THE COUNTESS ITHA
In the days of King Ceur de Lion the good Count Hartmann ruled in Kirchberg in
the happy Swabian land. And never had that fair land beer happier than it was in
those days, for the Count was a devout Christian, a lover of peace in the midst
of warlike and rapacious barons, and a ruler just and merciful to his vassals.
Among the green and pleasant hills on his domain he had founded a monastery for
the monks of St. Benedict, and thither he often rode with his daughter Itha, the
delight of his heart and the light of the grim old castle of the Kirchherg so
that, seeing the piety of her father, she grew up in the love and fear of God,
and from her gentle mother she learned to feel a deep compassion for the poor
and afflicted.
No sweeter maid than she with her blue eyes and light brown hair, was there in
all that land of sturdy men and nut brown maidens. The people loved the very
earth she stood on. In their days of trouble and sorrow she was their morning
and their evening star, and they never wearied of praising her goodness and her
beauty.
When Itha was in the bloom of her girlhood it befell that the young Count
Heinrich of the Toggenburg, journeying homeward from the famous tournament at
Cologne, heard of this peerless flower of Swabia, and turned aside to the Castle
of Kirchberg to see if perchance he might win a good and lovely wife. He was
made was made welcome, and no sooner had he looked on Itha's fair and loving
face, and marked with what modesty and courtesy she bore herself, than he heard
joy bells ringing in his heart, and said, " Now, by the blessed cross, here is
the pearl of price for me! " Promptly he wooed her with tender words, and with
eyes that spoke more than tongue could find words for, and passionate
observance, and all that renders a man pleasing to a maid.
And Itha was not long to be won, for the Count was young and handsome, tall and
strong, and famous for feats of arms, and a mighty lord—master of the rich
straights and valleys of the Thur River, and of many a burgh and district in the
mountains beyond; and yet, despite all this, he, so noble and beautiful, loved
her, even her, the little Swabian maid who had never deemed herself likely to
come to such honor and happiness. Nor were the kindly father and mother ill
pleased that so goodly a man and so mighty a lord should have their dear child.
So in a little while the Count put on Itha's hand the ring of betrothal, and
Itha, smiling and blushing, raised it to her lips and kissed it. " Blissful
ring! " said the Count jestingly; " and yet, dearest heart, you do well to
cherish it, for it is an enchanted ring, an old ring of which there are many
strange stories." Even while he was speaking Itha's heart misgave her, and she
was aware of a feeling of doubt and foreboding; but she looked at the ring and
saw how massive was the gold and how curiously wrought and set with rare gems,
and its brilliancy and beauty beguiled her of her foreboding, and she asked no
questions of the stories told of it or of the nature of its enchantment.
Quickly on the betrothal followed the marriage and the leavetaking. With tears
in her eyes Itha rode away with her lord, looking back often to the old castle
and gazing farewell on the pleasant land and the fields and villages she should
not see again for, it might be, many long years. But by her side rode the Count,
ever gay and tender, and he comforted her in her sadness, and lightened the way
with loving converse, till she put from her all her regret and longing, and made
herself happy in their love.
So they journeyed through the rocks and wildwood of the Schwartzwald, and came
in view of the blue waters of the lake of Constance glittering in the sun, and
saw the vast mountain region beyond with its pine forests, and above the forests
the long blue mists on the high pastures, and far over all, hanging like silvery
summer clouds in the blue heavens, the skirting peaks of the snowy Alps. And
here, at last, they were winding down the fruitful valley of the Thur, and
yonder, perched on a rugged bluff, rose the stern walls of Castle Toggenburg,
with banners flying from the turrets, and the rocky roadway strewn with flowers,
and vassals and retainers crowding, to welcome home the bride.
Now, for all his tenderness and gaiety and sweetness in wooing, the Count
Heinrich was a hasty and fiery man, quickly stirred to anger and blind rage, and
in sudden storms of passion he was violent and cruel. Not long after their
homecoming woe worth the while he flashed out ever and anon in his hot blood at
little things which ruffled his temper and spoke harsh words which his gentle
wife found hard to bear, and which in his better moments he sincerely repented.
Very willingly she forgave him, but though at first he would kiss and caress
her, afterwards her very forgiveness and her meekness chafed and galled his
proud spirit, so that the first magical freshness of love faded from their life,
even as the dew dries on the flower in the heat of the morning.
Not far from the castle, in a clearing in the woods, nestled the little convent
and chapel of Our Lady in the Meadow, and thither, attended by one of her pages,
the Countess Itha went daily to pray for her husband, that he might conquer the
violence of his wild heart, and for herself, that she might not grow to fear him
more than she loved him. In these days of her trial, and in the worse days to
come, a great consolation it was to her to kneel in the silent chapel and pour
out her unhappiness to her whose heart had been pierced by seven swords of
sorrow.
Time went by, and when no little angel came from the knees of God to lighten her
burden and to restrain with its small hands the headlong passion of her husband,
the Count was filled with bitterness of spirit as he looked forward to a
childless old age, and reflected that all the fruitful straight of the
Toggenburg, and the valleys and townships, would pass away-to some kinsman, and
no son of his would there be to prolong the memory of his name and greatness.
When this gloomy dread had taken possession of him, he would turn savagely on
the Countess in his fits of fury, and cry aloud: " Out of my sight! For all thy
meekness and thy praying and thy almsgiving God knows it was an ill day when I
set eyes on that fair face of shine! " Yet this was in no way his true thought,
for in spite of his lower nature the Count loved her, but it is ever the curse
of anger in a man that it shall wreak itself most despitefully on his nearest
and best. And Itha, who had learned this in the school of longsuffering,
answered never a word, but only prayed the more constantly and imploringly.
In the train of the Countess there were two pages Dominic, an Italian, whom she
misliked for his vanity and boldness, and Cuno, a comely Swabian lad, who had
followed her from her father's house. Most frequently when she went to Our Lady
in the Meadow she dismissed Dominic and bade Cuno attend her, for in her
distress it was some crumb of comfort to see the face of a fellow countryman,
and to speak to him of Kirchberg and the dear land she had left. But Dominic,
seeing that the Swabian was preferred, hated Cuno, and bore the lady scant
goodwill, and in a little set his brain to some device by which he might vent
his malice on both. This was no difficult task for the Count was as prone to
jealousy as he was quick to wrath, and with crafty hint and wily jest and
seemingly aimless chatter the Italian sowed the seeds of suspicion and
watchfulness in his master's mind consider, then, if these were not days of
heartbreak for this lady, still so young and so beautiful, so unlovingly
treated, and so far away from the home of her happy childhood. Yet she bore all
patiently and without complaint or murmur, only at times when she looked from
terrace or tower her gaze travelled beyond the deep pine woods, and in a wistful
day dream she retraced, beyond the great lake and the Black Forest, all the long
way she had ridden so joyfully with her dear husband by her side. One day in the
springtime, when the birds of passage had flown northward, carrying her tears
and kisses with them, she bethought her of the rich apparel in which she had
been wed, and took it from the carved oaken coffer to sweeten in the sun. Among
her jewels she came upon her betrothal ring, and the glitter of it reminded her
of what her lord had said of its enchantment and the strange. stories told of
it. " Are any of them so sad and strange as mine ~ " she wondered with tears in
her eyes; then kissing the ring in memory of that first kiss she had given it,
she laid it on a table in the wind was at bay, and busied herself with the
bridal finery; and while she was so busied she was called away to some cares of
her household, and left the chamber.
When she returned to put away her marriage treasures, the betrothal ring was
missing. On the instant a cold fear came over her. In vain she searched the
coffer and the chamber; in vain she endeavored to persuade herself that she must
have mislaid the jewel, or that perchance the Count had seen it, and partly in
jest and partly in rebuke of her carelessness, had taken it. The ring had
vanished, and in spite of herself she felt that its disappearance portended some
terrible evil. Too fearful to arouse her husband's anger, she breathed no word
of her loss, and trusted to time or oblivion for a remedy.
The Countess Itha while after this, as the Swabian page was rambling in the wood
near the convent, he heard a great outcry of ravens around a nest in an ancient
firtree, and prompted partly by curiosity to know the cause of the disquiet, and
partly by the wish to have a young raven for sport in the winter evenings, he
climbed up to the nest. Looking into the great matted pack of twigs, feather and
lamb's wool, he caught sight of a gold ring curiously chased and set with
sparkling gems; and slipping it gleefully on his finger he descended the tree
and went his way homeward to the castle.
A few days later when the Count by chance cast his eye on the jewel, he
recognized it at a glance for the enchanted ring of many strange stories. The
crafty lies of the Italian Dominic flashed upon him; and, never questioning that
the Countess had given the ring to her favorite, he sprang upon Cuno as though
he would strangle him. Then in a moment he flung him aside, and in a voice of
thunder cried for the wildest steed in his stables to be brought forth.
Paralysed with fright, the luckless page was seized and bound by the heels to
the tail of the half-tame creature, which was led out beyond the drawbridge, and
pricked with daggers until it flung off the men at arms and dashed screaming
down the rocky ascent into the wildwood.
Stung to madness by his jealousy, the Count rushed to the apartment of the
Countess. " False and faithless, false and faithless! " he cried in hoarse rage,
and clutching her in his iron grasp, lifted her in the air and hurled her
through the casement into the horrible abyss below.
As she fell Itha commended her soul to God. The world seemed to reel and swim
around her; she felt as if that long lapse through space would never have an
end, and then it appeared to her as though she were peacefully musing in her
chair, and she saw the castle of Kirchberg and the pleasant fields lying serene
in the sunlight, and the happy villages, each with its great crucifix beside its
rustic church, and men and women at labour in the fields. How long that vision
lasted she could not tell.
Then as in her fall she was passing through the tops of the trees which climbed
up the lower ledges of the castle rocks, green leafy hands caught her dress and
held her a little, and strong arms closed about her, and yielded slowly till she
touched the ground; and she knew that the touch of these was not the mere touch
of senseless things, but a contact of sweetness and power which thrilled through
her whole being. Falling on her knees, she thanked God for her escape, and
rising again she went into the forest, wondering whither she should betake
herself and what she should do; for now she had no husband and no home. She left
the beaten track, and plunging through the bracken, walked on till she was
tired. Then she sat down on a boulder. Among the pines it was already dusk, and
the air seemed filled with a gray mist, but this was caused by the innumerable
dry wiry twigs which fringed the lower branches of the trees with webs of fine
cordage; and when a ray of the setting sun struck through the pine trunks, it
lit up the bracken with emerald and brightened the ruddy scales of the pine bark
to red gold. Here it was dry and sheltered, with the thick carpet of
pine-needles -underfoot and the thick roof of branches overhead: and but for
dread of wild creatures she thought she might well pass the night in this place.
To-morrow she would wander further and learn how life might be sustained in the
forest.
The last ray of sunshine died away; the deep woods began to blacken; a cool air
sighed in the high tops of the trees. It was very homeless and lonely. She took
heart, however, remembering God's goodness to her, and placing her confidence in
His care.
The Countess Itha Suddenly she perceived a glimmering of lights among the pines.
Torches they seemed, a long way off; and she thought it must be the retainers of
the Count, who, finding she had not been killed by her fall, had sent them out
to seek for her. The lights drew nearer, and she sat very still, resigned to her
fate whatsoever it might be. And yet nearer they came, till at length by their
shining she saw a great stag with lordly antlers, and on the tines of the
antlers glittered tongues of flame.
Slowly the beautiful creature came up to her and regarded her with his large
soft brown eyes. Then he moved away a little and looked back, as though he were
bidding her follow him. She rose and walked by his side, and he led her far
through the forest, till they came to an overhanging rock beside a brook, and
there he stopped.
In this hidden nook of the mountain forest she made her home. With branches and
stones and turf she walled in the open hollow of the rock. In marshy places she
gathered the thick spongy mosses, yellow and red, and dried them in the sun for
warmth at night in the cold weather. She lived on roots and berries, acorns and
nuts and wild fruit, and these in their time of plenty she stored against the
winter. Birds' eggs she found in the spring; in due season the hinds, with their
young, came to her and gave her milk for many days; the wild bees provided her
with honey. With slow and painful toil she wove the cotton grass and the fibers
of the bark of the birch, so that she should not lack for clothing.
In the warm summer months there was a great tranquility and hushed joy in this
hard life. A tender magic breathed in the color and music of the forest, in its
long pauses of windless daydreaming, in its breezy frolic with the sunshine. The
trees and boulders were kindly; and the turf reminded her of her mother's bosom.
About her refuge the wild flowers grew in plenty primrose and blue gentian,
yellow cinquefoil and pink geranium, and forget me knots, and many more, and
these looked up at her with the happy faces of little children who were innocent
and knew no care; and over whole acres lay the bloom of the ring, and nothing
more lovely grows on earthly hills. Through breaks in the woodland she saw afar
the Alpine heights, and the bright visionary peaks of snow floating in the blue
air like glimpses of heaven.
But it was a bitter life in the wintertide, when the forest fretted and moaned,
and snow drifted about the shelter, and the rocks were jagged with icicles, and
the stones of the brook were glazed with cold, and the dark came soon and lasted
long. She had no fire, but, by God's good providence, in this cruel season the
great stag came to her at dusk, and couched in the hollow of the rock beside
her, and the lights on his antlers lit up the poor house, and the glow of his
body and his pleasant breath gave her warmth.
Here, then, dead to the world, dead to all she 1oved most dearly, Itha
consecrated herself body and soul to God for the rest of her earthly years. If
she suffered as the wild children of nature suffer, she was free at least from
the cares and sorrows with which men embitter each other's existence. Here she
would willingly live so long as God willed; here she would gladly surrender her
soul when He was pleased to call it home.
The days of her exile were many. For seventeen years
The Countess Itha she dwelt thus in her hermitage in the forest, alone and
forgotten.
Forgotten, did I say ? Not wholly. The Count never forgot her. Stung by remorse
(for in his heart of hearts he could not but believe her true and innocent),
haunted by the recollection of the happiness he had flung from him, wifeless,
childless, friendless, he could find no rest or forgetfulness except in the
excitement and peril of the battlefield. But the slaughter of men and the glory
of victory were as dust and ashes in his mouth. He had lost the joy of life, the
pride of race, the exultation of power. For one look from those sweet eyes, over
which, doubtless, the hands of some grateful peasant had laid the earth, he
would have joyfully exchanged renown and lordship, and even life itself.
At length in the fullness of God's good time, it chanced that the Count was
hunting in a distant part of the forest when he started from its covert a
splendid stag. Away through the open the beautiful creature seemed to float
before him, and Heinrich followed in hot chase. Across grassy clearings and
through dim vistas of pines, over brooks and among boulders and through close
under wood, the fleet quarry led him without stop or stay, till at last it
reached the hanging rock which was Itha's cell, and there it stood at bay; and
alarmed by the clatter of hoofs, a tall pale woman, rudely clad in her poor
forest garb, came to the entrance.
Surprised at so strange a sight, the Count drew rein and stared at the woman.
Despite the lapse of time and her pallor and emaciation, in an instant he
recognized
The Countess Itha , the wife whom he believed dead, and she too recognized the
husband she had loved.
How shall I tell of all that was said between those two by that lonely hermitage
in the depth of the forest? As in the old days, she was eager to forgive
everything; but it was in vain that the Count besought her to return to the life
which she had forgotten for so many years. Long had she been dead and buried, so
far as earthly things were concerned. She would prefer, despite the hardness and
the pain, to spend in this peaceful spot what time was yet allotted to her, but
that she longed once more to hear the music of the holy bells, to kneel once
more before the altar of God.
What plea could Heinrich use to shake her resolution? His shame and remorse,
even his love, held him tongue ied. He saw that she was no longer the meek
gentle Swabian maiden who had shrunk and wept at every hasty word and sharp
glance of his. He had slain all human love in her; nothing survived save that
large charity of the Saints which binds them to all suffering souls on the
earth.
Woefully, he consented to her one wish. A simple cell was prepared for her in
the wood beside the chapel of Our Lady in the Meadow, and there she dwelt until,
in a little while, her gentle spirit was called home.