By Peter
Rossegger, from unpublished journal entries for Geschichten aus der
Steiermark (Tales from Styria), 1871
St. Kristoff
is approached by minor roads. It was on one of those roads little wider
than a cow-path, one of the many byroads known locally as a Wildererweg
or poacher’s path, that I came down off the mountains one evening
many years ago. It being late, I beheld the last remnants of the dying
sunset over the crags and forests above the village as the darkness
descended, but not before I perceived the splendid views of an innumerable
multitude of hills to the southeast.
It is a
farming village and its people retire early. But as I plodded up one
of the narrow lanes that leads to its church, I heard voices within,
and soon the tones of an organ. The sound of that instrument has from
childhood filled me with a strange mixture of mirth and foreboding,
and that night this sensation descended upon me again as though the
decades of living in our cities had vanished, and I was a child again
listening.
It was
expertly played, and the old hymns that had sounded here for centuries
floated out on the night air to me. Soon they were joined by voices,
both men’s and women’s, and I passed a strange and not unhappy
half-hour. Around me was the sweet scent of woodsmoke from houses unseen,
and the smell of the earth with its autumnal exhalations. I fell into
a reverie, where the events of the long day arranged themselves alongside
tender thoughts of my wife and little ones awaiting me back in Vienna.
Such were the exertions of the day in these mountains as wild and remote
as any on the continent, that in a matter of minutes I passed from reverie
to sleep there on the grassy bank below the church.
It was
with a violent fright that I awoke not long after, and in the manner
of a primitive ancestor awakening in terror at the cave-mouth where
he stood guard over his clan, I was on my feet before being quite awake.
I was not alone, and for several of the longest moments of my life I
remained in that world of the Grimms where the woods are ever deep,
and they harbour fantastic beings. In front of me was a monster, I thought,
with huge shoulders and horns askew. Is this even the great Wotan, I
wondered, that ravening god that has been with us Germanic folk since
we became a people.
The monster
spoke.
“Good
night,” it said, in an accent that would be studied amongst my
colleagues at the University as though its owner had descended from
another planet.
“Good
night,” I believe I replied.
The dark
shape of the monster began to yield some form. Soon I saw that this
was one of my own, a human, a hunter, who had brought in a young deer
on his shoulders. But it came to me that he was in all likelihood less
a hunter than he was a poacher. It is long a custom here for those facing
hardship to enter the forest and take a deer without the permit of any
of the local nobility or the rich who own the rights here. This, along
with the custom of mountain treks that last for days and even weeks
by men who must feed their families, walks that neither know no respect
the lines drawn on the bright maps our little ones learn in their schoolrooms.
“You
are a hunter,” I offered then.
To this
he made no reply or gesture.
“I
was passing the church and heard the music,” I said. “I
must have dozed off.”
At this,
the monster nodded and shifted his load. I saw that he had a rifle on
his back. I began to wonder, and then to marvel, at how this man could
have hefted this not inconsiderable load home from the forest.
“You
are a traveller,” he said.
“That
I am.”
“Everyone
is a traveller,” he said. “On God’s earth.”
I thought
to ask him what he might mean by this but something in this man’s
demeanour, or perhaps his way of speaking, told me that would be an
impertinence.
“You
are late in from the woods,” I said instead.
“That's
how it is,” he said. “One must wait for the right time.”
Seeing
that the monster was but a man, and that he was in all likelihood a
villager here, I was emboldened to try a little mischief.
“You
are not afraid of the spirits in the forest?”
“The
spirits?” he said after several moments. “Which would they
be?”
“The
ones we hear of, ones in the old tales. Perhaps you don't believe in
them then?”
“That
hardly matters,” he said after a moment. “They are there
all the same.”
This silenced
me, and to this day, I do not know why his sparing words should have
had such an effect. I knew immediately that he was not being mischievous
with his words, and it galled me that I had no words to address him
further on this, so strange was his pronouncement.
Perhaps
it was the air of the mountains, or the long day’s hiking in the
woods and over moors and valleys, but the words did not come. He then
asked me if I were looking for a place that I might have an evening
meal. I was indeed, I told him, and a simple Gasthaus where I could
spend the night. He directed me to one, and we then parted.
I retired
that evening after a hearty meal, full sure that my sleep that evening
would be the soundest sleep possible, and perhaps the only dreams would
be those of the skies and trees, and the bright sun that had guided
me all day. Instead I passed several hours pondering our meeting, this
hunter and I, and I resolved to tell my colleagues of this man who seemed
to live a life no different than one of centuries past. How is it possible,
I wondered, that a man in the age of telegraphs and trains can believe
as he did?
We all
have our trove of stories, do we not, of bijou events and ‘characters’
that we collect and later relate, to show the rich variety of our world
and society? The retelling so often makes our pleasure keener, we believe,
especially if they raise a smile or a laugh, and such tales as we collect
and retail serve to make us more sociable and to enhance our own public
selves while they make those occasions more entertaining.
But now,
all these years later, I cannot conceal from others how I have tired
of those coffeehouses and dinners, those lectures and conferences. For
all the learning of my colleagues and friends, I find my thoughts returning
to that small village of St. Kristoff, high up on that hill, with the
forest around it, so remote from the bustle of life here. I returned
to the village several times over the years, and it had altered not
a whit. Yet I have never been visited by any desire to inquire for my
hunter there. For a time, I half-believed that I had not met him at
all, but that he had come out of my dream. I still remain undecided
on the matter.
I told
no one of my meeting that evening so long ago, but committed it here
to this journal instead, to consider its meaning yet again.