ly-days the bells tolled; that was all. His
mother sat between the stove and his bed with a sore heart; and his
father, as he went to and fro between the walls of beaten snow from the
wood-shed to the cattle-byre, was sorrowful, thinking to himself the
child would die, and join that earlier Findelkind whose home was with
the saints.

But the child did not die.

He lay weak and wasted and almost motionless a long time; but slowly, as
the springtime drew near, and the snows on the lower hills loosened, and
the abounding waters coursed green and crystal clear down all the sides
of the hills, Findelkind revived as the earth did, and by the time the
new grass was springing, and the first blue of the gentian gleamed on
the alps, he was well.

But to this day he seldom plays and scarcely ever laughs. His face is
sad, and his eyes have a look of trouble.

Sometimes the priest of Zirl says of him to others, "He will be a great
poet or a great hero some day." Who knows?

Meanwhile, in the heart of the child there remains always a weary pain,
that lies on his childish life as a stone may lie on a flower.

"I killed them!" he says often to himself, thinking of the two little
white brothers frozen to death on Martinswand that cruel night; and
he does the things that are told him, and is obedient, and tries to be
content with the humble daily duties that are his lot, and when he says
his prayers at bedtime always ends them so:

"Dear God, do let the little lambs play with the other Findelkind that
is in heaven."

End of Project Gutenberg's Findelkind, by Louise de la Ramee (AKA Ouida)

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