenzy rolling, had never 
 seen him; he knew little of his life, and was little interested 
 in it; he saw in him only the wonder of the world, dead and 
 risen from the dead. 
 
 He cried, "Awake! awake! God has been in the world! 
 Awake! He comes ... he comes! Make haste! ... to- 
 morrow or the day after to-morrow he will come down from 
 Heaven and pass judgment." 
 
 His fiery eloquence not only persuaded the disciples and 
 even the ancient followers; it convinced others, fellow country- 
 men and strangers. People longed for a great and conquering 
 faith to harmonise their view of the world and co-ordinate its 
 elements. In him gifted, courageous and inspired by a passion- 
 ate love of right, his new belief and love glowed like some 
 divine frenzy. His imagination knew no bounds ; he knew 
 the secret plans of God, the creation of the world, judgment 
 to come nothing was concealed from him. He erected a 
 marvellous edifice of thought, strongly built and inter-pene- 
 trated with the fiery breath of love, that reached up from the 
 foundations of Hell through the vaults of death, up to and 
 even above the arch of the seventh heaven. 
 
 And so the noble simplicity of the human picture disap- 
 peared. The true man, striving and fighting upwards through 
 pain, was distorted into the eternal wonder of the world. The 
 man who passionately loved his poor people and died for them 
 in spite of hopes betrayed became the eternal Redeemer of man- 
 kind yet to be. His words, " these are by nature the children 
 of God ; they can do His will, if they will it also," were twisted 
 to " these are corrupt by nature, powerless, the children of the 
 devil; they only reach God by the help of a wonder." His 
 words, " Feel thyself the child of God ! Do the will of God ! 
 Who so doeth the will of God is blessed," became, " Do this; 
 but only if you believe also that the Son of God has died for 
 you, are you blessed." His hope " that he should soon return 
 to erect the Kingdom of Heaven upon earth " became the belief 
 " that he would appear again as the Eternal Judge of all men, 
 living and dead."
 
 356 HOLYLAND 
 
 Only in one thing did he keep close to the pure and lofty 
 son of man; like him he said that love of God and man came 
 first of all. 
 
 He preached sermons glowing with passionate love of the 
 eternal, heavenly being, and of God; and of the men whom he 
 so longed to save. He endured danger and trouble, mockery 
 and abuse. For all his strangeness, he was a great and noble- 
 minded man; and his courage was heroic. Up to the hour of 
 his death he preached, "The Eternal One cometh! He com- 
 eth! and judgment with him!" 
 
 But he came not. 
 
 He came not. 
 
 Then the faithful accepted the conclusion that the time 
 might still be far away. They took life more easily; abandon- 
 ing the passionate belief that he might return every moment 
 they looked forward to the calm hope, " After death we shall 
 come to him and he will have mercy upon us." 
 
 In such a creed there was room for priests once more; they 
 gradually forced themselves between the " Divine Redeemer " 
 and men ; the old juggling with human fears and human indo- 
 lence began again ; once more the easy priest grew sleek and 
 rich. It all was as it had been when the hero arose. They 
 collected the old chronicles over which he had so brooded in 
 his youth; they gathered together four wonderful accounts of 
 his life, and the epistles of his great followers, and a few other 
 documents dealing with him; and bound up all these contra- 
 dictory and discordant stories in a book, which they called " the 
 Holy Writ," a book which they said, and most people believed 
 it, had been written under the eyes of God Himself; a book 
 which contained no error, admitted no contradiction. 
 
 The faith thus twice modified was both comforting and at- 
 tractive. It gained more and more adherents. Even the rich 
 and powerful found it tolerable, and this increase in numbers 
 brought the great mass of the indifferent, so that the faith be- 
 came the fashion and was accepted as the religion of the State. 
 
 Centuries passed. Priests and Synods amended and invented. 
 Legends arose; miracles, effected by old and new saints, Were 
 reported and recorded. Great collections of laws were com- 
 piled. All these reports, these legends of the saints, these com- 
 pilations were added to the Holy Writ. The priests' corn was
 
 HOLYLAND 357 
 
 in flower; its fragrance filled the warm summer day far and 
 wide. Human ingenuity was constantly at work upon the 
 ancient Holy Writ, which was itself as much forgotten as if 
 they thought that no one would ever trouble about it again. 
 In the end, time, human ingenuity and human ambition made a 
 cold and unreal abstraction out of the good countryman, the 
 brave hero who lived the life of a true and upright man : a man 
 who cherished the pure and wonderful faith of a child, and 
 died in lonely despair; an abstraction, that sat above the clouds 
 ruling the world in a garment of stiff gold. Beside him sat his 
 mother, almost greater than he was; his poor, foolish mother! 
 around him, clad in robes of silk, bearing themselves with pride 
 and dignity, stood the wise old peasants who had once gone 
 barefoot with him over the sands. 
 
 The eternal might is perpetually at work, working among 
 men as much as among the stars or on the ocean. 
 
 So it happened that among the German people a man arose: 
 a true German, full of passionate sincerity and vigorous life, 
 of native power and wide education. As he grew to manhood 
 he sought to set his soul in its true relation to the eternal 
 might. He cast into the mud the mass of stupid contradictions 
 with which the priests had overlaid the Holy Writ, and sat 
 down to study the Holy Writ itself. The trumpet tones of 
 Paul, that strange apostle, rang out clear and full; he heard 
 him only. He did not wholly understand his frenzied vehe- 
 mence; he adapted what he said. 'He took as the kernel of his 
 faith the words, " Man is just and pleasing in the sight of God 
 through his faith in the death and merits of the son of God." 
 
 His piety and the courage with which he upheld his faith 
 won for him half his countrymen. The northern part of 
 Germany and the other Germanic races, in whose hands lies 
 the future of the world, cast away the accursed collection of 
 writings; their faith in the "Word of God," the " doctrine of 
 the Church," as they called it, gave them a time of satisfaction. 
 
 It could not last; not more than three hundred years did 
 their faith hold them. 
 
 The so-called " Word of God " or " doctrine of the 
 Church" was founded on an error; it was internally false to 
 history and to morality, in that it taught that the simple hero 
 was merely the outward appearance which concealed the pres-
 
 358 HOLYLAND 
 
 ence in the world of an heavenly eternally existent being, the 
 son of God and the creator of the world. This error made the 
 doctrine based upon it empty, hard and unreal. And the more 
 empty and hard it grew the more it appealed to mediocrities, 
 and the more it was regarded as immutable. Narrow-minded 
 fools finally declared " The word of God and Luther's teach- 
 ing shall never pass away." 
 
 And so in the course of the last two centuries the best minds, 
 of the nation, its greatest poets, thinkers and leaders, the young, 
 the intellectual, the noble, the aspiring have turned away from 
 this belief and the Church that represented it demanding that 
 their Church should go before the people with a clarion voice 
 leading them in the lofty path of freedom. The churches now 
 stood in the road like two old market women in their broken 
 carts, calling out to the people, or it went on and left them be- 
 hind. It did go on ! Who can name them all ? Frederick the 
 Great, Goethe, Helmholtz! . . . Greeting to you, our leaders! 
 
 The eternal might is ever busy in the thoughts of men. 
 
 Dissatisfied with the cold repulsive teaching of the Church, 
 disturbed by the workings of the eternal in their souls, driving 
 them to seek out God, a hundred and fifty years ago German 
 men found courage and conviction to investigate the Holy 
 Writ. They wanted to see whether the book were really a 
 unity and infallible, as the Church maintained. It was a bold 
 undertaking, but they declared, " We shall examine the book 
 like any other." 
 
 For a hundred years a hundred good and true men of learn- 
 ing continued the investigation, and as they did so it became 
 clearer and clearer that the " Holy Writ " contained many 
 errors, religious and historical, and a mass of inconsistent be- 
 liefs: there was much that was noble in it, much that was bad, 
 much that was narrow, much that was contradictory. It was 
 like a garden, a wonderful, varied, disorderly book. The 
 brave men pressed their way further and further into the gar- 
 den ; through the long, rank grass and the tall trees. Further 
 and further they penetrated, anxiously and with reverent 
 hearts, seeking for the Holyland, the bourne of the human 
 spirit. . . . Ah! listen . . . from the midst of the wide gar- 
 den, hidden away in the mysterious mass of the green bushes, 
 there came, soft and clear, the exquisitely pure voice of a night-
 
 HOLYLAND 359 
 
 ingale. It sang with intense and penetrating sweetness, end- 
 ing on a note of quivering pain, of the love of the Almighty 
 and the divine nature of man. 
 
 In the time of Luther there arose in many German hearts 
 a new and passionate search for the word of God, a new love 
 for Him ; in our own day there has arisen a passionate and new 
 love for the pure hero who was hidden away under so many 
 strange disguises. It was a time of eager and joyful energy. 
 For a hundred years the brave German scholars toiled, in spite 
 of the scorn and contempt of obscurantists and the depreciation 
 of the anxious, to try and break through the hedge of thorns 
 behind which the hero has slept in concealment for two thou- 
 sand years. Awake, true hero ! awake ! Gradually, since many 
 good men and true aided in the work and assisted one another, 
 we saw his soul; six or seven of the most important incidents 
 in his life were established ; he stood there, a man. 
 
 He was a man. There are proofs enough. First of all: 
 He said so himself. Second : In his thought he was a child of 
 his time. Third: His character is remarkable. Fourth: He 
 developed. Fifth: His nature was not wholly free from evil. 
 Sixth: He made mistakes: he did not return, and the Kingdom 
 of Heaven did not come to pass. . . . He was a man. Won- 
 derful as his goodness and wisdom and courage, neither in 
 action nor in thought was he more than man. He was the 
 fairest of the children of men. 
 
 And his beautiful human soul has given us this: faith in 
 the divine dignity and lofty worth of every human soul; and, 
 derived from this, faith in the goodness and nearness of the un- 
 known eternal might; and, like good fruit from good soil, faith 
 in the stern and beautiful tasks of humanity and its lofty des- 
 tiny in the Kingdom of Heaven. Thus he brought to light the 
 meaning and the worth of human life and gave it an eternal 
 nobility. 
 
 We leave on one side all in him that was temporary, all that 
 was mistaken ; his belief in spirits, his miracles, his belief in his 
 bodily resurrection and the immediacy of the Kingdom of 
 Heaven. Even his morality, lofty as it is, cannot bind the chil- 
 dren of a time so different from anything of which he could 
 conceive. 
 
 We leave on one side all the doctrines which have been laid
 
 3 6o HOLYLAND 
 
 down from the time of Paul and the Evangelists on concerning 
 God and the Saviour. 
 
 We put away the mother of God and the Saints, the Pope 
 and the Mass away with them. God has had them judged 
 and sentenced to death by German science. 
 
 We put away the Trinity and the Fall, the eternal son of 
 God and the atonement by his blood and the resurrection of 
 the body. Why should we believe such things? They cannot 
 make us happier or better. And, moreover, what have such 
 things to do with belief? They are questions of knowledge. 
 Mistaken conceptions, German investigation has dismissed them 
 once and for all. In their time they may have had a validity 
 and a use for mankind; they may have served as a protecting 
 frame for the precious picture of the Saviour; but they have 
 no utility now. Away with the frame! Only ignorant men 
 or hypocrites fix their eyes on it now. Saviour, how beautiful is 
 thy picture! how simple and childlike thy faith! 
 
 Certainly thy faith had little visible basis, little outward 
 success. Thy " Father in Heaven " let thee descend into the 
 abyss of dark despair and had no mercy upon thee. And how 
 did men treat thee? the men whose dignity thou heldst so high? 
 Ah, but within thy soul had a prize beyond all estimation, 
 precious in that high and lofty faith that made thee so joyful, 
 set such a light in thine eyes, such strength and gentleness in 
 thy heart! Thy faith made thee the brightest star in man's 
 firmament. 
 
 Therefore let the unknown eternal power be what it may, 
 let it do with us what it will; thy faith, thou fairest of the 
 children of men, is our faith! And this is our faith: we feel 
 and we believe that the hidden and eternal power is good and 
 true and holy. We approach it with a trembling childlike 
 love, we trust it, we rejoice in it, we draw close to it. And in 
 this relation we find a deep and peaceful joy; it teaches us a 
 reverence for our own soul and the souls of others, an eager- 
 ness of eye and hand in the cause of progress, a mind ready to 
 help others and a joyous hopefulness for the future of hu- 
 manity. 
 
 And this faith is ours, not because he who first held it was 
 an eternal and wonderful being or because he had any such 
 authority over us. What has authority to say in such ques- 
 tions? How can one soul be responsible for others? Each
 
 HOLYLAND 361 
 
 soul must stand alone. It is ours because it corresponds to the 
 highest elements in the soul. All my life long I have asked my 
 soul, " My soul, you never cease to search for happiness. Tell 
 me, then, my soul, what makes you calm and strong, gay and 
 joyous? " And my soul replies, " The faith that the hero held. 
 He was the true, the complete man, and therefore he discovered 
 the true faith for man. Help me to hold it, eternal power, 
 thou mysterious goodness, thou my Father." 
 
 Therefore rejoice, ye school children and teachers through- 
 out the land. You have still to puzzle your brains over the 
 stupid knowledge that is useless and harmful and has nothing 
 to do with faith; but it will all come soon to the waste-paper 
 basket. Rejoice, ye, too, shall rejoice in Jesus the carpenter, 
 the wonderful stainless hero ; ye, too, shall bring into your lives 
 his lofty, childlike faith. 
 
 Rejoice, young manhood of the land ! The Church is fight- 
 ing against reason, the gift of God, and against the noble joy 
 of living. Here is a faith which rejoices in every triumph of 
 science, which is in harmony with the lofty spirit of Greece. 
 
 Rejoice, scholars and artists! You have stood, shaking your 
 heads over the marvel which the Church had set down in the 
 centre of man's path ; you went round about it, not knowing 
 where to begin. Now there stands in the path a fearful, simple 
 child of man looking at you with deep and truthful eyes. The 
 path of mankind is lofty indeed, but human. 
 
 Rejoice, preachers of both confessions, ye whose minds are 
 free and lofty. Not for long shall ye be compelled to proclaim 
 a senseless universe, a petty and unjust God, an unhistorically 
 distorted Saviour. Instead, you may proclaim with shining 
 eyes the life, the deeds, the faith of the pure and true hero; 
 and speak with prophetic eyes and voice of the future of man- 
 kind, leading it on to the blessed kingdom of God. 
 
 Rejoice, O State! The Church has used thee indeed; made 
 thee her servant and her scorn ; deceived and robbed thee. She 
 had grown swollen with her secrets; but German investigation 
 has torn her secrets from her. Is she to contest the people any 
 longer, to rule it, to hold it back? Now each man can hear 
 with his own ears the exquisite song of the nightingale, and 
 interpret it after his own fashion. 
 
 Rejoice, O Christendom! All seemed lost for thee in our 
 time. Thou couldst not have conquered the world with the
 
 362 HOLYLAND 
 
 " Pope " and the " Word of God." But China, India and 
 Japan will turn to the pure hero and accept his faith. If they 
 have souls like ours they will accept it, for it is adapted to the 
 human heart ; the heart needs it and opens out to it. 
 
 Rejoice, O my soul! Sit still a while and dream; rejoice! 
 What light has been cast into the darkness of German thought ! 
 If the light hurts thee, my soul, thy eyes will grow accustomed 
 to it, thou bird of the day! Dost thou see clear now? Dost 
 thou see the land? Dost thou rejoice? What a Holyland! 
 what a joyous future is before it! Sit still a while and look 
 around and think. . . . Now, no more; now arise, and go 
 about thy work thou joyful sad one, thou companion of God. 
 
 Heinke Boje sat by the table in her room, and read by the 
 light of the lamp. 
 
 When the night came the thick mist of autumn rose up from 
 the hollows and lay in grey, snakelike lines round the town 
 of Hilligenlei; it glided into the streets to terrify men with its 
 soundless advance, its pale coils, to fill the town over the tops 
 of the houses, up to the roof of the tower, hiding away all 
 light. 
 
 About midnight, when Heinke Boje had read to the end, she 
 opened the window and looked out. When she perceived the 
 void, cold, formless mass whirling there her heart contracted 
 and she felt oppressed with fear. The uncertainty, the burden 
 of human life, the awful isolation of every individual soul came 
 upon her and tortured her. She wept in pity for herself and all 
 men, and for him who was now making his lonely way through 
 this cold, grey, formless mist. No love went with him ; no 
 companion shared his faith. 
 
 Then her thoughts turned to him of whom she had just 
 read ; to the strong pure man and his faith. And her faith rose 
 up to meet his. She believed and prayed as he had believed and 
 prayed.
 
 CHAPTER XXVII. 
 
 THE first long letter from Kai Jans came three months 
 later, as Heinke Boje was sitting at breakfast one morning 
 with Peter Volquardsen's mother in East Holstein, the spark- 
 ling engagement ring on her finger. It came from Capetown. 
 She rose and went up to her bedroom, and devoured the letter 
 with eager eyes. The two travellers had gone ashore at Cape- 
 town, and now, after much laying of plans, had decided to 
 travel through all the English Colonies as far as the Crocodile 
 River. They meant to spend two years in doing this, and then, 
 if possible, to go by land to the German Colonies in the West. 
 The letter did not dwell upon this, but went on to talk of all 
 kinds of personal experiences old and new, great and small, and 
 the feelings which they had roused or the circumstances in 
 which they had taken place, giving the reader a lively picture 
 of the writer's mind. It was the letter of a man who had com- 
 pleted the act of renunciation and was going on his lonely way 
 in silent courage. Once, only once, something in the turn of a 
 phrase suggested the agonised sense of loss behind, but it was 
 quickly covered up by a gay jest. She was overjoyed with the 
 letter. She had been afraid he had turned away from her in 
 bitterness, that he would write coldly and distantly, or speak 
 of his suffering; instead, his letter breathed nothing but affec- 
 tion and courage; she could feel the affection and the courage 
 in his grave and jesting words as she read the letter again and 
 again with tears in her eyes. Then she sat down and wrote a 
 long letter in reply, full of her joy and her warm friendship 
 to him. 
 
 From this time on long friendly letters passed between them. 
 At times there was deep longing in her thought of him ; but 
 generally she was calm like a man who has a rich possession in 
 his hands and another far away which he knows is safe. She 
 looked forward with childlike delicht to the distant day of his 
 return. That would be a delightful day! to have him sitting
 
 364 HOLYLAND 
 
 at her table as her guest, such a dear guest! How she should 
 spoil him, laugh at him, tease him and find out all his likes and 
 dislikes. 
 
 One day she told him that she was now living with her 
 friend; another time that she was expecting her first child; 
 another that she had given birth to a boy. It was with deep 
 joy, with a secret and fearful pride that she saw from his let- 
 ters how deeply the news had affected him. She did desire pas- 
 sionately that he should continue to love her, always, always. 
 She could not bear the thought that another woman might 
 possess him and she be forgot. She told him in moving words 
 how she prized the jewel of his love, and of her cherished hope 
 that one day when they were both grown old and calm they 
 might live next door to one another, " and then every morning 
 one of the children shall bring you a flower to say good morn- 
 ing! and every evening you shall sit with us in the light of our 
 lamp." He took up the idea in his answer and elaborated it 
 half in jest and half in earnest, so movingly that she sobbed 
 aloud. 
 
 Three and a half years went by. She lived in perfect har- 
 mony and happiness with her husband, rejoicing with him in 
 the child now able to run from one parent to the other and 
 gaze with intelligent eyes at the pictures his father showed 
 him ; and expected her second child. 
 
 Just about this time the newspapers published the first re- 
 ports of that rising in our colony which was to cost us so many 
 noble lives. They were in no anxiety about the travelling, 
 however, since he had said in his last letter that the high prices 
 and the unsuitable time of year had decided them against going 
 by land ; they intended to go via Capetown. But when no 
 further news came for ten weeks they began to be uneasy. 
 
 At last a letter came. His friend wrote from Windhoek 
 to the " friend of his dear friend." " We decided, after all, 
 on finding that we could accompany a party of Boers to go 
 with waggons through Griqua and Namaqualand. We ar- 
 rived safely and intended to part from the Boers in order to 
 look at some of the farms. In the night a colonist came to 
 our camp fire, on foot, a fugitive, declaring that he had been 
 attacked and his wife and three children were wandering there 
 in the bush. Kai Jans and I immediately left the Boers and, 
 under cover of the darkness, made our way with the fugitive to
 
 HOLYLAND 365 
 
 his dwelling; after some search we found his wife and children 
 in the bush; and then made our way north, marching night 
 and day, on foot, over the parched and burning sand and rock, 
 often perishing of thirst, always in danger of our lives. Dur- 
 ing the march our friend underwent a great strain; as you 
 know since he was a sailor on the Clara his heart and lungs 
 have not been very strong, and, during our flight, even when 
 we others had the watch, his imagination kept him from sleep- 
 ing. All the time he was always ready to carry the youngest 
 . .Ihild, a stout little beggar who was always crying. Finally 
 when we reached Rehoboth in comparative safety he fell seri- 
 ously ill of pneumonia. The attack was sharp and short; he is 
 now practically recovered, but the doctor cannot say anything 
 definitely until it appears how far his heart has been affected. 
 I took advantage of the first opportunity of coming with him 
 to Windhoek, where we now are, and as soon as the doctor 
 recommends I shall bring him back to Germany, trusting that 
 your care and his native air may bring him back to health. 
 
 " You will pardon my freedom in saying to you that since 
 the beginning of our journey I have known, although my 
 friend breathed no word upon the subject, that he had some 
 heavy sorrow; his behaviour revealed to me what his lips did 
 not. Ordinarily he was as you know him: keenly observant, 
 deeply interested in the conditions of the unknown country, 
 friendly and sympathetic to all. But when he was alone and 
 thought himself unobserved I used often to find him in a 
 strange state of mind ; sometimes he seemed quite broken, there 
 was a silent anguish on his face like that of a man whose hopes 
 are all shattered ; sometimes, again, his eyes shone with an ab- 
 stracted expression as if in his mind's eye Ke saw his beloved 
 smiling to him from afar. I did not know what caused such 
 varied moods in him, and yet I had long felt certain that both 
 the mood of despair and of joy was connected with you; for 
 whenever he spoke of his youth and his home he ended by 
 speaking of you. 
 
 " It was the first day in Rehoboth, late in the afternoon, 
 that he spoke to me. He felt that a serious illness was coming 
 upon him, and while he tried hastily to write a letter to you 
 the fever made his hand so unsteady that he had to throw away 
 the pen. Then he said to me in a tone of utter despondency 
 that in his life he had endured much, he had fought against and
 
 366 HOLYLAND 
 
 conquered powerful spirit shapes, but one thing he could not 
 overcome: the knowledge that he had lost you, and lost you 
 through his own folly. 
 
 " I am a reserved and almost cold man ; he told me that he 
 chose me for his friend because I calmed the passion of his 
 blood. I told him that such a feeling might well grow to 
 something overwhelming if he allowed himself to feed it daily 
 on the longings of a lively imagination. He replied that he 
 had known you from his childhood, and, although he was not 
 blind to your faults, which were the faults of your family, you 
 had stood by him from your childhood for all that was dear 
 and beautiful and pure in life. 
 
 " I need tell you no more of his illness except this : in his 
 wandering he was always comforting a child, whom he carried 
 through sand and bush; but it was not that child, but yours. 
 In the strange confusion of disease he was carrying it to you, 
 toiling over wide plains and over exhausting roads, you stood in 
 the distance, looking across to him and scolding him for mak- 
 ing such slow progress. 
 
 " I found some notes in the diary which he handed over to 
 me, which I enclose. First, some notes on the life of the Sa- 
 viour, modifications of certain crudities of style and matter. 
 The rest deals with his relations to you. No doubt with the 
 idea of always having to hand thoughts that could console 
 and strengthen him in his sorrow he put down some considera- 
 tions which could help him. ' God did not let her belong to 
 me because He wished to shield me and her from exceeding 
 sorrow; for I shall die soon. ... I alone suffer; through my 
 renunciation they, too, live in peace. ... I must live and be of 
 good courage to be a helper to her if sorrow ever comes upon 
 her. . . . How often a poor rejected lover has no friendly 
 word from the woman he loves ; but every letter shows me that 
 I am dear to her. ... I will believe that there is a good end 
 attained by my sorrow; it will make me a better and deeper 
 man, and therefore I must not despair. ... I will think of 
 the days to come when we are old, when I may be able to en- 
 dure to see her, even to find joy in it. ... If she had been 
 my wife, every heart beat, every pang in my shoulder would 
 have tortured me with the fear of a long illness or death ; now 
 I am at all times ready for whatever the eternal power may 
 send, be it health or sickness or death.'
 
 HOLYLAND 367 
 
 " I am writing this and sending it by the mail that goes the 
 day after to-morrow in order that you may write to him what- 
 ever you think fit, or if I cable you in the course of a week 
 that I am bringing him home you may be fully informed as to 
 his condition." 
 
 So ran the friend's letter. Three weeks later came the cable, 
 "Jans, May 21, Hamburg." 
 
 Early in the morning of the 2ist of May the two who had 
 stood nearest to him from his childhood started off for Ham- 
 burg, Heinke Volquardsen and Lau, the corn-dealer. 
 
 On their arrival at the inn Pe Ontjes went down to the 
 harbour and saw the steamer slowly sailing up the Elbe. He 
 ran to the African quay, reaching it almost at the moment of 
 the steamer's arrival, and went on board. He asked for the 
 doctor and enquired of him whether Jans were on board and 
 how he was. The young doctor replied that the sea voyage 
 had done his lung great good ; it was in fact almost well again ; 
 but the condition of his heart left a great deal to be desired. 
 It was possible that he might recover his strength, and treat- 
 ment at some sanatorium might effect a complete cure; it was 
 also possible that any day might bring the end. He would 
 go down and announce the visitor. 
 
 Lau went in and found him alone. As he lay on his back 
 his emaciated appearance shocked Lau, although he concealed 
 it. He sat down on the chair by the bed and held his hand in 
 his. 
 
 " It's like Cape Horn," said Kai Jans, his eyes shining. 
 
 " Very like ! " said Lau. " They all send their love to you. 
 First your father." 
 
 "How is the old man?" said Kai Jans, smiling as he 
 thought of the letters he had had from him, the quaint humour 
 with which he spoke of the doings of Hilligenlei, the enthusias- 
 tic language of his political and religious aspirations. 
 
 " He's all right," said Lau ; " he has his interest from the 
 Hindorf Savings Bank and his pension, and now and then he 
 earns a trifle; and altogether he has a shilling a day. He has 
 got a little smaller and a little thinner since you saw him last, 
 but I can tell you there's nothing more magnificent in Hilli- 
 genlei than to see him sitting there, with his cap well over his 
 head and his eyes sparkling under the brim, puffing away at
 
 368 HOLYLAND 
 
 his short pipe. I often tell Anna, ' You and Thomas Jans in 
 your different ways are the noblesse of Hilligenlei.' He reads 
 the Labour Leader as he used, and still belongs to the party. 
 But he's not a whole-hearted adherent; he can't give up the 
 Bible ... he can't get away from the lightship, so to speak, 
 on which he used to brood and read the Bible in his young 
 days." 
 
 "And how are Anna and the children?" 
 
 Pe Ontjes Lau gave a curious smile. " Well," he said, " the 
 children and I know her humours now, and so we get on very 
 well on the whole. Of course, she worries because her husband 
 is not the richest and most learned man in Hilligenlei and 
 hasn't got the best position and, indeed, she might demand 
 as much of God and because her children are not first 
 at school. The girl is quick and bright like herself; but the 
 boy is slow like me. We have something to bear, Kai, and 
 perhaps we always shall have ; her nature somehow seems never 
 to have been smoothed off or finished. But you have helped us. 
 Four years ago, when she read the life of the Saviour that you 
 gave to Heinke, she was much softer and gentler and less un- 
 just for a while. The other day the boy came into my writing- 
 room and stood close by me for a time playing with the ruler, 
 and then said, in a kind of offhand way, ' Father, mother has 
 been so sharp and so cross to-day and yesterday ... do you 
 know . . . you must talk about the life of the Saviour this eve- 
 ning. Perhaps she will read it again.' " 
 
 Kai Jans smiled. "But you are happy?" 
 
 " Of course we are," said Pe Ontjes. ' The whole trouble, 
 hers and ours, is that she loves us beyond reason." 
 
 "And Pete?" 
 
 " Oh Pete. Pete has only one idea getting on get- 
 ting on. It does not make him happy, but there seems no room 
 for anything else in him. He has married a German-American 
 like himself. We see nothing of her." 
 
 Kai Jans lay still awhile, thinking of the friend of his youth 
 with half-closed eyes. Then his thoughts passed to Tjark 
 Dusenschon, and he asked about him. 
 
 " He is here in Hamburg, and is said to have a good position 
 in some private business something in the undertaking line, 
 I imagine. Don't be afraid ; a man like that never goes under." 
 
 Kai Jans was silent and lay still for awhile, rather ex-
 
 HOLYLAND 369 
 
 hausted. Pe Ontjes sat by his side. Then, rousing himself 
 again, he said, " Have you any other message for me? " 
 
 " Heinke is here, Kai." 
 
 "Is she coming?" he said softly. Then, suddenly, in spite 
 of his efforts to control himself, he began to weep passionately, 
 and said between his sobs, " Dear Pe, I am no coward, but I 
 am still weak from my illness." 
 
 " I know, my boy. ... I know. . . . Weep if it eases 
 you." 
 
 " I haven't wept since that day on the Gude Wife." 
 
 " I know, my boy. . . . You don't need to be ashamed ; 
 there's reason enough for it." 
 
 " There is nothing so hard in life," said Kai Jans, " as to 
 have to avoid what is more precious to one than everything in 
 the world." 
 
 "Yes, my boy; I can understand." 
 
 " I have fought against it ; you can believe that. But often 
 when I was so alone, so utterly alone, and used to think how 
 dear she is and hear her sweet voice and see her dear, bright 
 eyes, then despair seemed to take hold of me. Oh, Pe Ontjes, 
 what has one in the world . . . how poor the man is who 
 loves and has to avoid her he loves." 
 
 " I think, Kai, it will be easier now," said the great Pe 
 Ontjes sympathetically. " You will grow accustomed to seeing 
 her now and then, and then you will be more at rest." 
 
 He became calmer. " Yes," he said, " since it has to be I 
 ought to be glad that she and her husband are my fjiends. I 
 will learn to rejoice in her happiness." He passed his hand 
 across his eyes and lay still. " It is possible," he said, " that 
 I shall not live much longer; then there will be an end of all 
 trouble." 
 
 " Oh," said Pe Ontjes, " don't talk like that. You will go 
 to Wiesbaden or Nauheim and get well again ; and when you 
 are a strong man again you can do the work you describe in 
 the life of the Saviour." 
 
 " Yes," he said, " perhaps. There is a great deal I want to 
 do. Only, Pe Ontjes ... it is too deep. I have known her 
 so long since she was a child. God let her grow up before 
 my eyes; let her grow beautiful and clever and dear, so dear; 
 and said to me, ' Look how she grows and blooms ; one day
 
 370 HOLYLAND 
 
 she shall make a strong and good man of you. . . .' And now 
 ... it is hard to bear." 
 
 A step was heard outside and a woman's voice. 
 
 " I told her to follow me if I did not return. I think that 
 is she. . . . Courage, my boy! I will wait on board. I only 
 wanted to tell you that she is expecting her second child. . . . 
 Now, be brave and calm." He went out at the door and she 
 came in. 
 
 She went straight up to his bed and began to stroke his 
 hands. Although she had made up her mind to remain per- 
 fectly calm, she began to weep as she stroked his hands, and 
 said, " Dear, dear boy. . . . Heinke is here . . . only say 
 what can she do for you. Tell me, what can I do? " 
 
 He looked up at her with beaming eyes. " Be good to me, 
 as you are," he said. " It makes me too happy to have you 
 so. ... Are they good to you ? " 
 
 "Who, Kai? Peter Volquardsen? He is just what he al- 
 ways was, Kai . . . the same dear, splendid person that he 
 always was." 
 
 :< Then all is well," he said. " It has not been in vain." 
 
 "No," she said, "not in vain. You have saved one .human 
 soul from misery, and another from the pangs of conscience. 
 Not in vain! But you must be brave; what is the use, if you 
 are not brave and gay? " She bent over his hand and pressed 
 it against her face, weeping bitterly as she said, "If you cannot 
 bear it and your love for me ruins you that I could not bear. 
 All my happiness would vanish." 
 
 He nodded to her. " I have been brave always ; haven't I 
 written you good letters always ? I will fight it out ; you shall 
 see." 
 
 She pushed back the hair from his forehead and temples and 
 looked at him with affectionately tearful eyes. " And in the 
 summer holidays, if you are in Wiesbaden and we can save 
 enough, we will come and see you. I shall still be able to 
 travel then. 'Then I will sit with you all day. And in the 
 autumn you must come to Hilligenlei. You are to live with 
 Anna did you know that ? " 
 
 " Afterwards I shall live in Hamburg," he said. " I agreed 
 on that with my friend. I shall do all sorts of things there, and 
 then . . ." 
 
 " .Then you will come to Hilligenlei from time to time, and
 
 HOLYLAND 37' 
 
 we shall be ever so glad. You shall just see how glad we shall 
 be!" 
 
 " Then when your children are bigger," he said with happy 
 eyes, " you must bring them to Hamburg and I will show you 
 everything. And as I get older I can come and sit with you 
 and see you busy in your house, and talk over old times with 
 you." 
 
 " And then," she said, with merry eyes, " then we shall get 
 quite old, and you will come every day and we shall discuss the 
 state of your health." And she began to talk in the high, 
 piping voice of quite an old woman that came strangely from 
 her fresh, laughing face and her shining young eyes. 
 
 He looked at her with happy eyes. " Are you the same to 
 everybody that you are to me? " 
 
 " Oh, no," she said ; " the Bojes are not like that. Only to 
 my own people and you. Oh, you must see the little boy. . . . 
 I really wanted to bring him with me. But it is better as it is. 
 I wanted to be the old Heinke Boje when I came." 
 
 "The old Heinke Boje," he sighed. 
 
 " Your dearest friend," she said, " who would do anything 
 for you anything. Kai, you must never be lonely. My 
 husband told me to tell you that you are never to be lonely." 
 
 " You dear people," said he. " Tell me about him and about 
 your life." 
 
 She began to tell him and he listened for a while. Then his 
 eyes grew gradually heavy. 
 
 The doctor came in. He went up to the bed and said, " I 
 have decided to take you to the hospital this afternoon. Since 
 you have had all sorts of excitement to-day, and since you have 
 to move, I propose that you do not see your friends again until 
 to-morrow morning ... in the hospital. Do you agree ? " 
 
 Kai Jans nodded and the doctor turned to go. 
 
 Heinke bent down over him quickly and said in a low voice, 
 with tears streaming from her eyes, " Dear, precious one," and 
 went out. 
 
 It was the last time they saw each other. 
 
 Late in the afternoon he was moved into the harbour hos- 
 pital, and lay there exhausted by the moving, but at peace. 
 
 Towards evening a young Hamburg clergyman came to see 
 him, who had been devoted to him for years, and had heard of 
 his being there through a chance meeting with the doctor. He,
 
 372 HOLYLAND 
 
 like other friends, had read the manuscript life of the Saviour, 
 which had been copied and passed from hand to hand, and he 
 now asked whether he intended to publish it. He replied that 
 he should wait a year; he wanted to read it through first. His 
 young friend then asked him whether he dreaded publication. 
 
 " No," he said, "why should I dread it? I know that my 
 Saviour and my gospel are truer than those taught by the 
 Church. Even if I stood quite alone why should I be afraid? 
 One need not be afraid to be alone with truth. . . . Of course, 
 people will say, ' Look how wildly he talks as soon as he has 
 given up orders,' but that is not the explanation; it was only 
 that before I did not see things clearly. I was still under the 
 ban of doctrine, like most of my brethren; it only came to me 
 slowly and painfully. How I have brooded all my life, what 
 fears I have had ! " After a pause he said, " But I have fought 
 my way out of the confusion ; I have not wriggled and twisted 
 out like an eel ; and that is why I am happy now and ready to 
 die or live as God wills it." 
 
 After another silence, during which his friend turned over 
 the leaves of the New Testament that lay on the table by his 
 bed, he said, as if to himself, " And it is better so." 
 
 "What is better so?" asked his friend. 
 
 He made no reply. He only said in a low, weary voice 
 he had heard the rustling of the leaves " Read me something 
 aloud about Him." 
 
 He read some sentences from the Sermon on the Mount and 
 some of the parables, just where he happened to open the 
 book. 
 
 After a pause he awoke from his dreams and said, " Teachers 
 ought to be good to all children." 
 
 " Why do you say that? " said his friend. 
 
 " One must be good to children," he said. ' They cannot 
 defend themselves. And, perhaps, they cannot tell, the boy who 
 is to bring the final knowledge is sitting at their feet, or the 
 girl who is to be his mother, tortured by strange, dreamlike 
 thoughts." 
 
 His friend said, " Quite a number of professors are trying 
 to teach people the new knowledge. They write well." 
 
 He smiled. " Their task is hard enough. God bless Ger- 
 man science! I thought badly enough of it at one time; but 
 we owe it a great debt."
 
 HOLYLAND 373 
 
 His friend said, " If your life of the Saviour is published, 
 many, many people who have fallen away from the doctrines 
 of the Church, and lost all faith thereby, will be able to feel 
 themselves Christians again. They will be able to accept the 
 Gospel, and that will be a great gain in their lives and here- 
 after." 
 
 He seemed not to have heard. After a time he said, " It will 
 not be light until we have got rid of all our confused notions, 
 of the Pope and the atonement by His blood, and all the other 
 stupid errors, and have the simple gospel instead. His yoke 
 is easy and His burden is light." 
 
 He folded his hands painfully and lay still for a time. Then 
 he said in a clear voice, " I have seen Hilligenlei once in a 
 dream ... it was unspeakably beautiful." He seemed to 
 sleep. 
 
 His friend sat for a time beside the bed, reading in the New 
 Testament, and then went softly out. 
 
 The next morning they found Kai Jans dead. The exam- 
 ination proved that he had died of syncope about midnight, 
 apparently without any struggle. 
 
 When Pe Ontjes reached the hospital about nine next morn- 
 ing he learned that the end had come, and he went back to the 
 inn to Heinke in deep depression. She was still in her room. 
 
 When he told her she seemed at first like one turned to 
 stone. When she understood and it suddenly dawned upon her, 
 " He is gone gone out of my life," she wept bitterly and 
 stretched out her hand to him like a child whose favourite play- 
 thing has been taken away. 
 
 Once again a Boje sat upon the edge of her bed and would 
 not be comforted. 
 
 Pe Ontjes said what he could. "Did you love him so?" 
 he said. " And do you love your husband as much ? " Then 
 in genuine astonishment he said, " You Bojes are strange 
 people! . . . But now you mustn't cry any more. Get up 
 and come with me. We must telegraph and see about the 
 funeral." 
 
 " Not in Hamburg," said she. 
 
 " I should think not," said he. " In Hindorf. That's 
 where his people come from. That's where his father lived as 
 a young man. And he himself took duty there for two years."
 
 374 HOLYLAND 
 
 " Yes," she said, " I often go and see the dear people at the 
 vicarage, where we two used to be like their own children." 
 
 She rose and wiped her bright eyes and smoothed down her 
 dress, sobbing afresh as she said, " I can't go out like this; I 
 must have a black dress." 
 
 He smiled in the midst of his grief. 
 
 " We can buy one here, Heinke," he said, stroking her hair. 
 " Come now." 
 
 They drove to the hospital. On the way he tried to per- 
 suade her not to see the dead. " I have seen him," he said, 
 " and I can tell you that his face is quiet and peaceful. Be 
 content with that." 
 
 When they were leaving the building who should come 
 towards them but Tjark Dusenschon. He was clad in the 
 deepest mourning, with a shiny tall hat and umbrella. An ex- 
 pression of profound seriousness on his round, clean-shaven 
 face, he came towards them, and after shaking hands said, " I 
 have heard that Kai Jans is dead . . ."he swallowed down his 
 tears. . . . "The body is to go to Hilligenlei? " 
 
 "To Hindorf." 
 
 " I am at the head of the undertaking firm of Holy Trinity, 
 of which I am the founder. If you will entrust to me the exe- 
 cution of this melancholy commission, I can ensure that every- 
 thing will be carried out to your satisfaction. . . . We have 
 three classes . . ." he drew a price list out of his pocket. 
 
 " Medium," said Pe Ontjes, curtly and quickly. 
 
 " Coffin, pall . . ." 
 
 " I will be there to superintend," said Pe Ontjes. 
 
 ". . . and conveyance to Hilligenlei Station, thirteen 
 pounds." 
 
 " Agreed," said Pe Ontjes. " We can go now, Heinke." 
 
 Two days later Kai Jans lay on his bier in the hospital mor- 
 tuary, unchanged, wrapped in the white pall which Tjark 
 Dusenschon had provided. Pe Ontjes had stood by and seen 
 everything done. The bearers came in. 
 
 Tjark Dusenschon came in in his elegant frock coat, his 
 shiny black hat in his hand, and, standing at the head of the 
 bier, uttered an " Our "Father," as prescribed by the constitu- 
 tion of the Holy Trinity. 
 
 The coffin was closed and carried out. 
 
 Outside, when the hearse had already started and Pe Ontjes
 
 HOLYLAND 375 
 
 was just getting into the carriage beside Heinke, Tjark Du- 
 senschon came up to say farewell, and said, with a melancholy 
 shake of his head, " It's a pity that he never came to anything 
 ... he was such a gifted fellow. But . . . you know . . . 
 he had no class feeling. That was what it was. He always 
 remained the workman, the country boy. He never rose . . . 
 that was his failing." 
 
 Pe Ontjes said nothing. He was eager to be away from 
 the town and at home again. He kept leaning out of the win- 
 dow, watching the hearse in front making its way through the 
 press of traffic, the noise, and ringing of bells. 
 
 When they reached the station at Hilligenlei they found 
 there twenty or thirty people clad in mourning, people that 
 they knew; eight Hindorf workmen took the coffin, four on 
 each side, fair beards to the right, red to the left, and raised it 
 on to their shoulders. 
 
 Then Pe Ontjes drew a deep breath. "Thank God!" he 
 said. At last he seemed to feel him saved from all the sorrows 
 and troubles of life. 
 
 The little old man stood in front of his door, in front of the 
 long house, waiting for the procession. He gave a long look 
 at the coffin and his mouth quivered. Then he pressed his 
 cap over his eyes and silently joined the train. The mighty 
 Pe Ontjes went by his side. 
 
 Heinke and Anna, who had been with the old man, looked 
 out from the window. The custom for women to go to funer- 
 als is only finding its way very gradually here. 
 
 What more is there to say? The warm, heavy May rain 
 fell into his open grave. New corn is springing up. Men will 
 grow up to care for the highest in humanity, to fight for it in 
 deed and thought. 
 
 THE END.
 
 Selections from 
 
 The Page Company's 
 
 List of Fiction 
 
 WORKS OF 
 
 , ELEANOR H. PORTER 
 POLLYANNA: The GLAD Book (250.000) 
 
 Trade"" ~~Mark 
 
 Cloth decorative, illustrated by Stockton Mulford. 
 
 Net, $1.25 ; carriage paid, $1.40 
 
 Mr. Leigh Mitchell Hodges, The Optimist, in an editorial 
 for the Philadelphia North American, says : " And when, 
 after Pollyanna has gone away, you get her letter saying she 
 is going to take ' eight steps ' to-morrow well, I don't know 
 just what you may do, but I know of one person who buried 
 his face in his hands and shook with the gladdest sort of sad- 
 ness and got down on his knees and thanked the Giver of all 
 gladness for Pollyanna." 
 
 The Glad Book Calendar 
 
 Trade Mark 
 
 THE POLLYANNA CALENDAR FOR 1915 
 
 Printed in colors . . Net,$i.oo; carriage paid, $1.15 
 " When you read POLLYANNA you registered a resolve that 
 henceforth and forever you would play the ' Glad Game ' 
 every day of your life. And you meant it, too, but some- 
 times you forget and you waver in your resolve. For just 
 such backsliders as you a perpetual reminder has been evolved. 
 It is a POLLYANNA CALENDAR. There is a like message of 
 cheer on every page, and the calendar is beautifully illus- 
 trated." Kansas City Star, Kansas City, Mo. 
 
 CROSS CURRENTS 
 
 Cloth decorative, illustrated $1.00 
 
 "To one who enjoys a story of life as it is to-day, with its 
 
 sorrows as well as its triumphs, this volume is sure to appeal." 
 
 Book News Monthly. 
 
 THE TURN OF THE TIDE 
 
 Cloth decorative, illustrated $1.25 
 
 "A very beautiful book showing the influence that went to 
 the developing of the life of a dear little girl into a true and 
 good woman." Herald and Presbyter, Cincinnati, Ohio.
 
 THE PAGE COMPANY'S 
 
 WORKS OF ELEANOR H. PORTER (Continued) 
 
 MISS BILLY (i3th Printing) 
 
 Cloth decorative, with a frontispiece in full color from a 
 
 painting by G. Tyng $1.50 
 
 " There is something altogether fascinating about ' Miss 
 Billy,' some inexplicable feminine characteristic that seems 
 to demand the individual attention of the reader from the mo- 
 ment we open the book until we reluctantly turn the last 
 page." Boston Transcript. 
 
 " The book is a wholesome story, as fresh in tone as it is 
 graceful in expression, and one may predict for it a wide 
 audience." Philadelphia Public Ledger. 
 
 " Misls Billy is so carefree, so original and charming, that 
 she lives in the reader's memory long after the book has been 
 laid aside." Boston Globe. 
 
 MISS BILLY'S DECISION (loth printing) 
 
 Cloth decorative, with a frontispiece in full color from a 
 
 painting by Henry W. Moore. 
 
 Net, $1.25; carriage paid, $1.40 
 
 " The story is written in bright, clever style and has plenty 
 of action and humor. Misis Billy is nice to know and so are 
 her friends." 'New Haven Times Leader. 
 
 " The author has succeeded admirably in repeating so de- 
 lightful a character and in making her the heroine of so many 
 interesting and amusing adventures." The Springfield Union. 
 
 MISS BILLY MARRIED (8th printing) 
 
 Cloth decorative, with a frontispiece in full color from a 
 
 painting by W. Haskell Coffin. 
 
 Net, $1.25; carriage paid, $1.40 
 
 " Although Pollyanna is the only copyrighted glad girl, 
 Miss Billy is just as glad as the younger figure and radiates 
 just as much gladness. She disseminates joy so naturally 
 that we wonder why all girls are not like her." Boston 
 Transcript. 
 
 " No one can come within the charmed circle of Miss Billy's 
 radiant personality without a vast increase of good cheer, of 
 insistent optimism and outgoing unselfishness. She is one of 
 the vital characters that vitalize everyone." Christian En- 
 deavor World. 
 
 THE SUNBRIDGE GIRLS AT SIX STAR RANCH 
 
 By " ELEANOR STUART." 
 
 Cloth decorative, illustrated $1.50 
 
 "The book is one that will be enjoyed by all girls, being one 
 of the brightest of its kind." New York Sun. 
 
 " The happiest, the healthiest and the most natural book for 
 girls that has ever been written." Boston Herald.
 
 LIST OF FICTION 
 
 NOVELS BY 
 
 ISLA MAY MULLINS 
 THE BLOSSOM SHOP: A Story of the South 
 
 Cloth decorative, illustrated by John Goss. 
 
 Net, $1.00; carriage paid, $1.15 
 
 "Frankly and wholly romance is this book, and lovable 
 as is a fairy tale properly told. And the book's author has 
 a style that's all her own, that strikes one as praiseworthily 
 original throughout." Chicago Inter-Ocean. 
 
 " There is so much of sunshine in its pages that it sheds its 
 cheerfulness upon the reader, making life seem brighter and 
 convincing us that this world is a pleasant place to live in and 
 full of delightful kind-hearted people." Boston Times. 
 
 ANNE OF THE BLOSSOM SHOP: Or the Grow- 
 ing Up of Anne Carter 
 
 Cloth decorative, with a frontispiece in full color from a 
 
 painting by Z. P. Nikolaki. 
 
 Net, $1.00; carriage paid, $1.15 
 
 Grown-ups as well as young folks will enjoy this new 
 Blossom Shop story, which concerns itself with the " growing 
 up " of Anne Carter, known in the previous story as " Han- 
 nie," but now insisting since she is approaching young 
 womanhood upon the dignity of Anne. There are glad 
 times and sad times in Anne's endeavors to " grow up grace- 
 fully," but the sun manages to shine through most of the 
 pages of the story. Practically all of the characters of the 
 first Blossom Shop story are again introduced, including 
 sweet Mrs. Carter Anne's stepmother and little Eugene. 
 
 Like its predecessor, " Anne of the Blossom Shop " is a 
 " sunshine maker " and refreshingly natural in every way. 
 
 " When one receives full measure to overflowing of delight 
 in a tender, charming, and wholly fascinating new piece of 
 fiction, the enthusiasm is apt to come uppermost." Louisville 
 Post. 
 
 " This is the kind of a story that makes one grow younger, 
 more innocent, more light-hearted. Its literary quality is 
 impeccable. It is not every day that such a heroine blossoms 
 into even temporary existence, and the very name of the story 
 bears a breath of charm." Chicago Record-Herald. 
 
 " A charming portrayal of the attractive life of the South, 
 refreshing as a breeze that blows through a pine forest." 
 Albany Times-Union. 
 
 " A book which contributes so much of freshness, enthusi- 
 asm, and healthy life to offset the usual offerings of modern 
 fiction, deserves all the praise which can be showered upon 
 it" Kindergarten Review.
 
 THE PAGE COMPANY'S 
 
 WORKS OF 
 
 L. M. MONTGOMERY 
 
 ANNE OF GREEN GABLES (4oth printing) 
 
 Cloth decorative, illustrated by M. A. and W. A. J. Claus. 
 
 $1.50 
 
 " In ' Anne of Green Gables ' you will find the dearest and 
 most moving and delightful child since the immortal Alice." 
 
 Mark Twain in a letter to Francis Wilson. 
 
 ANNE OF AVONLEA (22nd printing) 
 
 Cloth decorative, illustrated by George Gibbs . . $1.50 
 " A book to lift the spirit and send the pessimist into bank- 
 ruptcy ! " Meredith Nicholson. 
 
 CHRONICLES OF AVONLEA (6th printing) 
 
 Cloth decorative, illustrated by George Gibbs. 
 
 Net, $1.25; carriage paid, $1.40 
 
 " The author shows a wonderful knowledge of humanity, 
 great insight and warm-heartedness in the manner in which 
 some of the scenes are treated, and the sympathetic way the 
 gentle peculiarities of the characters are brought out." Bal- 
 timore Sun. 
 
 THE STORY GIRL ( 9 th printing) 
 
 Cloth decorative, illustrated by George Gibbs . . $1.50 
 " A book that holds one's interest and keeps a kindly smile 
 upon one's lips and in one's heart as well." Chicago Inter- 
 Ocean. 
 
 KILMENY OF THE ORCHARD (loth printing) 
 
 Cloth decorative, illustrated by George Gibbs . . $1.50 
 " A story born in the heart of Arcadia and brimful of the 
 
 sweet and simple life of the primitive environment." Boston 
 
 Herald. 
 
 THE GOLDEN ROAD ($th printing) 
 
 Cloth decorative, illustrated by George Gibbs. 
 
 Net, $1.25; carriage paid, $1.40 
 
 In which it is proven that " Life was a rose-lipped comrade 
 with purple flowers dripping from her fingers." 
 
 " It is a simple, tender tale, touched to higher notes, now 
 and then, by delicate hints of romance, tragedy and pathos." 
 
 Chicago Record-Herald.
 
 LIST OF FICTION 
 
 NOVELS BY 
 
 MRS. HENRY BACKUS 
 
 THE CAREER OF DOCTOR WEAVER 
 
 Cloth decorative, illustrated by William Van Dresser. 
 
 Net, $1.25 ; carriage paid, $1.40 
 
 "High craftsmanship is the leading characteristic of this 
 novel, which, like all good novels, is a love story abounding 
 in real palpitant human interest. The most startling feature 
 of the story is the way its author has torn aside the curtain 
 and revealed certain phases of the relation between the med- 
 ical profession and society." Dr. Charles Reed in the Lancet 
 Clinic. 
 
 " The pictures that Mrs. Backus gives us of hospital life and 
 her views of medical ethics are admirable." New York Herald. 
 
 THE ROSE OF ROSES 
 
 Cloth decorative, with a frontispiece in full color. 
 
 Net, $1.25; carriage paid, $1.40 
 
 The author has achieved a thing unusual in developing a 
 love story which adheres to conventions under unconventional 
 circumstances. She has written a novel out of the ordinary 
 in every way and one of striking brilliance, remarkable for 
 its unaffectedness and human interest appeal. 
 
 " Mrs. Backus' novel is distinguished in the first place for 
 its workmanship." Buffalo Evening News. 
 
 SYLVIA'S EXPERIMENT: The Cheerful Book 
 
 By MARGARET R. PIPER. Tr.de Mark 
 
 Cloth decorative, with a frontispiece in full color from a 
 painting by Z. P. Nikolaki. Net, $1.25; carriage paid, $1.40 
 "An atmosphere of good spirits pervades the book; the 
 humor that now and then flashes across the page is entirely 
 natural, and the characters are well individualized." Boston 
 Post. 
 
 " The bright story is told with freshness and humor, and 
 the experiment is one that will appeal to the imagination of all 
 to whom the festival of Christmas is dear." Boston Herald. 
 
 MISS MADELYN MACK, DETECTIVE 
 
 By HUGH C. WEIR. 
 
 Cloth decorative, illustrated. Net, $1.25; carriage paid, $1.40 
 " Clever in plot and effective in style, the author has seized 
 on some of the most sensational features of modern life, and 
 the result is a detective novel that gets away from the beaten 
 track of mystery stories in the first page and never returns 
 to it." New York Sun.
 
 THE PAGE COMPANY'S 
 
 WORKS OF 
 
 THEODORE GOODR1DGE ROBERTS 
 
 THE HARBOR MASTER 
 
 Cloth decorative, with a frontispiece in full color from a 
 
 painting by John Goss. Net, $1.25; carriage paid, $1.40 
 
 The salt of the sea is in every chapter. From start to finish 
 
 the story thrills with its action and clear presentation of life in 
 
 the open." Kansas City Star. 
 
 RAYTON: A Backwoods Mystery 
 
 Cloth decorative, illustrated by John Goss. 
 
 Net, $1.25; carriage paid, $1.40 
 
 " The story has plenty of action, breathes of the fresh fields 
 and forests of New Brunswick, and presents life in all its health 
 and vigor." Boston Transcript. 
 
 A CAPTAIN OF RALEIGH'S 
 
 Cloth decorative, with a frontispiece in full color from a paint- 
 ing by John Goss . . $1.50 
 
 " A strong, straightforward tale of love and adventure, well 
 worth reading." Springfield Union. 
 
 A CAVALIER OF VIRGINIA 
 
 Cloth decorative, illustrated by Louis D. Gowing . $1.50 
 
 " The action is always swift and romantic and the love is of 
 
 the kind that thrills the reader. The characters are admirably 
 
 drawn and the reader follows with deep interest the adventures 
 
 of the two young people." Baltimore Sun. 
 
 HEMMING, THE ADVENTURER 
 
 Cloth decorative, with six illustrations by A. G. Larned. 
 
 $1.50 
 
 " Its ease of style, its rapidity, its interest from page to page, 
 are admirable; and it shows that inimitable power the story 
 teller's gift of verisimilitude." The Reader. 
 
 BROTHERS OF PERIL 
 
 Cloth decorative, with four illustrations in color by H. C. 
 
 Edwards $1.50 
 
 A tale of Newfoundland in the sixteenth century, and of the 
 now extinct Beothic Indians who lived there. 
 
 " An original and absorbing story. A dashing story with a 
 historical turn. There is no lack of excitement or action in it, 
 all being described in vigorous, striking style." Boston Tran- 
 script.
 
 LIST OF FICTION 
 
 WORKS OF 
 
 CHARLES G. D. ROBERTS 
 
 HAUNTERS OF THE SILENCES 
 
 Goth, one volume, with many drawings by Charles Livingston 
 Bull, four of which are in full color .... $2.00 
 The stories in Mr. Roberta's new collection are the strongest and 
 best he has ever written. 
 
 He has largely taken for his subjects those animals rarely met 
 with in books, whose lives are spent " In the Silences," where they 
 are the supreme rulers. Mr. Roberts has written of them sympa- 
 thetically, as always, but with fine regard for the scientific truth. 
 " As a writer about animals, Mr. Roberts occupies an enviable 
 place. He is the most literary, as well as the most imaginative 
 and vivid of all the nature writers." Brooklyn Eagle. 
 
 RED FOX 
 
 THE STORT OF His ADVENTUROUS CAREER IN THE RINGWAAK 
 WILDS, AND OF His FINAL TRIUMPH OVER THE ENEMIES OF 
 His KIND. With fifty illustrations, including frontispiece in 
 color and cover design by Charles Livingston Bull. 
 
 Square quarto, cloth decorative $2.00 
 
 " True in substance but fascinating as fiction. It will interest 
 old and young, city-bound and free-footed, those who know ani- 
 mals ana those who do not." Chicago Record-Herald. 
 
 " A brilliant chapter in natural history." Philadelphia North 
 American. 
 
 THE KINDRED OF THE WILD 
 
 A BOOK OF ANIMAL LIFE. With fifty-one full-page plates and 
 many decorations from drawings by Charles Livingston Bull 
 
 Square quarto, decorative cover $2.00 
 
 " Is hi many ways the most brilliant collection of animal stories 
 
 that has appeared; well named and well done." John Bur* 
 
 roughs. 
 
 THE WATCHERS OF THE TRAILS 
 
 A companion volume to " The Kindred of the W?Id." With 
 forty-eight full-page plates and many decorations from draw- 
 ings by Charles Livingston Bull. 
 Square quarto, decorative cover ..*. $2.00
 
 THE PAGE COMPANY'S 
 
 11 These stories are exquisite in their refinement, and yet robust 
 in their appreciation of some of the rougher phases of woodcraft. 
 Among the many writers about animals, Mr. Roberts occupies an 
 enviable place." The Outlook. 
 
 " This is a book full of delight. An additional charm lies in Mr. 
 Bull's faithful and graphic illustrations, which in fashion all theii 
 own tell the story of the wild life, illuminating and supplementing 
 the pen pictures of the author." Literary Digest. 
 
 THE HOUSE IN THE WATER 
 
 With thirty full-page illustrations by Charles Livingston Bull 
 and Frank Vining Smith. Cover design and decorations by 
 Charles Livingston Bull. 
 
 12mo, cloth decorative $1.50 
 
 " Every paragraph is a splendid picture, suggesting in a few 
 
 words the appeal of the vast, illimitable wilderness." The 
 
 Chicago Tribune. 
 
 TFE HEART THAT KNOWS 
 
 Library 12mo, cloth, decorative cover . . . $1.50 
 
 " A Dovet of singularly effective strength, luminous in literary 
 
 color, rich in its passionate, yet tender drama." New York Globe. 
 
 EARTH'S ENIGMAS 
 
 A new edition of Mr. Roberta's first volume of fiction, pub- 
 lished in 1892, and out of print for several years, with the addi- 
 tion of three new stories, and ten illustrations by Charles 
 Livingston Bull. 
 
 Library 12mo, cloth, decorative cover . . . $1.50 
 
 " It will rank high among collections of short stories. In 
 ' Earth's Enigmas ' is a wider range of subject than in the ' Kin- 
 dred of the Wild.' " Review from advance sheets of the illustrated 
 edition by Tiffany Blake in the Chicago Evening Post. 
 
 BARBARA LADD 
 
 With four illustrations by Frank Verbeck. 
 Library 12mo, cloth, decorative cover .... $1.50 
 " From the opening chapter to the final page Mr. Roberts lures 
 us on by his rapt devotion to the changing aspects of Nature and 
 by his keen and sympathetic analysis of human character."* 
 Boston Transcript.
 
 LIST OF FICTTOff 
 
 CAMERON OF LOCHIEL 
 
 Translated from the French of Philippe Aubert de Gaspe 1 , with 
 
 frontispiece in color by H. C. Edwards. 
 
 Library 12mo, cloth decorative . . . . $1.50 
 
 " Professor Roberts deserves the thanks of his reader for giving 
 a wider audience an opportunity to enjoy this striking bit of 
 French Canadian literature." Brooklyn Eagle. 
 
 THE PRISONER OF MADEMOISELLE 
 
 With frontispiece by Frank T. Merrill. 
 
 Library 12mo, cloth decorative $1.50 
 
 A tale of Acadia, a land which is the author's heart's delight, 
 
 of a valiant young lieutenant and a winsome maiden, who first 
 
 captures and then captivates. 
 
 THE HEART OF THE ANCIENT WOOD 
 
 With six illustrations by James L. Weston. 
 
 Library 12mo, decorative cover ..... $1.50 
 
 *' One of the most fascinating novels of recent days." Boston 
 Journal. 
 
 " A classic twentieth-century romance." New York Commer- 
 cial Advertiser. 
 
 THE FORGE IN THE FOREST 
 
 Being the Narrative of the Acadian Ranger, Jean de Mer, 
 Seigneur de Briart, and how he crossed the Black Abbe", and 
 of his adventures in a strange fellowship, Illustrated by Henry 
 Sandham, R. C. A. 
 
 Library 12mo, cloth decorative $1.50 
 
 A story of pure love and heroic adventure. 
 
 BY THE MARSHES OF MINAS 
 
 Library 12mo, cloth decorative, illustrated . . $1.50 
 Most of these romances are in the author's lighter and more 
 
 playful vein; each is a unit of absorbing interest and exquisite 
 
 workmanship. 
 
 A SISTER TO EVANGELINE 
 
 Being the Story of Yvonne de Lamourie, and how she went into 
 exile with the villagers of Grand Pre\ 
 
 Library 12mo, cloth decorative, illustrated . . . $1.50 
 Swift action, fresh atmosphere, wholesome purity, deep pas- 
 sion, and searching analysis characterize this strong novel.
 
 I0 THE PAGE COMPANY'S 
 
 WORKS OF 
 
 NATHAN GALLIZIER 
 
 THE SORCERESS OF ROME 
 
 Cloth decorative, with four drawings in color by " The Kin- 
 
 neys" .... $1.50 
 
 The love-story of Otto III., the boy emperor, and Stephania, 
 wife of the Senator Creseentius of Rome. 
 
 CASTEL DEL MONTE 
 
 Cloth decorative, with six drawings by H. C. Edwards. 
 
 $1.50 
 A romance of the fall of the Hohenstaufen dynasty hi Italy. 
 
 THE COURT OF LUCIFER 
 
 Cloth decorative, with four drawings in color by " The Kin- 
 
 neys" $1.50 
 
 An historical romance woven around the famous Borgia 
 family. 
 
 THE HILL OF VENUS 
 
 Cloth decorative, with four drawings in color by Edmund H. 
 Garrett. Net, $1.35; carriage paid, $1.50 
 
 This is a vivid and powerful romance of the thirteenth century 
 in the times of the great Ghibelline wars. 
 
 WORKS OF 
 
 HELEN M. WINSLOW 
 
 THE PLEASURING OF SUSAN SMITH 
 
 Cloth decorative, illustrated by Jessie Gillespie. 
 
 Net, $1.00; carriage paid, $1.15 
 
 " One is glad to recommend this book to folk who care for 
 romance, humor and good sense, simplicity and brevity aa 
 quite the sort of reading they are sure to like by way of enter- 
 tainment." Chicago Inter-Ocean. 
 
 PEGGY AT SPINSTER FARM 
 
 Cloth decorative, illustrated by Mary G. Huntsman . $1.50 
 
 " Very alluring is the picture she draws of the old-fashioned 
 
 house, the splendid old trees, the pleasant walks, the gorgeoua 
 
 sunsets, and or it would not be Helen Winslow the cats.'! 
 
 The Boston Transcript.
 
 LIST OF FICTION' u 
 
 WORKS OF 
 
 ROBERT NEILSON STEPHENS 
 
 Each one volume, library I2mo, cloth decorative . . $1.50 
 
 THE FLIGHT OF GEORGIANA 
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE DAYS OP THE YOUNG PRETENDER. Illus- 
 trated by H. C. Edwards. 
 
 " A love-story in the highest degree, a dashing story, and a 
 remarkably well finished piece of work." Chicago Record- 
 Herald. 
 
 THE BRIGHT FACE OF DANGER 
 
 Being an account of some adventures of Henri de Launay, son 
 of the Sieur de la Tournoire. Illustrated by H. C. Edwards. 
 " Mr. Stephens has fairly outdone himself. We thank him 
 
 heartily. The story is nothing if not spirited and entertaining, 
 
 rational and convincing." Boston Transcript. 
 
 THE MYSTERY OF MURRAY DAVENPORT 
 
 (40th thousand.) 
 
 " This is easily the best thing that Mr. Stephens has yet done. 
 Those familiar with his other novels can best judge the measure 
 of this praise, which is generous." Buffalo News. 
 
 CAPTAIN RAVENSHAW 
 
 OR, THE MAID OP CHEAPSIDE. (52d thousand.) A romance 
 
 of Elizabethan London. Illustrations by Howard Pyle and 
 
 other artists. 
 
 Not since the absorbing adventures of D'Artagnan have we 
 had anything so good in the blended vein of romance and comedy. 
 
 " The story proceeds with a rapidity which holds the attention 
 of the reader from the start to the finish. The characters are 
 well portrayed with a vividness only found in this well-known 
 author." The Waterbury Democrat. 
 
 " It is a work of fiction well worth reading, and once read it is 
 not easily forgotten." Common Sense Magazine, Chicago. 
 
 THE CONTINENTAL DRAGOON 
 
 A ROMANCE OF PHILIPSE MANOR HOUSE IN 1778. (53d 
 
 thousand.) Illustrated by H. C. Edwards. 
 
 A stirring romance of the Revolution, with its scenes laid on 
 neutral territory. 
 
 " One of the most delightful stories we have had for many a 
 day." Chicago Record-Herald.
 
 I2 THE PAGE COMPANY'S 
 
 PHILIP WINWOOD 
 
 (70th thousand.) A Sketch of the Domestic History of an 
 American Captain in the War of Independence, embracing 
 events that occurred between and during the years 1763 and 
 1785 in New York and London. Illustrated by E. W. D. 
 Hamilton. 
 
 AN ENEMY TO THE KING 
 
 (70th thousand.) Illustrated by H. De M. Young. 
 
 An historical romance of the sixteenth century, describing the 
 adventures of a young French nobleman at the court of Henry 
 III., and on the field with Henry IV. 
 
 THE ROAD TO PARIS 
 
 A STORY OF ADVENTURE. (35th thousand.) Illustrated by 
 H. C. Edwards. 
 
 An historical romance of the eighteenth century, being an 
 account of the life of an American gentleman adventurer. 
 
 A GENTLEMAN PLAYER 
 
 His ADVENTURES ON A SECRET MISSION FOR QUEEN ELIZA- 
 'BETH. (48th thousand.) Illustrated by Frank T. Merrill. 
 The story of a young gentleman who joins Shakespeare's 
 company of players, and becomes a prote'ge' of the great poet. 
 
 CLEMENTINA'S HIGHWAYMAN 
 
 Illustrated by A. Everhart. 
 
 The story is laid in the mid-Georgian period. It is a dashing, 
 sparkling, vivacious comedy. 
 
 TALES FROM BOHEMIA 
 
 Illustrated by Wallace Goldsmith. 
 
 These bright and clever tales deal with people of the theatre and 
 odd characters in other walks of life which fringe on Bohemia. 
 
 A SOLDIER OF VALLEY FORGE 
 
 By ROBERT NEILSON STEPHENS AND THEODORE GOODRIDGE 
 ROBERTS. 
 
 With frontispiece by Frank T. Merrill. 
 
 " The plot shows invention and is developed with originality, 
 and there is incident in abundance." Brooklyn Times. 
 
 THE SWORD OF BUSSY 
 
 By ROBERT NEILSON STEPHENS AND HERMAN NICKERSON. 
 
 With frontispiece by Edmund H. Garrett. 
 
 Net, $1.25; carriage paid, $1.40 
 
 " The plot is lively, dashing and fascinating, the very kind 
 of a story that one does not want to stop reading until it is 
 finished." Boston Herald.
 
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