The Burgomaster's Wife Volume 05
Ebers, Georg, 1837-1898
English
We will print you a perfectly bound paperback of your selected title and send it to you at your nominated address
Below is a summary of The Burgomaster's Wife Volume 05
This eBook was produced by David Widger
THE BURGOMASTER'S WIFE
By Georg Ebers
Volume 5.
CHAPTER XXVIII.
Days and weeks had passed, July was followed by sultry August, and that,
too, was drawing to a close. The Spaniards still surrounded Leyden, and
the city now completely resembled a prison. The soldiers and armed
citizens did their duty wearily and sullenly, there was business enough
at the town-hall, but the magistrates' work was sad and disagreeable; for
no message of hope came from the Prince or the Estates, and everything to
be considered referred to the increasing distress and the terrible
follower of war, the plague, which had made its entry into Leyden with
the famine. Moreover the number of malcontents weekly increased. The
friends of the old order of affairs now raised their voices more and more
loudly, and many a friend of liberty, who saw his family sickening,
joined the Spanish sympathizers and demanded the surrender of the city.
The children went to school and met in the playrounds as before, but
there was rarely a flash of the merry pertness of former days, and what
had become of the boys' red cheeks and the round arms of the little
girls? The poor drew their belts tighter, and the morsel of bread,
distributed by the city to each individual, was no longer enough to quiet
hunger and support life.
Junker Georg had long been living in Burgomaster Van der Werff's house.
On the morning of August 29th he returned home from an expedition,
carrying a cross-bow in his hand, while a pouch hung over his shoulder.
This time he did not go up-stairs, but sought Barbara in the kitchen.
The widow received him with a friendly nod; her grey eyes sparkled as
brightly as ever, but her round face had grown narrower and there was a
sorrowful quiver about the sunken mouth.
"What do you bring to-day?" she asked the Junker. Georg thrust his hand
into his game-bag and answered, smiling: "A fat snipe and four larks; you
know."
"Poor sparrows! But what sort of a creature can this be? Headless,
legless, and carefully plucked! Junker, Junker, that's suspicious."
"It will do for the pan, and the name is of no consequence."
"Yet, yet; true, nobody knows on what he fattens, but the Lord didn't
create every animal for the human stomach."
"That's just what I said. It's a short-billed snipe, a corvus, a real
corvus."
"Corvus! Nonsense, I'm afraid of the thing--the little feathers under
the wings. Good heavens! surely it isn't a raven?"
"It's a corvus, as I said. Put the bird in vinegar, roast it with
seasoning and it will taste like a real snipe. Wild ducks are not to be
found every day, as they were a short time ago, and sparrows are getting
as scarce as roses in winter. Every boy is standing about with a cross-
bow, and in the court-yards people are trying to catch them under sieves
and with lime-twigs. They are going to be exterminated, but one or
another is still spared. How is the little elf?"
"Don't call her that!" exclaimed the widow. "Give her her Christian
name. She looks like this cloth, and since yesterday has refused to take
the milk we daily procure for her at a heavy cost. Heaven knows what
the end will be. Look at that cabbage-stalk. Half a stiver! and that
miserable piece of bone! Once I should have thought it too poor for the
dogs--and now! The whole household must be satisfied with it. For
supper I shall boil ham-rind with wine and add a little porridge to it.
And this for a giant like Peter! God only knows where he gets his
strength; but he looks like his own shadow. Maria doesn't need anything
more than a bird, but Adrian, poor fellow, often leaves the table with
tears in his eyes, yet I know he has broken many a bit of bread from his
thin slice for Bessie. It is pitiable. Yet the proverb says: 'Stretch
yourself towards the ceiling, or your feet will freeze--'Necessity knows
no law,' and 'Reserve to preserve.' Day before yesterday, like the rest,
we again gave of the little we still possessed. To-morrow, everything
beyond what is needed for the next fortnight, must be delivered up, and
Peter won't allow us to keep even a bag of flour, but what will come
then--merciful Heaven!--"
The widow sobbed aloud as she uttered the last words and continued,
weeping: "Where do you get your strength? At your age this miserable
Back