Page:Select Popular Tales from the German of Musaeus.djvu/131

Rh the distance; but the maiden adorned herself modestly, dressed in the colour of innocence; and when she heard the trampling of horses, she flew to her mother, and received her respectfully, and with open arms. At the first glance, the Countess perceived that the maiden was seven times handsomer than the copy, which she had seen in the mirror, and withal discreet, gentle, and intelligent. This oppressed her envious heart; but the serpent concealed her viper’s poison deep in her bosom, talked hypocritically with her, complained of the hard-hearted father, who, all the time that he lived, had refused her the pleasing sight of the maiden, and promised, for the future, to embrace her with a mother’s love. Soon the seven little dwarfs prepared the table, and spread a lordly repast. For dessert, the superintendent placed before them the most costly fruits out of the garden. Richilda tasted them, found them not sufficiently pleasant, and asked her servants for a pomegranate, with which, as she said, she was accustomed to end each meal. The servants immediately handed it her on a silver waiter; she cut it up neatly, and begged the beautiful Blanche to take half as a token of her kind disposition towards her. As soon as the pomegranate was eaten, the mother, with her attendants, set off, and rode home. Soon after their departure, the maiden had a pain at her heart, her rosy cheeks faded, all the limbs of her tender body shook, all her nerves were convulsed, her lovely eyes grew dim, and at last slumbered in the sleep of death.

Ah! what sorrow and heart-grief arose within the walls of the palace at the death of the beautiful Blanche, who was plucked like a hundred-leaved rose, by a thievish hand, in its most beautiful bloom, because it was the ornament of the garden. The fat duenna shed torrents of tears, like a swelled sponge, which, by a hard squeeze, gives out its hidden moisture all at once. But the ingenious dwarfs prepared for her a wooden coffin with silver plates and handles, and, that they might not at once be robbed of the sight of their beloved mistress, they made a glass window to it; the servants prepared a shroud of the finest Brabant linen, wrapped the corpse up in it, put the maiden’s crown, and a wreath of fresh myrtle on her head, and carried the coffin, with much sorrow, into the chapel of the castle, where father Messner performed the requiem, and the little bell tolled the mournful funeral knell, from morning till midnight.

In the mean time Lady Richilda, well pleased, reached her home. The first thing she did was to repeat her question to the mirror, and nimbly she drew back the curtain. With inward joy, and a look of triumph, she again saw her own image reflected; but on the metallic surface, great marks of rust, the plague-spots of sin, were here and there to be seen, which disfigured the clear polish as much as smallpox scars do a young lady’s face. “What a pity!” thought the Countess to herself; “it is better it should happen to the mirror than to my skin; it is still useful, and has