介绍:
People said "The Evening Bell is sounding, the sun is setting." For a strangewondrous tone was heard in the narrow streets of a large town. It was like thesound of a church-bell: but it was only heard for a moment, for the rolling ofthe carriages and the voices of the multitude made too great a noise.
Those persons who were walking outside the town, where the houses were fartherapart, with gardens or little fields between them, could see the evening skystill better, and heard the sound of the bell much more distinctly. It was asif the tones came from a church in the still forest; people lookedthitherward, and felt their minds attuned most solemnly.
A long time passed, and people said to each other--"I wonder if there is achurch out in the wood? The bell has a tone that is wondrous sweet; let usstroll thither, and examine the matter nearer." And the rich people drove out,and the poor walked, but the way seemed strangely long to them; and when theycame to a clump of willows which grew on the skirts of the forest, they satdown, and looked up at the long branches, and fancied they were now in thedepth of the green wood. The confectioner of the town came out, and set up his
booth there; and soon after came another confectioner, who hung a bell overhis stand, as a sign or ornament, but it had no clapper, and it was tarredover to preserve it from the rain. When all the people returned home, theysaid it had been very romantic, and that it was quite a different sort ofthing to a pic-nic or tea-party. There were three persons who asserted theyhad penetrated to the end of the forest, and that they had always heard thewonderful sounds of the bell, but it had seemed to them as if it had come fromthe town. One wrote a whole poem about it, and said the bell sounded like thevoice of a mother to a good dear child, and that no melody was sweeter thanthe tones of the bell. The king of the country was also observant of it, and
vowed that he who could discover whence the sounds proceeded, should have thetitle of "Universal Bell-ringer," even if it were not really a bell.
Many persons now went to the wood, for the sake of getting the place, but oneonly returned with a sort of explanation; for nobody went far enough, that onenot further than the others. However, he said that the sound proceeded from avery large owl, in a hollow tree; a sort of learned owl, that continually
knocked its head against the branches. But whether the sound came fromhis head or from the hollow tree, that no one could say with certainty. So nowhe got the place of "Universal Bell-ringer," and wrote yearly a short treatise"On the Owl"; but everybody was just as wise as before.
It was the day of confirmation. The clergyman had spoken so touchingly, thechildren who were confirmed had been greatly moved; it was an eventful day forthem; from children they become all at once grown-up-persons; it was as iftheir infant souls were now to fly all at once into persons with moreunderstanding. The sun was shining gloriously; the children that had beenconfirmed went out of the town; and from the wood was borne towards them thesounds of the unknown bell with wonderful distinctness. They all immediately
felt a wish to go thither; all except three. One of them had to go home to tryon a ball-dress; for it was just the dress and the ball which had caused herto be confirmed this time, for otherwise she would not have come; the otherwas a poor boy, who had borrowed his coat and boots to be confirmed in fromthe innkeeper&`&s son, and he was to give them back by a certain hour; the thirdsaid that he never went to a strange place if his parents were not withhim--that he had always been a good boy hitherto, and would still be so now
that he was confirmed, and that one ought not to laugh at him for it: theothers, however, did make fun of him, after all.
There were three, therefore, that did not go; the others hastened on. The sunshone, the birds sang, and the children sang too, and each held the other bythe hand; for as yet they had none of them any high office, and were all ofequal rank in the eye of God.
But two of the youngest soon grew tired, and both returned to town; two littlegirls sat down, and twined garlands, so they did not go either; and when theothers reached the willow-tree, where the confectioner was, they said, "Now weare there! In reality the bell does not exist; it is only a fancy that peoplehave taken into their heads!"
At the same moment the bell sounded deep in the wood, so clear and solemnlythat five or six determined to penetrate somewhat further. It was so thick,and the foliage so dense, that it was quite fatiguing to proceed. Woodroof andanemonies grew almost too high; blooming convolvuluses and blackberry-bushes
hung in long garlands from tree to tree, where the nightingale sang and thesunbeams were playing: it was very beautiful, but it was no place for girls togo; their clothes would get so torn. Large blocks of stone lay there,overgrown with moss of every color; the fresh spring bubbled forth, and made astrange gurgling sound.
"That surely cannot be the bell," said one of the children, lying down andlistening. "This must be looked to." So he remained, and let the others go onwithout him.
They afterwards came to a little house, made of branches and the bark oftrees; a large wild apple-tree bent over it, as if it would shower down allits blessings on the roof, where roses were blooming. The long stems twinedround the gable, on which there hung a small bell.
Was it that which people had heard? Yes, everybody was unanimous on thesubject, except one, who said that the bell was too small and too fine to beheard at so great a distance, and besides it was very different tones to thosethat could move a human heart in such a manner. It was a king`s son who spoke;whereon the others said, "Such people always want to be wiser than everybodyelse."
They now let him go on alone; and as he went, his breast was filled more andmore with the forest solitude; but he still heard the little bell with whichthe others were so satisfied, and now and then, when the wind blew, he couldalso hear the people singing who were sitting at tea where the confectionerhad his tent; but the deep sound of the bell rose louder; it was almost as ifan organ were accompanying it, and the tones came from the left hand, the sidewhere the heart is placed. A rustling was heard in the bushes, and a littleboy stood before the King`s Son, a boy in wooden shoes, and with so short ajacket that one could see what long wrists he had. Both knew each other: theboy was that one among the children who could not come because he had to gohome and return his jacket and boots to the innkeeper`s son. This he had done,and was now going on in wooden shoes and in his humble dress, for the bellsounded with so deep a tone, and with such strange power, that proceed hemust.
"Why, then, we can go together," said the King&`&s Son. But the poor child thathad been confirmed was quite ashamed; he looked at his wooden shoes, pulled atthe short sleeves of his jacket, and said that he was afraid he could not walkso fast; besides, he thought that the bell must be looked for to the right;for that was the place where all sorts of beautiful things were to be found.
"But there we shall not meet," said the King&`&s Son, nodding at the same timeto the poor boy, who went into the darkest, thickest part of the wood, wherethorns tore his humble dress, and scratched his face and hands and feet tillthey bled. The King&`&s Son got some scratches too; but the sun shone on his
path, and it is him that we will follow, for he was an excellent and resoluteyouth.
"I must and will find the bell," said he, "even if I am obliged to go to theend of the world."
The ugly apes sat upon the trees, and grinned. "Shall we thrash him?" saidthey. "Shall we thrash him? He is the son of a king!"
But on he went, without being disheartened, deeper and deeper into the wood,where the most wonderful flowers were growing. There stood white lilies withblood-red stamina, skyblue tulips, which shone as they waved in the winds, andapple-trees, the apples of which looked exactly like large soapbubbles: so
only think how the trees must have sparkled in the sunshine! Around the nicestgreen meads, where the deer were playing in the grass, grew magnificent oaksand beeches; and if the bark of one of the trees was cracked, there grass andlong creeping plants grew in the crevices. And there were large calm lakes
there too, in which white swans were swimming, and beat the air with theirwings. The King&`&s Son often stood still and listened. He thought the bellsounded from the depths of these still lakes; but then he remarked again thatthe tone proceeded not from there, but farther off, from out the depths of the
forest.
The sun now set: the atmosphere glowed like fire. It was still in the woods,so very still; and he fell on his knees, sung his evening hymn, and said: "Icannot find what I seek; the sun is going down, and night is coming--the dark,dark night. Yet perhaps I may be able once more to see the round red sunbefore he entirely disappears. I will climb up yonder rock."
And he seized hold of the creeping-plants, and the roots of trees--climbed upthe moist stones where the water-snakes were writhing and the toads werecroaking--and he gained the summit before the sun had quite gone down. Howmagnificent was the sight from this height! The sea--the great, the glorioussea, that dashed its long waves against the coast--was stretched out beforehim. And yonder, where sea and sky meet, stood the sun, like a large shiningaltar, all melted together in the most glowing colors. And the wood and the
sea sang a song of rejoicing, and his heart sang with the rest: all nature wasa vast holy church, in which the trees and the buoyant clouds were thepillars, flowers and grass the velvet carpeting, and heaven itself the largecupola. The red colors above faded away as the sun vanished, but a millionstars were lighted, a million lamps shone; and the King&`&s Son spread out hisarms towards heaven, and wood, and sea; when at the same moment, coming by apath to the right, appeared, in his wooden shoes and jacket, the poor boy who
had been confirmed with him. He had followed his own path, and had reached thespot just as soon as the son of the king had done. They ran towards eachother, and stood together hand in hand in the vast church of nature and ofpoetry, while over them sounded the invisible holy bell: blessed spiritsfloated around them, and lifted up their voices in a rejoicing hallelujah!
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