The German Classics of the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Volume 08

CHAPTER XII
HOW ULI LEAVES HIS OLD PLACE AND REACHES HIS NEW ONE

On the following morning the sleigh was made ready and the box fastened on it, and Uli had to breakfast with the family in the living-room—coffee, cheese, and pancakes. When the horse was harnessed Uli could scarcely go, and when at last the time came, and he stretched out his hand to his mistress and said, "Good-bye, mother, and don't be angry with me," the tears rushed to his eyes again; and the mistress had to lift her apron to her eyes, saying, "I don't know what for; I only hope you'll get along well. But if you don't like it come back any time, the sooner the better." The children would scarcely let him go; it seemed as if his heart would break when the master finally told them to let loose, that they must start if they wanted to get there today, and it wouldn't be the last time they were to see each other; but that now there was no help for it. When they drove away the mistress kept wiping her eyes for a long time, and had to comfort the children, who, it seemed, could not stop weeping and lamenting.

In silence the two men drove over the gleaming snow. "Steady!" the master had to say occasionally, when the wild Blazer struck into a gallop, pulling the light sleigh along like the wind and kicking the snow high in the air. "It distresses me," said Uli, "and more and more, the nearer we get; it's so hard for me! I can't believe that I'm not running into misfortune; it seems as if it was right ahead of me."

"That's natural," said the master, "and I wouldn't take that as a bad omen. Think: nearly ten years ago, when you were a ne'er-do-well and I started you going right, how hard it was for you to do better, and how little faith you had in the possibility that everything would turn out right. But still it did, gradually. Your faith got stronger, and now you're a lad that can be said to have won his battle. So don't be distressed; what you've got before you now is all the easier for it, and the worst thing that can happen is that you'll come back to me in a year. Just keep yourself straight and watch out, for my cousin is terribly suspicious; but once he's taken your measure, you can put up with him. You'll have the worst time with the other servants; go easy with them, little by little, and in kindness as long as you can; then if that's no good, speak right up so that you'll know where you are—I wouldn't like a year of that sort of thing myself."

It was a bright, clear January day as they drove through handsome fields, then between white fences and glittering trees, toward Slough Farm. This property lay perhaps ten minutes' walk from Uefligen, was over a hundred acres in size and very fruitful, but not all in one piece; some fields and one grass-meadow lay at some distance. In wet years it might be swampy in spots, but that could be managed. As they drove up, Joggeli came stumping on a stick around the house, which stood on rather low ground, and said that he had been looking for them for a long time, and had almost thought they weren't coming; he had become impatient. He shouted toward the barns, which were built against the house, for some one to come and take the horse. No one came. Uli himself had to unhitch and asked where to take Blazer. "Why, is nobody here?" Nobody came. Then the old man went angrily to the stable and pulled the door open, and there was the carter calmly currying horses. "Don't you hear when you're called?" cried Joggeli.

"I didn't hear anything."

"Then prick up your ears and come and take the horse."

He'd have to make room for it first, growled the fellow, and shot in among his horses like a hawk in a pigeon-house, so that they dashed at their mangers and kicked, and Uli only by constant "Whoas" and at risk of life got Blazer into the last stall. There he could find no halter for a time.

"Should have brought one," was the carter's remark. When Uli went back to the sleigh and untied his box, the wood-cutters were to help him carry it; but for a long time none stirred. Finally they dispatched the boy, who let the handle go when they were on the stairs, so that Uli almost tumbled down backward and only owed it to his strength that he did not. The room to which he was shown was not bright, was unheated, and provided with two beds. He stood in it somewhat depressed, until they called to him to come down and get something warm to eat. Outside, a cheerful, pretty girl received him, nutbrown of hair and eyes, red and white as to cheeks, with kissable lips, blinding white teeth, tall and strong, yet slender in build, with a serious face behind which lurked both mischief and good nature.

And over the whole lay that familiar, but indescribable Something, that always testifies to inward and outward purity, to a soul which hates the unclean and whose body therefore never becomes unclean, or never seems so even in the dirtiest work. Freneli—this was the girl's name—was a poor relation, who had never had a home and was always treated like Cinderella, but always shook off the ashes—a girl who was never dimmed outwardly or inwardly, but met God and men and every new day with fresh and merry laughter, and hence found a home everywhere and made a place for herself in all hearts, however they might try to resist her; therefore she was often dearly loved by her relatives even while they fancied they hated her, casting her out because she was the offspring of an illicit intercourse between an aristocratic relative and a day-laborer. Freneli had not opened the door. When Uli came out the brown eyes rapidly swept over him, and quite seriously Freneli said, "I suppose you're the new overseer; they want you to come down and get something warm to eat." There was no need, said Uli, they had eaten something on the way.

None the less he followed the fleet girl to the living-room in silence. In it Joggeli and Johannes were already sitting at the table, half hidden by smoking meat, both fresh and salted, sauerkraut and dried pears. A plump, friendly old woman came to meet him, wiped her hand on her apron, Held it out to him, and said, "Are you the new overseer? Well, well, if you're as good as you are handsome, it'll be all right, I don't doubt. Sit down and eat, and don't be bashful; the food's there to be eaten."

On the stove bench there sat yet another form, lean, with a white face and pale, lustreless eyes; she acted as if she were paying no heed to anything, but had a pretty box before her, and was winding blue silk from one ball to another. Joggeli was telling about the time he had had with the last overseer, and what he had had to stand since then, and how it seemed to him that it had been much worse than he could remember now. "All the torment such a fellow can make you, and you can't string him up for it—it's not right, I swear. It didn't use to be so; there was a time when they hanged everybody that stole as much as would pay for the rope. That was something like, but all that's changed. It's enough to make you think the bad folks have nothing but their own kind in the government, the way it lets 'em get away. Why, we don't even hang the women that poison their husbands any more. Now, I'd like to know what's worse, to break the law by killing somebody, or by letting him live; it looks to me as if one was as bad as the other. And then it seems to me that if those who ought to maintain the law are the ones to break it, they deserve no forgiveness of God or men. Then I think we ought to have the right to put 'em where they belong, instead of having to pay 'em besides."

During this long speech of Joggeli's, which he fortunately delivered inside his four walls, as otherwise it might easily have brought down upon him an action for high treason, his wife kept constantly saying to Johannes and especially to Uli, "Take some more, won't you, that's what it's for; or don't you like it? We give what we've got—it's bad enough; but at least we don't grudge it to you. (Joggeli, do fill up the glasses; look, they're empty.) Drink, won't you, there's more where that came from. Our son gave us the wine; they say it's good; he bought it himself down in Italy; it actually cost fivepence halfpenny the quart, and not too full a quart at that." When Uli did not wish to take any more the old woman still kept putting food before him, stuck the fork into the largest pieces and then thrust them off on his plate with her thumb, saying, "Ho, you're a fine fellow if you can't get that down too; such a big lad must eat if he wants to keep his strength, and we're glad to give it to him; whoever wants to work has got to eat. Take some more, do."

But at last Uli really could eat nothing more, took up his cap, prayed, and stood up to go. "Stay awhile," said Joggeli; "where are you going? They'll look after your Blazer, I gave 'em strict orders."

"Oh, I'd like to go out and look around a bit and see how I like it," said Uli.

"Go then; but come back when you get cold; you're not to work today, do you hear," said the mother.

"He'll have something to live through," said Joggeli, "they hate like poison to have him come, and I think the carter would have liked to be overseer. But I don't care if they are against each other. It's never good to have the servants on too good terms; it always comes out of the master."

"Ho," said Johannes, "that's as you take it. If the servants are on one side and the master on the other, then he has a hard time and can't do anything. But when the servants are all against each other, and each one does his best to vex the others, and one won't help another—that's bad for the master too; for after all in the end everything hits the master and his interests. I think it's a true saying that peace prospers, discord destroys. I don't just like it here. Nobody came to take the horse; nobody wanted to help Uli with his box; each one does as he likes, and they don't fear anybody. Cousin, that won't be good. I must tell you, Uli won't stay here under those conditions. If he's to be overseer and have the responsibility, he wants order too; he won't let 'em all do as they please. Then there'll be a fuss; it will all come back on him, and if you don't back him up he'll run off. Let me say frankly: I told him that if he couldn't stand it here any longer, he was to come back to me, that I'd always have room for him. We're sorry enough to lose him, and the wife cried when I went off with him, as if it was her own child."

That seemed very lovely to the old mother and she wiped her own eyes just from hearing about it, and said, "Have no fear, Cousin Johannes, he shan't have a hard time with us; we know how to look after him, too. I am sure that if we've only found some one at last that we can trust and that takes an interest in things, no pay will seem too high."

"Cousin," said Johannes, "pay isn't everything; you must back Uli up and you must trust him. We've treated him almost like our own child, and he'd feel very strange if he was to be nothing but a servant."

"Oh," said the mother, "don't be anxious, Johannes, we'll do all we can. When we make coffee for ourselves in between meals, it can't be but he shall have a cup of it. And we have our piece of meat every day, but the servants only on Sunday. What would become of us if we gave 'em meat every day? But if you think best we'll see to it that Uli gets a piece of meat every now and then."

"Cousin," said Johannes, "that's not the thing, and Uli doesn't want it either, for it only makes the others envious. No matter how you do it, they find it out just the same. We had a maid once that used to smell of all the pots when she came in from the field, and she always guessed when coffee had been given to the other servants; and then she used to sulk for a week, so that you could hardly stand it. No, you must have confidence in him and help him; then it'll be all right."

Joggeli did not want the conversation to continue and took Johannes around through stables and granary, as long as it was light. He asked for advice and got it, but Johannes would praise nothing. Of the calves he said that they ought to be looked to, for they had lice; and of the sheep that they were too cramped for room, that they would squeeze each other and the lambs would be ruined. For the rest, the inspection was made in silence. On the way back they found Uli standing gloomily in the front shed and took him in with them; but he remained down-cast the whole evening—indeed on the verge of tears whenever any one spoke to him.

On the following morning Johannes made ready for his return, after having had to eat beyond his capacity and drink a nip of brandy on top of it, although he said he never did so in the morning. Uli almost clung to his coat like a child that fears its father will run away from it; and when he started to give him his hand, Uli said he would drive a piece with him if he might; he didn't know when he should see him again.

"And how do you like it?" asked Johannes, as soon as they were away from the house.

"Oh, master, I can't tell you how I feel. I've been in a lot of places, but I never saw anything like that. So help me God, there's no order in the place anywhere. The liquid manure runs into the stable; they've never cleaned out the dung properly, the horses' hind feet are higher than the forefeet; half the grain is in the straw; the loft is like a pig-sty; the tools aren't fit to be seen. The men all look at me as if they'd like to eat me. Either they give me no answer, or they give me impudent ones, so that I feel as if I'd have to punch their heads."

"Be patient and calm yourself," said Johannes. "Begin slowly, take the helm little by little, do all you can yourself, speak pleasantly, and try to bring 'em around gradually or at least get some on your side. Then wait awhile and see how things go, until you're familiar with everything, so that you can tell the best way to take hold. It's no good to rush right in at the start; usually one doesn't know his business well enough and takes hold of it at the wrong end. Then when you know how you stand, and if things don't get any better, sail into 'em good and proper, let 'em know where they stand with you, and force one or two of 'em to leave; you'll see an improvement right away. And be of good cheer; you're no slave, and you can go when you will. But it's a good apprenticeship for you, and the more a young man has to stand the better for him. You can learn a lot—even to be master, and that takes more skill than you think. But I keep feeling that you can make your fortune at it and make a proper man of yourself. Get on good terms with the women-folk, but not so as to make the old man suspicious; if you can get on their good side, you've won a lot. But if they keep inviting you away from your work to drink coffee with 'em, don't go; stay with the others. And always be the first one in the work; then they'll have to give in at last, willing or not."

This put Uli on his feet. He found new courage; but still be could hardly leave the master. A number of things came into his mind, about which he ought to ask; it seemed as if he knew nothing. He asked about the sowing, and how he had best do this or that; whether this plant grew here, and how that one should be raised. There was no end to his questions, until finally Johannes stopped at an inn, drank another bottle with him, and then almost drove him off home.

Encouraged, Uli finally set off, and now for the first time felt his importance to the fullest extent. He was somebody, and his eyes saw quite differently, as he now set foot on the farm that was to get its rightful attention from him alone. With quite a different step he approached the house where he was, in a sense, to govern, and where they were waiting for him as a rebellious regiment awaits its new colonel.

CHAPTER XIII
HOW ULI INSTALS HIMSELF AS OVERSEER

Calmly, with resolution taken, he joined the workers; it was afternoon, shortly after dinner. They were threshing by sixes. The milker and carter were preparing fodder; these he joined and helped. They did not need him, they said, and could do it alone.—He couldn't do anything on the threshing-floor, he said, until they started to clear up, and so today he would help them prepare fodder and manure. They grumbled; but he took hold and with his wonted adroitness mixed the fodder and shook the dust from it, and so silently forced the others to work better than usual. Below in the passage he shook out the fodder again, and made the fodder piles so fine and even along the walls, sweeping up with the broom the path between the horse-fodder and the cow-fodder, that it was a pleasure to see him. The milker said that if they did it that way every day, they couldn't prepare in two days what the stock would eat in one. That depended, said Uli, how one was accustomed to prepare, and according to how the stock treated the fodder.

When they went at the manure he had his troubles with the milker, who wanted to take only the coarsest stuff off the top, as it were the cream from the milk. It was nice and warm outside, said Uli, and the stock wouldn't get cold; they would work thoroughly this time. And indeed it was necessary, for there was old stuff left that almost required the mattock before they could get to the stone floor of the stable. But there was no time left to dig out between the stones. They had to dip out the manure-pit, for the liquid was rising and almost reached the back of the stable; and only with difficulty could he get them to carry what they clipped out into the courtyard and not pour it into the road. When the manure was outside no one wanted to spread it, and the answer he got to his question was that they had no time today; they must soon fodder; it would be time enough in the morning.—It could easily be done during the foddering, said Uli, and the dung must be spread while still warm, especially in winter. Once frozen, it wouldn't settle any more and one would get no manure from it. With that he went at it himself, and the two men calmly let him work and made fun of him behind the stable-doors and in the fodder-passage.

In the house they had long since begun to wonder that the new overseer did not come home, and to fear that he might have driven off and away. Joggeli had sat down at the window from which he could see the road, almost looked his eyes out, and began to scold: he hadn't thought Johannes was as bad as that, and here he was his cousin, too, and such a trick he wouldn't play on the merest stranger; but nowadays one couldn't place reliance upon anybody, not even one's own children.

While he was in his best vein, Freneli came in and said, "You can look a long time; the new man's out there spreading the manure they've taken out; he probably thinks it's better not to let it pile up. If nobody else will do it he probably thinks he must do it himself."

"Why doesn't he show himself when he comes home?" said Joggeli; and "Good gracious, why doesn't he come to supper?" said the mother. "Go and tell him to come in at once, we're keeping something warm for him."

"Wait," said Joggeli, "I'll go out myself and see how he's doing it and what's been done."

"But make him come," said the mother; "I think he must have got good and hungry."

Joggeli went out and saw how Uli was carefully spreading the manure and thoroughly treading it down; that pleased him. He wanted to look for the milker and the carter, to show them how Uli was doing it and to tell them to do it so in the future; he looked into the fodder-passage and could not take his eyes from it for a long time, as he saw the handsome, round, appetizing fodder-piles and the clean path between them. He looked into the stable, and as he saw the cows standing comfortably in clean straw and no longer on old manure he too felt better, and so he now went to Uli and told him that it had not really been the intention that he should do all the dirty work himself; that was other people's business. He had had the time for it, said Uli; there was no place for him in the threshing, and so he had done this in order to show how he wanted it done in the future. Joggeli wanted to bid him come in; but Uli said he would first like to watch the cleaning up after the threshing; he wanted to see how they did it. There he saw that the men simply thought of getting through quickly. The grain was poorly threshed; a number of ears could still be seen; it was winnowed still worse. The grain in the bin was not clean, so that he felt like emptying it and beginning the work over; however, he controlled himself and thought he would do it otherwise tomorrow.—But in the house Joggeli was saying that he liked the new man, for he knew his business; but he hoped he wouldn't boss too much—he didn't like that. You couldn't do things in all places just alike, and by and by he wouldn't have any orders to give himself.

After supper Uli came to the master and asked him what was to be done during the winter; it seemed to him that the work should be so arranged that one should be all ready for the new work when the spring came.

Yes, said Joggeli, that might be good; but one couldn't do everything all at once; things had to take their time. The threshing would last about three weeks more; then they could begin to cut wood, and by the time they were through with that the spring would just about be at hand.

If he might say so, said Uli, it seemed to him that they ought to bring in the wood now. It was fine weather and the road good, so it would be twice as easy. In February the weather was generally bad and the ground soft; then you couldn't budge anything and ruined all the wagons.

That wouldn't do very well, thought Joggeli; it was not customary to begin threshing in February.

He hadn't meant that, said Uli. They should continue threshing. He and one more would cut down and get ready all the wood the carter could bring home, and until a load was ready the carter could help them in the woods.

Then they couldn't thresh by sixes any more, said Joggeli, if he took a man from the threshing, and when they all cut wood together they could do a lot in a short time.

"Well," said Uli, "as you will; but I thought this way: couldn't the milker help in the threshing during the morning and the afternoon, too, if the others help with the manure and the foddering at noon? And sometimes two can do more in the woods than a whole gang, when nobody wants to take hold."

"Yes," said Joggeli, "sometimes it goes that way; but let's let the wood go: the threshing's more pressing now."—

"As you will," said Uli, and went somewhat heavy-hearted to bed.

"Well, you are the queerest man," said the old woman to her husband. "I liked what Uli said awfully well. It would have been to our advantage; and if those two fine gentlemen, the carter and the milker, don't have time to be drying their noses in the sun all day, it won't hurt 'em a bit, the scamps. Uli will be worth nothing to you, if you go on that way."

"But I won't take orders from a servant. If I let him do that he'd think nobody but he was to give orders. You've got to show 'em right from the start how you want to have things." grumbled Joggeli.

"Yes, you're the right one to show 'em; you spoil the good ones, and the bad ones you're afraid of and let 'em do as they please—that's your way," said his wife. "It's always been that way, and it isn't going to be any different now."

The next morning Uli told the mistress that one maid was superfluous on the threshing-floor, and she might keep for the house whichever she wanted. And Uli threshed through to the floor, and held his flail so that it touched his neighbor's and forced him to thresh the whole length of the grain to the wall; and when one section was done, the secondary tasks were quickly finished and they threshed again; and all this Uli effected not by words, but, by the rapidity of his own work. In the house they remarked that it seemed as if they must have different flails for the threshing; these sounded quite different, and as if they went through to the floor. The maid who was released told Freneli how they were going to do for this fellow; he needn't think that he was going to start a new system, for they weren't going to let themselves be tormented by such a fellow. She was sorry for him; he was well-mannered and he certainly could work, she must admit. Everything he put his hands to went well. While they were threshing the carter had ridden off, ostensibly to the blacksmith. The milker had gone off with the cow, but without telling his errand. It was noon before either came back, and neither had worked a stroke.

After dinner Uli helped peel the remaining potatoes, as is customary in well-ordered households if time permits; the others ran out, scarcely taking time to pray. When Uli came out there was an uproar in the barn; two couples were wrestling on the straw of the last threshing, while the others looked on. He called to the milker to come quickly and take out the calves and look to them; probably they needed to be shorn and salved. The milker said that wasn't Uli's business; nobody was to touch his calves; they would be all right for a long while. And the carter stepped up to Uli, crying, "Shall we have a try at each other—if you dare?" Uli's blood boiled, for he saw that it was a put-up job; yet he could not well refuse. Sooner or later, he well knew, he would have to stand up to them and show his mettle. And so he said to himself, let it be now; then they would have his measure.

"Ho, if you want to try it, I'm willing," he replied, and twice running he flung the Carter on his back so that the floor cracked. Then the milker said he would like to try too; to be sure, it was scarcely worth while to try falls with a walking-stick, with legs like pipe-stems and calves like fly-specks. With his brown hairy arms he grasped Uli as if he would pull him apart like an old rag. But Uli held his ground and the milker made no headway. He grew more and more angry, took hold with ever greater venom, spared neither arms nor legs, and butted with his head like an animal, until at last Uli had enough of it, collected all his strength, and gave him such a swing that he flew over the grain-pile into the middle of the floor and fell on the further side; there he lay with all fours in the air, and for a long time did not know where he was.

As if by chance Freneli had brought food for the hogs and had seen Uli's victory. In the house she told her godmother that she had seen something that tickled her. They had wanted to give Uli a beating; he had had to wrestle with them, but he was a match for them all. He had thrown the hairy milker on his back as if he had never stood up. She was glad that he could manage them all; then they would be afraid of him and respect him. But Uli, interrupted in his examination of the calves, seized a flail and merely told the milker that he had no time for the calves today; they would look to them another day. The cleaning of the grain took more time than usual, and yet they were through quicker and the grain was better cleaned; but they had exerted themselves more, too, and in consequence had felt the cold less. When Uli told the master how much grain he had obtained, the latter said that they had never done so much this year and yet today they had been threshing the fallen grain.

In the evening, as they sat at table, the master came and said he thought it would be convenient to cut wood now; the horses weren't needed, the weather was fine, and it seemed to him that the threshing and the wood-cutting could go on together if properly arranged. The carter said the horses' hoofs were not sharpened; and another said that they couldn't go on threshing by sixes, but at most by fours, and would never get done. Uli said nothing.

Finally, when Joggeli had no further answers to give, and was out-talked by the servants, he said to Uli, "Well, what do you think?"

"If the master orders it's got to be done," answered Uli. "Hans, the carter, and I will bring the wood in, and if the milker helps in the threshing and the others help him with fodder and manure, the threshing won't suffer." "All right, do it so," said Joggeli, and went out.

Now the storm broke over Uli's head, first in single peals, then in whole batteries of thunder. The carter swore he wouldn't go into the woods; the milker swore he wouldn't touch a flail; the others swore they wouldn't thresh by fours. They wouldn't be howled at; annoyed; they weren't dogs; they knew what was customary, etc. But they knew where all this came from, and he had better look out for himself if he was going to have the evening bells ring at six here (in the winter three o'clock is the hour, six in summer). Many a fellow had come along like a district governor, and then had had to make tracks like a beaten hound. It was a bad sort of fellow who got his fellow-servants into trouble in order to put the master's eyes out. But they would soon give such a fellow enough of it. Uli said little in reply, only that the master's orders had to be carried out. The master had ordered, not he, and if none of them got off worse than he they ought to thank God for it. He wasn't going to torment anybody, but he wouldn't be tormented either; he had no cause to fear any of them. Then he told the mistress to be kind enough to put up lunch for three, for they would scarcely come back from the woods to dinner.

The next morning they went out into the woods. Much as the carter growled and cursed, he had to go along. The milker would not thresh and the master did not appear. Then the mistress plucked up courage and went out and said that she thought he needn't be too high and mighty to thresh; better folks than he had threshed before now. They couldn't afford to pay a milker who wanted to dry his teeth in the sun all the morning. So the wood was brought in, they scarcely knew how; and in February weather and roads were so bad that they would have had a hard time with the wood.