The Forest Farm: Tales of the Austrian Tyrol

by Peter Rosegger

  XIII

  The Recruit

  Never in my life shall I forget that February morning. It was only tobe expected; and yet it took us by surprise.

  I was a little over twenty years of age. Though I already felt aregular young man and did my very best to act as such, still I alwayslooked upon myself as a child, for I was ever so considered by myparents and to a certain extent so treated by my teacher. I had tostoop nowadays, when I entered the house through the door; and, when Istood by the table-corner in the parlour, my head reached up to theHoly Trinity on the wall, to espy whose mystery I had so often, as aboy, scrambled up chair and table. But people still always called me bymy short pet name; and I still answered to it. And so, silently, thatFebruary morning came upon us.

  It was a Sunday. I had come back from a long job,[14] and meant to havea pleasant rest. When I awoke, my father was standing by the bed andsaid it was high time for me to get up, he wanted to speak to me.

  "Do you owe any money to B?rscher the innkeeper at Krieglach?" heasked, and waited anxiously for my answer.

  I asked him why he put such a question to me: what I had drunk atB?rscher's I had always paid for.

  "So I should have thought. It's only because B?rscher has sent me apaper to-day, which belongs to you, I'm thinking."

  He gave me the paper: it was grey; and I turned red. Father noticedthis and said:

  "Seems to me there's some disgrace about it, for all that!"

  "Not a disgrace," said I, with my eyes fixed on the lines, which werepart in print and part in writing. "An honour rather. _Present myself_,that's what I have to do."

  The paper ran:

  "MILITARY SUMMONS

  "Take note that you, Peter Rosegger, living at house No. 18 at Alpel, born in the year 1843, in the parish of Krieglach, are hereby called upon to fulfil your military obligations by presenting yourself for inspection, at 8 o'clock in the morning on the 14th of March, 1864, at the appointed place at Bruck, clean-washed and in clean linen, failing which you will be treated as a deserter and undergo the usual consequences prescribed by law.

  "KINDBERG, 15 February, 1864. "For the Town Council, "WESTREICHER, "_Chairman_. "Lot No. 67. Age-class I."

  By this time, my mother was there too. She could not believe it. Why,it wasn't so long since I was just a little bit of a chap! And now, allat once, a soldier!

  "He's not that yet," said father.

  "Give them time. And look at him. They won't send _him_ home in ahurry. Jesu, Mary! And the chest is spreading, too, now! That narrowlittle chest of yours was always my comfort. And to think that you havegrown so broad all in a year!"

  I had jumped out of bed, but did not know how to defend myself againstmy disconsolate mother's reproaches.

  My father said to her:

  "Thank your stars that he's healthy. Do you want a cripple for a son?Would you rather have had that than a fine, well-set-up soldier?"

  "You're right, of course, Lenzel:[15] if only I could keep him with me,though. Sooner or later, he'll have to go to the front; and I simplycan't bear to think of that."

  She wept.

  "Get back into bed again," said father to me. "You could have stayed inbed, if you'd wanted to."

  I didn't care about bed now. I was glowing in every limb. True, I hadbeen secretly awaiting this summons, in fear and trembling; but, nowthat it had come, I had an ever so pleasant and cheerful feeling insideme. I was filled with joy and pride. The Emperor had sent for me! Irushed to the door; I could have shouted from house to house, from hillto hill:

  "I'm a recruit!"

  There were many weeks yet before the 14th of March. Mother wanted menot to go on any more jobs, but to stay at home so that she could haveme with her for that short time. My master, indulgent as ever, yieldedto her. She gave herself up to thinking and planning how to make thistime, the last that I should spend with her, pleasant to me. She calledto mind all my pet dishes. She asked the market-woman to get beetrootfor her and dried cherries, two things which my palate speciallyrelished at the time. She scattered more and more oats before the hensand tried to explain to them that they would be dispensed from duty thewhole of next summer if only they would lay eggs now, at this greattime; otherwise there would be nothing for it but to cut off theirheads; for a soldier, if he got no eggs to eat, was not averse toroast fowls, however old and tough--they never saw such teeth as ayoung fellow had who was just going for a soldier!

  Dear mother-heart, once so warm and true, can it be possible that youare now but a cold bit of clay? How I yearn for you these days! How Ipray that you will let me love you, as you once prayed to me! You arealmost colder to me now than I was then to you. I never thought whatendless loving-kindness and cheerfulness and self-sacrifice lay hiddenin the little gifts and pleasures which you prepared for me! I tookyou, O my mother's heart, as a man takes the breath of the morning andthe sunshine, without so much as a "Thank you"!

  So, at that time, with the conscription near at hand, I accepted mymother's tenderness rather casually and, instead of staying at homewith her, went about the neighbourhood and forgathered with the ladswho had received their summons like myself. True, there were some amongthem for whom I had but little fellow-feeling--I did not care much forthe lads of my neighbourhood, our tastes lay too far asunder--but thecommon lot now united us, we consorted together, we drank together inthe taverns; and, full of esprit de corps as I was, I behaved just aswildly as the rest.

  Everybody smoked; and it was no longer pipes, but cigars, to makepeople think that the Emperor already had sent army tobacco on aheadfor his young recruits. Everybody strove to walk grand and straight andupright, though, as I presently found, this resulted rather in a sortof strut or swagger. Whether everybody had a sweetheart I can't quitesay; but this much is certain, that everybody sang about hissweetheart. There are songs about the pretty and the ugly, thefaithless and the deserted, the cold and the warm-hearted; songs fordaily use and songs for special occasions. I joined boldly in everyditty, as though I owned girls of all sorts and descriptions. And yet,all the while, I was secretly afraid because of my recruiting-favour.

  Here let me explain that every lad who is called upon for conscriptiongets a many-coloured bunch of ribbons pinned to his hat by hissweetheart. The ribbons are mostly red and wave in the breeze--whentheir wearers bluster as they should--like flags. The rose orbud-shaped favours are generally cut out of coloured linen or paper andhave the advantage of always keeping bright and fresh and not drooping,as real flowers do;--for a drooping air won't do for recruits. Only,there is just one green sprig of rosemary with it, forming the heart ofthe favour; and in this green spray the beloved talks to her lover,saying I know not what sweet and good things! So long as the belovedhas to do with rosemary, it is the May-time of love.

  Now where was _I_ to get my favour from? A sweetheart! I knew of one,but I had none: I had never reflected how indispensable the sweetheartis to the recruit.

  Must I, while all the others marched away with fluttering top-knots,trot favourless behind? And what was the good of marching and what thegood of going for a soldier, if I left no sobbing girl behind me?

  The day arrived.

  My mother made as if she were calm, at times even cheerful, but she hadalways red eyes. Once she went to my master and wept and was surprisedthat he did not cry too. But he only laughed and said that he did notsee what there was to grieve about: Peter need not be afraid ofsoldiering; he would have a good time; he had learnt tailoring; hemight even become a cutter in the army tailors' department; and then hecould laugh at all of them. But my dear mother wouldn't hear aboutlaughing, for the time being; she remained disconsolate: under thecircumstances she felt better so. She got ready for me the finest linenshe could lay hold of and marked each garment with a little cross; butnothing further was said about the recruiting, until the last moment,when I was starting and mother wished to go with me as far asKrieglach.

  "For God's sak
e, don't!" I cried; for how would it have gone off if Ihad marched with mother by my side and the lads in front of us withtheir wild songs and chaff! Pretty badly: such young devils are ladsthat there are times when the gentlest mother's son of them all blushesfor his parents.

  "Nay, nay, mother," said father to her, "you can't go; you're no goodat that; and they would only poke fun at the boy."

  My mother did not say another word. She did not even come as far as thefront door with me, for fear of getting me laughed at by thepassers-by. Inside, in the parlour, she dipped her finger in theholy-water stoup and made a cross with it over my face and then hurriedinto the next room, to let her tears flow freely. I felt just a queersort of choking at the throat, but did not let it master me. And Iwon't warrant that, when, in the dark passage, I made a quick movementover my eyes, I did not at the same time wipe off the wet mark of thecross.

  We all met at Stocker's inn on the bridle-path. Everyone, as Iexpected, had his hat full of finery; my head alone was smooth as thatof a poor little ram that has grown no horns yet and has just to becontent with its long ears. Therefore I was still mortally unhappy atthe first glass; at the second, however, I thought of the shako withthe flaunting imperial eagle on it, which I was as certain of wearingas any of the rest.

  There were pretty fellows among them, but also wretched pigmies whoneeded their streaming ribbons to hide their humps, their goitres, andeven--if I may be allowed a little exaggeration--their weedyspindle-shanks. Now where had _they_ got their sweethearts from, thatthey sported such fine favours? They all had their hats on; I alone hadflung mine into a corner, to avoid the scorn with which, for thatmatter, they had already overwhelmed me.

  When we broke up at last and I was obliged to fish out my hat again, Icould not find it. For in its place was another, with a splendidrosette and two ribbons, one red and the other white; and I now sawthat it _was_ my hat which had been so gloriously favoured by anunknown hand. Perhaps I had a sweetheart after all! I reflected, butcould hit upon none whom I thought capable of liking such a"Marry-me-not" as myself. Stocker, the innkeeper, had nice-lookingdaughters, but they were all married. His old wife was reported to haveonce been young herself, but the ribbons and that wonderful, daintysprig of rosemary could not possibly date back to that period. And theold woman played no other part in the business than to whisper to methat someone had been past the house and secretly prigged a rosette forme.

  Anyway, I had it--that was the great thing--and it looked finer andgrander than all the rest. Goodness, how I racked my brains under thatfavour! To the others, however, I behaved as if I knew right well fromwhom it came, and I even carried this plan to such a pitch that Imyself began to fix on a definite person and believed and was soonconvinced that it was she I loved. It's inconceivable how soon acertainty of this sort makes a man of one! I was now the liveliest ofthem all as we went along; and more than one of them said they neverknew that Lenzel's son was such a devil of a fellow. Which made me feelnot a trifle flattered.

  One of our numberless jokes was to "make the railway-train stop." Weposted ourselves outside the station and, as the train came up, yelledand shouted:

  "Hi! Stop!"

  Then the train stopped and we laughed.

  But things did not always end so harmlessly. We were seated in therailway-carriage--the Krieglach Town Council had given us our fares,which, as we believed, were sent direct by the Emperor--when one of us,Zedel-Zenz, proposed that we should all examine our tufts of rosemary:he whose spray was beginning to fade had lain oftenest in hissweetheart's arms. And then it turned out that the green sprig in myhat was clinging a little wearily and languidly to the red linenflowers. This, of course, caused me a fresh inward alarm. Could thissprig of rosemary know more about her and more about me than I myselfdid? Had I really been favoured already?

  "Yes, that goes without saying!" I laughed, swaggering like anything.

  But instead of impressing the others, I only brought down ridicule uponmyself. They spoke of rocking the cradle and drew all sorts ofconclusions from the fading of the rosemary, until at last I protestedangrily. What had it to do with them? I asked. If anybody had anythingto complain of, let him come on! For it at once occurred to me, a realrecruit must put up with nothing, must know how to be rude and raise abrawl in due season. And so I blustered away until I had blusteredmyself into a regular, genuine rage, stamping my feet, waving my armsand actually managing to shatter a window-pane.

  The guard at once appeared. Who had broken the glass?

  "Lenzel's son!" crowed one. "The tailor!"

  But the others shouted that it wasn't true and that we mustn't tell whohad done it.

  "I want no hushing up from any of you!" I broke in. "I smashed thepane. What's the damage?"

  "We'll see to that at Bruck," answered the guard. "I'll speak to thecaptain; the army'll soon tame you, my lad!"

  "Now you've done it," thought I to myself; "now you're a soldier,Lenzel's son."

  And I became quite quiet, as if the wintry air, rushing in through thebroken window, had cooled me to good purpose.

  At the station at Bruck there was no more said about that pane ofglass; and, when we went shouting through the town, I slung my armsround the necks of my companions on either side of me and felt gratefulto them for their willingness to screen the felon that I was.

  From the windows of the houses, the town misses looked down upon ourmad doings; and we were convinced that they must all be in love with usand that, the more rudely we behaved and the more wildly the ribbonsstreamed from our hats, the more ardent their love must grow. We had alurking suspicion that even a farmer's lad from the mountains, bawlingwith brag and arrogance and marching away as the champion of hiscountry, may, when all is said, possess some little interest for thecity dame.

  Now escorted by corporals, we marched back into the town by the otherside and up to a building standing by itself. Then we went indoors. Allof us were a little flurried; none knew in what condition he wouldleave this house again. And here, in the town, the soldier's life nolonger looked so glorious as at home in the still woods. Most ofus--even though we were not the most pious--sighed an "In God's name!"as we blundered up the steps.

  We went into a large hall which was almost like a barn and in whichover a hundred young men were already gathered. There was a tremendousbuzzing and pushing; and it was a very curious sight. Some, filled withthe gaiety of despair, were jumping up and down on their stocking-feetor barefoot; others tied up their clothes and sat down on the bundlesand were sad as death. Others again leant or stood against the walls,like carved saints, with the cold sweat on their foreheads. One mightsay even of the dwarfs and cripples that their hearts sank into theirtrousers, had they still had their trousers on!

  I walked round the hall, meaning well by everybody, but caring to talkto none. They were surprised that I could keep so indifferent; of thegreat excitement bubbling inside me I gave no sign.

  Suddenly the entrance-door was locked, which made one of us whisper:

  "Look, the trap's snapped to!"

  On the other hand, a door opposite opened; and a couple ofsoldiers--but these were full-blown soldiers--walked about among us andpushed one after the other into the inner room. I then saw some of thepalest faces I ever beheld in my life. Most of them, however, strodequite bravely through the fateful gate. But we were numbered. Toprevent unfairness in any given age-class, the order of the muster--forit is usually to the recruit's advantage to be one of the last--theorder is always arranged, a few weeks beforehand, by lot, which everyman liable to military service can draw in person or allow to be drawnby such persons as he pleases. My number had been drawn by theKrieglach Town Council; and it bore the favourable number of 67.

  Nearly half of the numbers up to 30 did not come back. A sergeantfetched their clothes. But those who did come back wore an all thegladder look, dressed themselves as quickly as they could, or, for fearlest the gentleman inside should repent of having let them go, bundledtheir clothes under thei
r arms and slipped out through some hole orother.

  Numbers 51 to 65 all came back. Number 66 did not reappear. Thesergeant came for his things. Then, at last, Number 67 was called. Iwalked with the utmost composure--rather too fast than too slow--intothe lions' den.

  What was there so extraordinary? Three or four gentlemen in blackcoats, with shiny buttons, silver collars, clattering swords andwarlike moustaches. The blades were smoking cigars. My first thoughtwas, could they be bribed with a civil "Good morning"? But I had heardfrom the men before me that the gentlemen had not said so much as"Thank you" to this greeting. We were just "things." And who is goingto exchange greetings with a _Number 67_? So I bit my teeth togetherand held my tongue and sported my most defiant air.

  I was at once put against an upright post. One of the officers, with asoft pressure of the hand, pushed my chest out and my knees in andsaid:

  "Sixty-four and a half!"

  Another seemed to write it down.

  "Chest sound. Muscles might be more developed."

  "Give him another year to run about in," said a third.

  "Go and dress yourself!"

  That was the whole proceeding. I hardly know how I got back to thefront room. As I went out by the steps, the soldiers on duty stucktheir bayonets in my way: that means a request to the lucky ones for atip. It did not need the bayonets: everyone gives, for it is the momentwhen he is free to leave the fatal building, with its often harshconsequences, and return to his dear home.

  Those who are "kept" are mostly also allowed to go home once more andthere await the muster-call; but they remain in custody on the dayitself, until the gentlemen are finished with the inspection. Then theyare drafted into the regiments and made to take the military oath; andthen they are--soldiers.

  We waited for them in the Bruck taverns. They were received with loudshouts and cheered with wine and song; and, if many a "kept" one feltlike falling in the dumps because his glad young life in the greenmountains was over to-day and because he had to march away, perhaps toa foreign country, perhaps to the distant battle-field, and because he,who was as fond of life as another, had to risk his young blood, thehurrahs of his boon companions soon roused him to fresh tavern joys;and, at last, all began to feel as though this were but one long day,without an end to it, sinking into the night and the night into wine.

  But hours come and pass away; and so do drinking-bouts. The next day weseparated; and to Krieglach-Alpel went what from Krieglach-Alpel came.Of our lot, two men had become soldiers: a bloodless, but verygood-looking charcoal-burner's son; and a labourer. The labourer put ona jovial and almost wild air and tried to pick a quarrel with more thanone stranger who greeted us in the street. The charcoal-burner's sonwas steeped in melancholy. We did not know what he was losing through amilitary life, nor he either: he just gazed at the great mountains andthe glorious forest trees....

  We others and the inns on the road took all the greater care to keepthe mad recruiting-spirit alive. By the custom of our fathers, therosette and ribbons are worn on the hat by the recruit who goes home asoldier and by no other. But we acted differently that day: we all keptour rosettes, so as to create a greater sensation and compel respect.

  "Look, look! Expect we'll be having war soon," said many a littlepeasant, "for they're keeping them all now, every man jack of them.It'll be true what the old folks say, that the women will fight for thechair on which a he once sat."

  Beyond the village of Fressnitz we came up with a beggar-man carrying ahurdy-gurdy on his back. One of us at once demanded the use of it; and,while a second led the old man like a bridle-horse, a third ground outon the beggar-man's back all the tunes which the organ contained; andwe others danced and jumped about on the frozen road. In this array, wearrived at Krieglach, where we took our musical team to the tavernwith us. The old man was in fine fettle and assured us that we wereangels of recruits compared with those of his day. He had been onehimself; and once they took a peasant who was sitting in a cart,letting his donkey pull him uphill, and harnessed him between theshafts and put the donkey in the cart instead; and they had donesaucier things than that. He drank our healths and praised the days ofold.

  There was lots of singing as we crossed the mountain by thebridle-path. I should be sorry to repeat the songs. We sang ourselveswarm, we sang ourselves hoarse. On the upper ridge, a hawker, known asEgg Mary, met us, carrying to M?rzzuschlag her baskets filled withthose little things of which the songs says:

  It's an oval fortress, Has no towers, no portress But lordly food inside.

  And the words came to my mouth:

  "Raw eggs are good for hoarseness!"

  "We'll make sure of that at once!" cried the others, took the woman'sbasket and sucked out all her eggs--the charcoal-burner's son with therest of them--and I too.

  All that Egg Mary could get out in her wrath was:

  "You're a pack of scoundrels!"

  "Never mind," answered Zedel-Zenz. "We'll pay as soon as we have anymoney."

  Then she went back with an empty basket, grumbling and uttering hervarious views of us and our behaviour. We started singing again, andthe eggs did their duty.

  At Stocker's inn we once more gave rein to our spirits. I did not failto renew my inquiries about my benefactress with the ribbons and wasfirmly determined, if ever I came across the girl, to love her with allmy heart and soul. The old hostess blinked significantly with herlittle grey eyes, but I got nothing more out of her.

  We lads parted outside the inn in the steadfast belief that, afterthese days spent in one another's company, we would remain the firmestof mutual friends. A farewell feast was ordered of the innkeeper forthe day when the two who had been kept were to join the colours.

  When the spree was over, I felt a sinking inside, as I wended my wayhome. A laughing face looked out at me from every window. My fatherwalked slowly up to me and knocked the hat off my head with his arm, sothat the ribbons rustled against the frozen snow. For the moment I didnot know what this meant; but my father did not leave me long inignorance.

  "Is it all the same to you," he said, "that you come home with ablazing lie on your hat? As to _who_ gave you that besom, we'll talkabout that later. All I ask you now is, how can you do a thing likethat to your mother? I dare say you don't know--you blackguard youngpuppy you!--how her heart is torn with anxiety at the thought of losinga child. But that you could give her such a fright! I wouldn't havethought it of you! If Egg Mary hadn't happened to come and tell us thatyou had a lucky escape this time, you might have had a nice business toanswer for, with that damned rosette of yours. And your mother sopoorly this long while past and all!"

  I trembled in every limb. My recruiting giddiness was gone; I suddenlysaw my whole baseness. My heart cried out for my mother. And that sameEgg Mary, whom we--not to mince matters--had robbed on the high-road,had gone on ahead, in her good nature, to tell my people, to whom sheowed many a little kindness, that they must not be frightened at thesoldier's favour with which I should most likely come home, and that Ihad come out of it with luck.

  My mother's joyful, loving grip of my hand only deepened my contrition.But father was wagging the rosette under my nose:

  "And now, boy, perhaps you'll be good enough to tell me where you gotthose fine feathers from! Are you walking out with somebody, young asyou are? That's what I want to know!"

  Many and sweet as were the thoughts of pretty girls that filled mymind, fond as I was of talking of it to fellows like myself, the thinglooked very different in my father's presence. I assured him that I waswalking out with nobody and that I did not know who had given me thefavour. He laughed out loud and then flew at me angrily because of "thesilly impudence of trying to make him believe a fib like that."

  My mother interposed and said that they could rejoice that I was homeagain, and that they must not begin by scolding me so hard.

  "Now you're backing him in his wickedness," he cried, "when he's lyingstraight in my face! But did you ever see such a booby as not
to knowfrom whom he got the ribbons in his hat?"

  "Now it's my turn to laugh," said my mother. "This time the boy reallycan't tell, for _I_ had the favour stuck in his hat on the sly, so thathe might have a bit of colour about him, as good as the rest of them."

  She had done it secretly, because she suspected that her son waslonging for a rosette from strange hands, and could easily havedespised his mother's gift. She had prevented his ingratitudebeforehand. And her home-coming son might have smitten her to the heartwith that same rosette!...

  The murder was out; father said nothing; and I ... I also did my shareof thinking....

  That children must always be striving after strange and far-away joys,hungering for love and yearning for love, which they will never find sopure and rich and endless as at home, in that perennial spring oftenderness, their mother's heart!

  FOOTNOTES:

  [14] Peter Rosegger was at that time a travelling tailor's apprentice.

  [15] Lorenz, Lawrence.