Year: 1870

1T was beautiful, warm summer after
noon among the Harz mountains. was
going to the Brocken, and loitered through
q little valley, along narrow path which
led to the mountain side. A poor old
man with thin, snow white hair was sit
ting by the wayside he had long, brown
stall, cut from blackthorn, between his
knees. l sat down by him, asking his
name and way of life, and the old man
told me that he had formerly been forest
Keeper; there was no rock which could
be climbed, and no ravine which he had
not over and over again explored. "And
do you see," he said, "those fir trees up
there? | planted them. Every day when
| went to the mountains, I carried my
game-bag full of earth up with me, and
there in the crevices where the rocks gave
me the least chance, / fixed it firmly; and
then | waited till the grass and briers
grew out of it, and made the earth cling
closer to the rocks; then I carried the
saplings up and planted them. NY
Fabian, my eldest, who was long in the
army, and at last was killed by falling
tree, often helped me about it. If you
come up you can see the trees !; I can't see
them now very we'll"


And with whom do you live now 2"
I asked.


With whom with whom ~ repeated
the old man, gazing at me. With no.
body. | have nobody left in the world.
Yes, have son left, he may be in the
world, but don't know p


And what do you live on?''


have my pension, twenty-four tha-
lers year; but everything is so dear
now"


" But doesn't your SON write to you, or
send anything?"


He never learned to write, and one
can only send when he has anything him
self. But he's the best fellow in the world,
a good child, faithful child, he left me
his whole property. But don't touch it,
it's just as it was. | am no spendthrift.
No, Henry, your father won't rob you of
your money"


With many digressions I heard the fol-
lowing story


1t might be about eighteen years before,
perhaps longer, for the old man was very
uncertain in his figures" thirty years
ago." he said of everything, which might
have taken place only two or three years
betore-the youngest son OF the keeper
had been tempted to emigrate 10 America,
the country where, as the old man ex-
pressed himself, there were great forests
that had never seen an axe, to be cleared
away before the settlers The son had an
inheritance from his mother, amounting
to hundred thalers. The old man would
not hear of anything but Henry taking
his money with him; it belonged to him,
and he did not know how much he might
want the spare cash over there in the
strange land. His son had to consent.
But on Saturday, before his departure, he
went to take leave of the pastor and got
him to write down for him the number of
the psalm which was to be sung next
morning at church. In the night he bade
his father goodbye, and his last words
were: Father, when you sing the psalm
tomorrow in church, think kindly OF me. u


In the night the old man, who was now
alone, got up several times; it seemed to
him that he heard his son moving about
in the sitting room, but no one was there
He had certainly forgotten something,
thought the old man, and now his spirit
is coming to find it and take it away. The
old man is not free from superstitions,
and it certainly would be no kindness to
convert him. On the window sill, where
rosemary and pinks were blooming, a
bunch of which the wanderer had stuck
in his hat, lay the old mans hymn-book,
wrapped up as his wife had always kept
it, in piece of white cotton; on this
cotton the moonlight, shining down from