and strong enough. No one had seen Hans for a
couple of days.
"Not since he did that brutal thing, you know,"
he said.
"What brutal thing?" It was Satan that asked.
"Well, he is always clubbing his dog, which is a
good dog, and his only friend, and is faithful, and
loves him, and does no one any harm; and two days
ago he was at it again, just for nothing just for
pleasure and the dog was howling and begging, and
Theodor and I begged, too, but he threatened us,
and struck the dog again with all his might and
knocked one of his eyes out, and he said to us,
'There, I hope you are satisfied now; that's what
you have got for him by your damned meddling'
and he laughed, the heartless brute." Seppi's voice
trembled with pity and anger. I guessed what Satan
would say, and he said it.
"There is that misused word again that shabby
slander. Brutes do not act like that, but only men."
"Well, it was inhuman, anyway."
"No, it wasn't, Seppi; it was human quite
distinctly human. It is not pleasant to hear you
54
THE MYSTERIOUS STRANGER
libel the higher animals by attributing to them
dispositions which they are free from, and which
are found nowhere but in the human heart. None
of the higher animals is tainted with the disease called
the Moral Sense. Purify your language, Seppi; drop
those lying phrases out of it."
He spoke pretty sternly for him and I was sorry
I hadn't warned Seppi to be more particular about
the word he used. I knew how he was feeling. He
would not want to offend Satan; he would rather
offend all his kin. There was an uncomfortable
silence, but relief soon came, for that poor dog came
along now, with his eye hanging down, and went
straight to Satan, and began to moan and mutter
brokenly, and Satan began to answer in the same
way, and it was plain that they were talking together
in the dog language. We all sat down in the grass, in
the moonlight, for the clouds were breaking away now,
and Satan took the dog's head in his lap and put the
eye back in its place, and the dog was comfortable,
and he wagged his tail and licked Satan's hand, and
looked thankful and said the same; I knew he was
saying it, though I did not understand the words.
Then the two talked together a bit, and Satan said:
"He says his master was drunk."
"Yes, he was," said we.
"And an hour later he fell over the precipice
there beyond the Cliff Pasture."
"We know the place; it is three miles from here."
"And the dog has been often to the village, beg
ging people to go there, but he was only driven
away and not listened to."
55
MARK TWAIN
We remembered it, but hadn't understood what he
wanted.
"He only wanted help for the man who had
misused him, and he thought only of that, and has
had no food nor sought any. He has watched by his
master two nights. What do you think of your race ?
Is heaven reserved for it, and this dog ruled out, as
your teachers tell you? Can your race add anything
to this dog's stock of morals and magnanimities?"
He spoke to the creature, who jumped up, eager
and happy, and apparently ready for orders and im
patient to execute them. ' ' Get some men ; go with the
dog he will show you that carrion; and take a priest
along to arrange about insurance, for death is near."
With the last word he vanished, to our sorrow and
disappointment. We got the men and Father Adolf,
and we saw the man die. Nobody cared but the dog ;
he mourned and grieved, and licked the dead face,
and could not be comforted. We buried him where
he was, and without a coffin, for he had no money,
and no friend but the dog. If we had been an hour
earlier the priest would have been in time to send
that poor creature to heaven, but now he was gone
down into the awful fires, to burn forever. It
seemed such a pity that in a world where so many
people have difficulty to put in their time, one little
hour could not have been spared for this poor
creature who needed it so much, and to whom it
would have made the difference between eternal joy
and eternal pain. It gave an appalling idea of the
value of an hour, and I thought I could never waste
one again without remorse and terror. Seppi was
56
THE MYSTERIOUS STRANGER
depressed and grieved, and said it must be so much
better to be a dog and not run such awful risks.
We took this one home with us and kept him for
our own. Seppi had a very good thought as we were
walking along, and it cheered us up and made us
feel much better. He said the dog had forgiven the
man that had wronged him so, and maybe God
would accept that absolution.
There was a very dull week, now, for Satan did not
come, nothing much was going on, and we boys
could not venture to go and see Marget, because
the nights were moonlit and our parents might find
us out if we tried. But we came across Ursula a
couple of times taking a walk in the meadows beyond
the river to air the cat, and we learned from her
that things were going well. She had natty new
clothes on and bore a prosperous look. The four
groschen a day were arriving without a break, but
were not being spent for food and wine and such
things the cat attended to all that.
Marget was enduring her forsakenness and isolation
fairly well, all things considered, and was cheerful, by
help of Wilhelm Meidling. She spent an hour or
two every night in the jail with her uncle, and had
fattened him up with the cat's contributions. But
she was curious to know more about Philip Traum,
and hoped I would bring him again. Ursula was
curious about him herself, and asked a good many
questions about his uncle. It made the boys laugh,
for I had told them the nonsense Satan had been
stuffing her with. She got no satisfaction out of us,
our tongues being tied.
57
MARK TWAIN
Ursula gave us a small item of information:
money being plenty now, she had taken on a servant
to help about the house and run errands. She tried
to tell it in a commonplace, matter-of-course way,
but she was so set up by it and so vain of it that her
pride in it leaked out pretty plainly. It was beautiful
to see her veiled delight in this grandeur, poor old
thing, but when we heard the name of the servant
we wondered if she had been altogether wise; for
although we were young, and often thoughtless, we
had fairly good perception on some matters. This
boy was Gottfried Narr, a dull, good creature, with
no harm in him and nothing against him personally;
still, he was under a cloud, and properly so, for it had
not been six months since a social blight had mildewed
the family his grandmother had been burned as a
witch. When that kind of a malady is in the blood
it does not always come out with just one burning.
Just now was not a good time for Ursula and Marget
to be having dealings with a member of such a family,
for the witch-terror had risen higher during the past
year than it had ever reached in the memory of the
oldest villagers. The mere mention of a witch was
almost enough to frighten us out of our wits. This
was natural enough, because of late years there were
more kinds of witches than there used to be; in
old times it had been only old women, but of late
years they were of all ages even children of eight
and nine; it was getting so that anybody might turn
out to be a familiar of the Devil age and sex hadn't
anything to do with it. In our little region we had
tried to extirpate the witches, but the more of them
58
THE MYSTERIOUS STRANGER
we burned the more of the breed rose up in their
places.
Once, in a school for girls only ten miles away, the
teachers found that the back of one of the girls was
all red and inflamed, and they were greatly frightened,
believing it to be the Devil's marks. The girl was
scared, and begged them not to denounce her, and
said it was only fleas ; but of course it would not do
to let the matter rest there. All the girls were
examined, and eleven out of the fifty were badly
marked, the rest less so. A commission was
appointed, but the eleven only cried for their mothers
and would not confess. Then they were shut up,
each by herself, in the dark, and put on black bread
and water for ten days and nights; and by that time
they were haggard and wild, and their eyes were dry
and they did not cry any more, but only sat and
mumbled, and would not take the food. Then one
of them confessed, and said they had often ridden
through the air on broomsticks to the witches*
Sabbath, and in a bleak place high up in the moun
tains had danced and drunk and caroused with
several hundred other witches and the Evil One,
and all had conducted themselves in a scandalous
way and had reviled the priests and blasphemed
God. That is what she said not in narrative form,
for she was not able to remember any of the details
without having them called to her mind one after
the other; but the commission did that, for they
knew just what questions to ask, they being all
written down for the use of witch-commissioners two
centuries before. They asked, "Did you do so and
59
MARK TWAIN
so?" and she always said yes, and looked weary and
tired, and took no interest in it. And so when the
other ten heard that this one confessed, they con
fessed, too, and answered yes to the questions. Then
they were burned at the stake all together, which
was just and right ; and everybody went from all the
countryside to see it. I went, too; but when I saw
that one of them was a bonny, sweet girl I used to
play with, and looked so pitiful there chained to the
stake, and her mother crying over her and devouring
her with kisses and clinging around her neck, and
saying, "Oh, my God! oh, my God!" it was too
dreadful, and I went away.
It was bitter cold weather when Gottfried's grand
mother was burned. It was charged that she had
cured bad headaches by kneading the person's head
and neck with her fingers as she said but really
by the Devil's help, as everybody knew. They were
going to examine her, but she stopped them, and
confessed straight off that her power was from the
Devil. So they appointed to burn her next morning,
early, in our market-square. The officer who was to
prepare the fire was there first, and prepared it. She
was there next brought by the constables, who left
her and went to fetch another witch. Her family
did not come with her. They might be reviled,
maybe stoned, if the people were excited. I came,
and gave her an apple. She was squatting at the
fire, warming herself and waiting; and her old lips
and hands were blue with the cold. A strangei
came next. He was a traveler, passing through;
and he spoke to her gently, and, seeing nobody but
60
THE MYSTERIOUS STRANGER
me there to hear, said he was sorry for her. And he
asked if what she confessed was true, and she said
no. He looked surprised and still more sorry then,
and asked her:
"Then why did you confess?"
"I am old and very poor," she said, "and I work
for my living. There was no way but to confess.
If I hadn't they might have set me free. That would
ruin me, for no one would forget that I had been
suspected of being a witch, and so I would get no
more work, and wherever I went they would set the
dogs on me. In a little while I would starve. The
fire is best; it is soon over. You have been good to
me, you two, and I thank you."
She snuggled closer to the fire, and put out her
hands to warm them, the snow-flakes descending soft
and still on her old gray head and making it white
and whiter. The crowd was gathering now, and an
egg came flying and struck her in the eye, and broke
and ran down her face. There was a laugh at that.
I told Satan all about the eleven girls and the old
woman, once, but it did not affect him. He only
said it was the human race, and what the human
race did was of no consequence. And he said he
had seen it made; and it was not made of clay; it
was made of mud part of it was, anyway. I knew
what he meant by that the Moral Sense. He saw
the thought in my head, and it tickled him and made
him laugh. Then he called a bullock out of a pasture
and petted it and talked with it, and said:
"There he wouldn't drive children mad with
hunger and fright and loneliness, and then burn
61
MARK TWAIN
them for confessing to things invented for them
which had never happened. And neither would he
break the hearts of innocent, poor old women and
make them afraid to trust themselves among their
own race; and he would not insult them in their
death-agony. For he is not besmirched with the
Moral Sense, but is as the angels are, and knows no
wrong, and never does it."
Lovely as he was, Satan could be cruelly offensive
when he chose ; and he always chose when the human
race was brought to his attention. He always
turned up his nose at it, and never had a kind word
for it.
Well, as I was saying, we boys doubted if it was
a good time for Ursula to be hiring a member of the
Narr family. We were right. When the people
found it out they were naturally indignant. And,
moreover, since Marget and Ursula hadn't enough
to eat themselves, where was the money coming
from to feed another mouth? That is what they
wanted to know; and in order to find out they
stopped avoiding Gottfried and began to seek his
society and have sociable conversations with him.
He was pleased not thinking any harm and not
seeing the trap and so he talked innocently along,
and was no discreeter than a cow.
"Money!" he said; "they've got plenty of it.
They pay me two groschen a week, besides my keep.
And they live on the fat of the land, I can tell you;
the prince himself can't beat their table."
This astonishing statement was conveyed by the
astrologer to Father Adolf on a Sunday morning
62
THE MYSTERIOUS STRANGER
when he was returning from mass. He was deeply
moved, and said:
"This must be looked into."
He said there must be witchcraft at the bottom
of it, and told the villagers to resume relations
with Marget and Ursula in a private and unosten
tatious way, and keep both eyes open. They were
told to keep their own counsel, and not rouse the
suspicions of the household. The villagers were at
first a bit reluctant to enter such a dreadful place,
but the priest said they would be under his protection
while there, and no harm could come to them,
particularly if they carried a trifle of holy water
along and kept their beads and crosses handy. This
satisfied them and made them willing to go; envy
and malice made the baser sort even eager to go.
And so poor Marget began to have company again,
and was as pleased as a cat. She was like 'most
anybody else just human, and happy in her pros
perities and not averse from showing them off a little;
and she was humanly grateful to have the warm
shoulder turned to her and be smiled upon by her
friends and the village again; for of all the hard
things to bear, to be cut by your neighbors and left
in contemptuous solitude is maybe the hardest.
The bars were down, and we could all go there
now, and we did our parents and all day after
day. The cat began to strain herself. She provided
the top of everything for those companies, and in
abundance among them many a dish and many a
wine which they had not tasted before and which
they had not even heard of except at second-hand
63
MARK TWAIN
from the prince's servants. And the tableware was
much above ordinary, too.
Marget was troubled at times, and pursued Ursula
with questions to an uncomfortable degree; but
Ursula stood her ground and stuck to it that it was
Providence, and said no word about the cat. Marget
knew that nothing was impossible to Providence, but
she could not help having doubts that this effort
was from there, though she was afraid to say so,
lest disaster come of it. Witchcraft occurred to her,
but she put the thought aside, for this was before
Gottfried joined the household, and she knew Ursula
was pious and a bitter hater of witches. By the
time Gottfried arrived Providence ; was established,
unshakably intrenched, and getting all the gratitude.
The cat made no murmur, but went on composedly
improving in style and prodigality by experience.
In any community, big or little, there is always a
fair proportion of people who are not malicious or
unkind by nature, and who never do unkind things
except when they are overmastered by fear, or when
their self-interest is greatly in danger, or some such
matter as that. Eseldorf had its proportion of such
people, and ordinarily their good and gentle influence
was felt, but these were not ordinary -times on
account of the witch-dread and so we did not seem
to have any gentle and compassionate hearts left,
to speak of. Every person was frightened at the
unaccountable state of things at Marget 's house, not
doubting that witchcraft was at the bottom of it,
and fright frenzied their reason. Naturally there
were some who pitied Marget and Ursula for the
64
THE MYSTERIOUS STRANGER
danger that was gathering about them, but naturally
they did not say so; it would not have been safe.
So the others had it all their own way, and there
was none to advise the ignorant girl and the foolish
woman and warn them to modify their doings. We
boys wanted to warn them, but we backed down
when it came to the pinch, being afraid. We found
that we were not manly enough nor brave enough
to do a generous action when there was a chance
that it could get us into trouble. Neither of us
confessed this poor spirit to the others, but did as
other people would have done dropped the subject
and talked about something else. And I knew we
all felt mean, eating and drinking Marget's fine
things along with those companies of spies, and
petting her and complimenting her with the rest,
and seeing with self-reproach how foolishly happy
she was, and never saying a word to put her on her
guard. And, indeed, she was happy, and as proud
as a princess, and so grateful to have friends again.
And all the time these people were watching with
all their eyes and reporting all they saw to Father
Adolf.
But he couldn't make head or tail of the situation.
There must be an enchanter somewhere on the
premises, but who was it? Marget was not seen to
do any jugglery, nor was Ursula, nor yet Gottfried;
and still the wines and dainties never ran short, and
a guest could not call for a thing and not get it. To
produce these effects was usual enough with witches
and enchanters that part of it was not new; but
to do it without any incantations, or even any
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MARK TWAIN
rumblings or earthquakes or lightnings or appari
tions that was new, novel, wholly irregular. There
was nothing in the books like this. Enchanted
things were always unreal. Gold turned to dirt in
an unenchanted atmosphere, food withered away
and vanished. But this test failed in the present
case. The spies brought samples: Father Adolf
prayed over them, exorcised them, but it did no
good; they remained sound and real, they yielded
to natural decay only, and took the usual time to
doit.
Father Adolf was not merely puzzled, he was also
exasperated; for these evidences very nearly con
vinced him privately that there was no witch
craft in the matter. It did not wholly convince him,
for this could be a new kind of witchcraft. There
was a way to find out as to this: if this prodigal
abundance of provender was not brought in from
the outside, but produced on the premises, there was
witchcraft, sore.
66
CHAPTER VH
MARGET announced a party, and Invited forty
people; the date for it was seven days away.
: This was a fine opportunity. Marget's house stood
by itself, and it could be easily watched. All the
week it was watched night and day. Marget's
household went out and in as usual, but they carried
nothing in their hands, and neither they nor others
brought any thing to the house. This was ascertained.
Evidently rations for forty people were not being
fetched. If they were furnished any sustenance it
would have to be made on the premises. It was true
that Marget went out with a basket every evening,
but the spies ascertained that she always brought it
back empty.
The guests arrived at noon and filled the place.
i Father Adolf followed; also, after a little, the
astrologer, without invitation. The spies had in
formed him that neither at the back nor the front
had any parcels been brought in. He entered, and
i found the eating and drinking going on finely, and
everything progressing in a lively and festive way.
* He glanced around and perceived that many of the
cooked delicacies and all of the native and foreign
- fruits were of a perishable character, and he also
i recognized that these were fresh and perfect. No
c, apparitions, no incantations, no thunder. That
I settled it. This was witchcraft. And not only
i that, but of a new kind a kind never dreamed of
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MARK TWAIN
before. It was a prodigious power, an illustrious
power; he resolved to discover its secret. The
announcement of it would resound throughout the
world, penetrate to the remotest lands, paralyze all
the nations with amazement and carry his name
with it, and make him renowned forever. It was
a wonderful piece of luck, a splendid piece of luck;
the glory of it made him dizzy.
All the house made room for him; Marget politely
seated him; Ursula ordered Gottfried to bring a
special table for him. Then she decked it and
furnished it, and asked for his orders.
"Bring me what you will," he said.
The two servants brought supplies from the pantry,
together with white wine and red a bottle of each.
The astrologer, who very likely had never seen such
delicacies before, poured out a beaker of red wine,
drank it off, poured another, then began to eat with
a grand appetite,
I was not expecting Satan, for it was more than a
week since I had seen or heard of him, but now he
came in I knew it by the feel, though people were
in the way and I could not see him. I heard him
apologizing for intruding; and he was going away,
but Marget urged him to stay, and he thanked
her and stayed. She brought him along, introducing
him to the girls, and to Meidling, and to some of
the elders; and there was quite a rustle of whispers:
"It's the young stranger we hear so much about and
can't get sight of, he is away so much." "Dear,
dear, but he is beautiful what is his name?"
"Philip Traum." "Ah, it fits him!" (You see,
68
THE MYSTERIOUS STRANGER
"Traum" is German for "Dream.") "What does
he do?" "Studying for the ministry, they say."
"His face is his fortune he'll be a cardinal some
day." "Where is his home?" "Away down some
where in the tropics, they say has a rich uncle
down there." And so on. He made his way at
once; everybody was anxious to know him and talk
with him. Everybody noticed how cool and fresh
it was, all of a sudden, and wondered at it, for they
could see that the sun was beating down the same
as before, outside, and the sky was clear of clouds,
but no one guessed the reason, of course.
The astrologer had drunk his second beaker; he
poured out a third. He set the bottle down, and by
accident overturned it. He seized it before much
was spilled, and held it up to the light, saying,
"What a pity it is royal wine." Then his face
lighted with joy or triumph, or something, and he
said, ' ' Quick ! Bring a bowl. ' '
It was brought a four-quart one. He took up
that two-pint bottle and began to pour; went on
pouring, the red liquor gurgling and gushing into the
white bowl and rising higher and higher up its
sides, everybody staring and holding their breath
and presently the bowl was full to the brim.
"Look at the bottle," he said, holding it up ; "it
is full yet!" I glanced at Satan, and in that moment
he vanished. Then Father Adolf rose up, flushed and
excited, crossed himself, and began to thunder in his
great voice, ' ' This house is bewitched and accursed ! "
People began to cry and shriek and crowd toward
the door. "I summon this detected household to "
69
MARK TWAIN
His words were cut off short. His face became
red, then purple, but he could not utter another
sound. Then I saw Satan, a transparent film, melt
into the astrologer's body; then the astrologer put
up his hand, and apparently in his own voice said,
"Wait remain where you are." All stopped where
they stood. "Bring a funnel!" Ursula brought it,
trembling and scared, and he stuck it in the bottle
and took up the great bowl and began to pour the
wine back, the people gazing and dazed with astonish
ment, for they knew the bottle was already full
before he began. He emptied the whole of the bowl
iato the bottle, then smiled out over the room,
chuckled, and said, indifferently: "It is nothing