"But don't you know better? A judge has no business to spare anybody, except the innocent; his duty is to see justice done--he has nothing to do with mercy."

"Nothing to do with mercy! O Meredith!"

"Not as a judge. He is put in his place to see the laws executed."

"Then you think that dreadful old heathen you are reading about did _right_ to have his friends' heads struck off?"

"I think he did just his duty."

"Oh, _do_ you, Ditto?" cried Maggie.

"He did not make the law, Maggie; he had only to see it obeyed. The law was terribly severe; but I think the judge was very tender."

"O Ditto!"

"He was what you call a true man. He was no heathen, Flora. But nothing would make him budge from the right. I think he was magnificent. I wonder how many men could be found nowadays who would be faithful to duty at such a cost."

"You have strange notions of duty!" said his sister.

"I am afraid you have imperfect notions of faithfulness."

"Well, go on. I have no opinion of religion that is not kind."

"The religion that is from above 'is _first_ pure, then peaceable,'"

said Meredith.

"Go on," said Flora. "I suppose you would cut my head off, if you were judge, and I had done something you thought deserved it."

"If the law said you deserved it. But I think I would give my head in that case for yours, Flora. It would be easier."

"What good would that do?"

"Keep the law unbroken and save you. Well, I will go on with my story--

"'When the sitting of the court was ended he sent his retinue to find quarters in the other six of his manors, but he himself pa.s.sed the night at the princ.i.p.al manor-house on the Oerze, which he had himself built, called the _Bondenhof_, that is, the "peasant's manor;" for in old Saxon _Bond_ meant a free peasant. But what a night that was! Sleep never came to his eyes; he pa.s.sed that night and also the following day in praying and fasting. When at last, by the Word of G.o.d and the talk of a faithful priest he had got some comfort, at least a little, he vowed to the Lord that he would build a church on this manor, the "Bondenhof," which should be dedicated to the apostles Peter and Paul, like the first one built by his forefathers at the Deep Moor, which in the course of time had become far too small. And as with him to resolve and to do were always the same thing, he did not quit the manor till he had laid the foundation-stone of the new church and given order to have the building vigorously carried forward. That was in the year 958.

"'By this deed of rigid, impartial justice, which nevertheless was found in beautiful harmony with a tender and good heart, the honour in which people held him was raised to such a point, that everywhere they carried him on their hands, and at his return to the royal court he was received with wondering admiration. The great Otto folded him in his arms and called him his most faithful knight, who served his G.o.d and his king with equal fidelity.

"'Soon thereafter followed Hermann's greatest elevation. Otto had determined, you must know, in the year 960, to take a journey into Italy, in order to compose certain troubles which had arisen through the G.o.dless Pope John. But now his beloved Saxon country, out of which Otto himself drew his origin, lay just in the north of Germany; and was bordered on the north and north-east by the Danes and Sclaves, but recently conquered, who indeed were in part nominally Christian, but in part were still heathen, and the whole of them haters of Christianity.

Who would take care of Christian Saxony in the king's absence, which it was possible might last for years? Then Otto's eye fell upon the faithful Hermann, and he had found his man. Hermann was appointed to the dukedom of Saxony, so that he might thus supply the king's place and govern in his stead. When this was made known to the good Archbishop Adaldag, who was to accompany the king in his journey to Rome, he rejoiced aloud, and said to the king, "Now we can travel in peace and have no care; for, O king, you can trust him with the land, and I can trust him with my church; Hermann with G.o.d's help will protect church and land both." And that is what the faithful man truly did. In the following year the king really set out on his journey to Rome, and Adaldag went with him. Otto set up a stern tribunal in Rome, deposed the G.o.dless Pope John, and made good Leo Pope. Five years Otto spent in Italy, and wherever he came he wrought righteousness and judgment, punished the wicked and relieved the innocent and oppressed; being such a prince as Germany has had few. In the year 962 Otto was solemnly crowned kaiser by Leo at Rome, and thus acknowledged as the earthly head of the whole Christian world. During all this time, the Saxons might count themselves happy that they had such a true and valiant duke in Hermann. The Sclaves ventured again to make a marauding incursion, probably to try whether in Otto's absence they could not accomplish something. One tribe of the great Sclavic race, namely, the Wends, dwelt not on the other side of Elbe only, but also on this side, as far as the neighbourhood of Melzen. These Wends, on the hither side of the Elbe, reinforced by a strong party of their brethren from beyond the river, undertook a campaign against Saxony; for they themselves were still heathen and therefore had a hatred against the Christians. This hatred was all the stronger because the Saxons under Otto had vanquished them.

In this campaign, so far as they went, they burnt and laid waste everything, and in especial their aim was directed against the churches and chapels and Christian priests; the former were burned and levelled with the ground, the latter were put to death in tortures. So it befell with that first church which Landolf had built at the Deep Moor; it was burned down and entirely destroyed. Eight priests, who served this church and the chapels lying in the neighbourhood, were slain, part of them at once, part of them were dragged to the Wendish idol altar in Radegast, not far from the Elbe, and there slaughtered in honour of the heathen G.o.d; those chapels were likewise destroyed. Hermann was just come to Bremen when this news reached him. He rapidly gathered his warriors, came suddenly upon the robbing and plundering Wends at the so-called Huhnenburg, obliged them to flee with great loss, and pursued them without stay or respite into their own country; whereupon they sued for peace, and promised they would keep quiet and accept the Christian religion. He granted them peace, but went on to destroy their idol temple in Radegast, and then returned in triumph home. He next applied his whole energy to repair the destruction which had been wrought, to rebuild the churches and chapels, and establish priests in them. And the better to secure the land, and especially his own beloved inheritance, against the like predatory incursions, he built strong fortresses, as, for instance, the Hermannsburg' (_burg_ means a castle or fortress, Maggie), 'the Hermannsburg, around which now the people began to build again, who had fled away before the Wends; the Oerzenburg, the Wiezenburg, &c.'"

"Then _that_ is how so many names have come to end with 'burg,'" said Esther.

"Hermann did not build all the castles," said Meredith, "But yes--that is very much how it has come. In those old Middle Ages, when the right of the strongest was the only prevailing one, naturally there were a great many castles built. Indeed all the n.o.bles lived in castles, and must. Just look at the pictures of the Rhine to see what the Middle Ages were; see how the people had to perch their fortresses up on almost inaccessible peaks of rock, where it must have been terribly inconvenient to live, one would think. I suppose people knew little of what we call _conveniences_ in these days."

"Then round the princ.i.p.al fortresses, naturally, the villages grew up,"

said Flora. "They would cl.u.s.ter round the castles for protection."

"Well, I never thought before that one could see the Middle Ages through the stereoscope," said Maggie.

"Pretty fair," said Meredith. "Well, let us go on with Hermann. 'Through his unintermitting activity all was soon in blooming condition again, and no enemy dared to show himself any more. Before his end in the year 972, he had the joy of seeing the church, the foundation-stone of which he had laid at the Bondenhof, consecrated on Peter and Paul's day. That is this same church which is still standing in Hermannsburg, and in which we hold divine service.'"

"O Ditto! is _that_ church standing yet that Hermann built?"

"And the very foundation-stone that Hermann laid is there to this day.

I'd like to see it! We have nothing old in this country. Imagine attending a church that has stood for nine hundred years! He endowed this church with a tenth, and gave almost the half of the fields and meadows of the above-named manor to the Hermannsburger pastor.

"'Of his remaining great deeds our chronicle says little; which is natural, as it is and proposes to be only a Hermannsburg chronicle. In the year 973, the same year that his great friend and benefactor Otto died, died also Hermann Billing, the freeman's son who had come to be Duke of Saxony. About his end the chronicle relates only that he was sick but a few days; that he wished for and received the Holy Supper before his death; admonished his son Benno, or Bernhard, who was his heir: "My son, be true to your G.o.d and your kaiser, a protector to the Church, and a father to your va.s.sals;" laid his hands upon his head and blessed him; and then extended his hand to all his weeping servants who were a.s.sembled, commended them to the grace of G.o.d; and at last prayed--"Into Thy hands I commend my spirit; Thou hast redeemed me, Lord G.o.d of hosts." Then he softly fell asleep, and the same wonderful sweetness which in life had given such a charm to his face, in death put a very glory around his brow.

"'King Otto the second honoured the true man's memory by confirming his son Bernhard, or Benno, as Duke of Saxony.'"

CHAPTER VII.

"Is that all?" said Maggie.

"All in this place, about Hermann Billing."

"I like him very much!" said Maggie drawing a deep sigh.

"Notwithstanding he was such an incorruptible judge!"

"Notwithstanding he was such a hard, cruel man, you should say," said Flora. "Ditto, you are ridiculous!"

"It is a great mistake, you must remember, to judge a man of one time by the lights or laws of another."

"There's a law of nature," said Flora, "in _some_ people, which makes them dislike to kill their relations."

"There is a higher law than the law of nature. Nature did not prevent Abraham from making preparations to offer up Isaac. It did not hinder Moses"----

"I do not know what unnatural thing Moses did," said Flora; "but I confess to you, I think Abraham acted much more like a heathen than like a Christian in that event of his life."

"Which only shows, that if you had been in his place you would have failed to manifest Abraham's faith, and so would have entirely missed Abraham's blessing. 'Because thou hast done this thing, saith the Lord, and hast not withheld thy son, thine only son;' then the Lord went on to heap blessing upon him."

"I don't see how Abraham could do it."

"Because he trusted G.o.d. It is not _trust_, Flo, that will not go any further than it sees why."

"Ditto, what are you going to read next?" said Maggie.

"We'll see. Next thing, I think, will be the description Pastor Harms gives of that old church which Hermann Billing built; Hermann the duke, I mean. Don't you want to hear it?"

"Oh, yes. The description of it as it is now?"

"As it is now. But what a wonderful sort of a church is this we are in!"