The Roanoke times. [volume] (Roanoke, Va.) 1890-1895, 1890-10-12

and over comes tho refrain: sGesei-
gert sci der Rhein," ("Blessed Be the
Rhein"). 1t is not what you would call
musical singing. Some of tho voices
are hoarse and rough, but it grows ever
quicker and fuller in volume, and 1t
seems to carry the very spirit of the
vintage. 1t is impossible to stay in
doors; ono must go out and look and
listen. There is a sturdy, strong-waist-
ed, ycllow-haired girl of eighteen whose
voice rises above the others. She is a
merry girl with blue eyes, cookbook
ing, muscular peasant, and she leads tho
chorus:
Where tho mountains bear the vine
And the vine bears golden wine.
Hear it again. There arc twoscore
voices singing:
Muir am Rhene will ich trinkcn,
Einen echten dcutschen Trankl
Und so lang noch CHASER winlien,
Tone laut linn Lob und Dunkl
When the laughter and the song arc
loudest the church bells ring eleven.
This is the signal for going home. In
fifteen minutes the noon fires arc burn
ing and potatoes arc boiling for the sub
stantial meal of the day. There is no
meat to the dinner, for the wagcs-cven
the vintage wagcS-will not buy it, but
milk and potatoes are set out and tho
house tidied. and at one o'clock the bells
call men, women and children again to
the hills. There arc no clocks in the
houses, and the church bells keep the
reckoning of the laborers' day. Tho
cutting begun again il is not
long before vineyard is cleared,
and bare and dcsolate it
looks indeed, like house
you have lived in for years when you
have moved out the furniture. The jol
lily OF the vintage runs highest in the
afternoon. Tho climax comes at four
o'clock, when the bells announce anoth-
cr rest and bread eating. Under tho
plum trees there is babel of voices. A
rustic lover sits openly with his arm
about his sweethcart's waist, and you
will not have to Wait long before you see
him kiss hor-ycs, and hear him; for tho
hearty smack sounds rods away. There
is moro singing, and higher on the
slope somebody is playing on an accor-
dion. Five o'clock interrupts the NOR
rymaking. Tho work goes on, the
shadows lengthcn, but the vines arc not
deserted until il is too dark to sort the
grapes properly.
Such u day with fourteen or fifteen
hours in the field and yet only ten
hours work accomplished is too waste
full for any American laborcr; but the
long rest periods morning and afternoon
for which the German begins early and
stops late add to the festival aspect of
tho harvesting. Tho presses wait for
the fruit, and soon will come the vino
auction, when tho buyers from Cologne
hill little Bacharach, and wurst and
horsc-radish and cheese are set out, and
everybody drinks to the growth of the
vines and the vintage of year ago is
disposed of.
1t is a land of corn and wine that Dor
ders this turbid river, but it's fruits are
not gathered without it's women. They
want not wives, these Rhcnish peasants
say, who sit in rocking-chairs. 1t is the
girl who sings the loudest in the vintage
who soonest gets husband Twelve
cents day is the wages she earns, be-
sides the prospect of marriage. Forty
cents is mans hire, with two quarts
of the poorer wine. And when tho rus
tic lover has married his sweetheart,
then you will sec her climbing
tho hill-sides in the morning to
cut grass for their cow If YOU
walk you will notice everywhere the
low stone posts set back few feet from
every highway. Between these and the
beaten track the peasant women's
sickles arc always busy, for these little
margins are public property and supply
grass for tho summer and hay against
the winter time. You will meet her.
too, with an enormous weight
of wood on her head, load
that man could not carry, dead
sticks picked up in tho forest.
Or you will pass her digging in
the little patch of vines or potatoes that
every peasant owns and leaves his wife
to plant and hoe and harvest while he
hires out to vincyarder. This is her
morning-her houselleepinG-and at one
o'clock she, too, is ready for half days
hiring to pull weeds or train vines. And
withal she bears many children and
finds life not less pleasant than women
of other lands whose tasks press not SO
heavily.
And when tho wild winds of Noyem-
Der sweep down tho hill-sides and the
swallows have gone and the vines are
bare, then there are leaves in the
woods to bring home for the mixers
bedding, and-but let us not talk of
winter, for it is still golden autumn and
the vintage but to-day begun.
ELIZA PUTNAM IIEAroN.
A Timely Text.
clergyman who recently held servi-